The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
Genre: Realistic Fiction
Blurb (on back of book): The Bluest Eye is Toni Morrison's first novel, a book heralded for its richness of language and boldness of vision. Set in the author's girlhood hometown of Lorain, Ohio, it tells the story of black, eleven-year-old Pecola Breedlove. Pecola prays for her eyes to turn blue so that she will be as beautiful and beloved as all the blond, blue-eye
d children in America. In the autumn of 1941, the year the marigolds in the Breedloves' garden do not bloom. Pecola's life does change- in painful, devastating ways.
What its vivid evocation of the fear and loneliness at the heart of a child's yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment. The Bluest Eye remains one of Toni Morrisons's most powerful, unforgettable novels- and a significant work of American fiction.
MY OPINION: *****
TW: Rape, domestic abuse, etc -- check trigger warnings before reading this book
I was assigned to read this book for my AP Lit class and while it's not due to be finished until the end of this week, I finished it a week early because I got way too invested in it.
This was my first Toni Morrison. I've always heard great things about her writing but I hadn't gotten around to starting one of her books yet. I'm glad it became a forced-read because although I generally hate all assigned books for school, this on was a clear exception and one that I will have on my favorites shelf for a long time. I personally loved everything about this book, though it was traumatic at times, and think that the insights it carried were beautifully described.
At times, the book could be confusing as it switched through perspectives quite a lot and even traveled back and forth from first-person to third-person. However, I think that the narration style was very unique and made the book stand out in a way that is hard to obtain in literature, especially books written more in the "classics" style.
The book deals with a variety of important themes, from race and racism to physical beauty to feminism and sexism. Set in the 1940s, prior to the Civil Rights Movement, the book follows an eleven-year-old African-American, unfortunately "ugly" girl named Pecola and our main narrator, Claudia. Critics claim that this book is strongly "anti-white," which I personally do not think is true. The book highlights the damaging effects of internalized hatred/sexism/racism and illustrates how the emphasis on "white beauty" and the correlation between whiteness and beauty can damage the mental perception of vulnerable children and foster hatred.
I loved the opening prologue to the book. We get a two-page summary of the entire book but told in a beautiful and haunting style so that it's less cut-and-dry and more metaphorical and allegorical. From the opening pages, we learn about Pecola's unfortunate childhood pregnancy by her father (yes, I had to reread those lines as well), setting the stage for the trauma readers should expect from this book. The book itself tells a story of various characters and storylines that played a role in this final culminating early pregnancy.
The book is actually quite short, considering how much it covers, but despite its length, it manages to explore so many different themes through incredibly powerful prose and ambiguous descriptions. I liked how things were never fully concretely stated and we instead were left questioning how people turned out the way they did or why people did the things they did. The book is intentionally traumatizing and while it wasn't enough to make me cry, it did make me feel like I needed a break from it every now and then just to find some relief from how many horrible things were happening.
Many important topics are highlighted through metaphors, such as the rotting effects of violence through the rotting of a tooth, that I found to be so insightful and powerful that I was in awe that someone had thought up these incredible ways to describe something that seems so simple. Even the commentary on the treatment of doctors towards white pregnant women in contrast to Black pregnant women didn't feel that momentous but in reality was describing an incredibly serious topic.
I loved getting to read the history of various side characters because it helped me to understand them more and brought them to life in a way that a few mentions of "Mrs. Breedlove" didn't. I also thought it was very unique as it is rare that readers get to see a detailed description of the story behind side characters.
I have already checked out a copy of Beloved which I'm very excited to read, since I know Morrison is fairly well-known for that one. Overall, I loved this book and am actually ready to write an essay on it next week without dreading it, like I did for 19*4. I would recommend this book to readers looking for a beautifully-written, insightful novel about race, gender, and what it means to be beautiful.
Main Character: Pecola
Sidekick(s): Claudia, Freida, etc
Villain(s): Racism, sexism, rape, etc
Realistic Fiction Elements: This book was very real to 1940s life.
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