The Bluest Eye

Synopsis:Nine-year-old Claudia lives with her parents and her ten-year-old sister. In her nine-year-old narrative, she remembers Pecola who was placed with them by child care services. Pecola, who becomes a woman from a ten-year-old girl while she lives with them. Pecola's life with her family is shown next, where her brand of life makes her wish that she had the bluest eye thinking that it may have made her more loveable and more acceptable. But life is not that simple, as there are more hardships in the life of that little girl with unimaginable consequences.Review:This is my second Morrison and it doesn't get any easier. But in this case, the first book written by her, the difficult thing was to read it without it devastating me. There's this sense of impending doom even with the little bit of innocence that there is.This one starts with a description of a family, in the midst of war and depression in the 1940s, and its way of narration reminded me of this (which seems quite silly now) children's song in Hindi - Aao Milo Seelo Saalo. We used to clap animatedly, after pairing up with another person, while reciting the rhyme in a complete sing-song voice. Of course, this is a story narrated by a nine-year-old child which at once drips with innocence while carrying a vat of pain. The beginning itself will numb you because it's evident that this story is going to be full of agony. But it is equally interesting to note how such a complex, 'grown-up' story was narrated in part by such a young child. Especially when we often refuse to believe them to be worldly-wise and aware, to the extent of having banned the book then, in schools and libraries."Jealousy we understood and thought natural – a desire to have what somebody else had; but envy was a strange, new feeling for us."What is beauty? Most of us, in one way or other, can be accused of defining beauty through unnatural standards. I share the blame for being harsh on not only others but myself. And however much we speak about inner beauty is the only thing that matters, some of us also have tried the rub-de-dub once in a while, for that glowing, fairer skin. An unnecessary legacy that resurfaces in almost all the dark-skinned Indian households every once in a while.Was that magical realism when Pecola wished for herself to disappear? How sad I felt for her, even before her major problems began. To be living with constantly feuding parents, to be wishing for death. Either for self or the others. And to feel such an inadequacy that she ended up wanting blue eyes, it was all so heart-breaking."All were engrossed in early-night reminiscences about dreams, figures, premonitions. Their stuffed comfort was narcotic and had produced recollections and fabrications of hallucinations."Pecola's experience with the White Mr Yacobowski reminded me of Untouchable by Mulk Raj Anand. Quite the same premise, where shame at being less than deserving morphs into anger for the inequality that is there in the world. I was astounded at the way Morrison not only wrote about Pecola's inferiority complex of being an African-American in a White community but also inserted internalised racism in the form of a mixed-race girl and how a scale is brought out to measure who is lighter in the skin and prettier than whom.The overbearing – will do what I want to, others (especially women) be damned – men of this story need to be mentioned too. Pecola's father's childhood doesn't let me hate him, while his deeds do not make me like him! This was a female-dominated story, with a major chunk of the characters being female, especially the three prostitutes who are a major part of the story even after them not being one of the central characters. But will I call it a feminist story? I honestly don't know, since this is such a sad story where women don't seem to understand the plight of a young girl, where apart from men, women are also bringing down others of their kind, be it conditioning or judgement."He responded to his father's controlled violence by developing hard habits and a soft imagination."Divided into four parts, each a season, the squalor in which them Black people live is described in stark detail. While it is Pecola's story, the weight of the narration falls on young Claudia's shoulders which she does in the first-person. But, interspersed is Cholly (Charlie) and Polly (Pauline) Breedlove's story in third-person narration. (I wonder as to the significance behind their names?) It is followed by a dialogue at the end, the same dialogue that wrecked me."We looked for eyes creased with concern, but saw only veil."Maybe Sula wasn't it for me since The Bluest Eye hit me right where it hurt. I remember Baishakhi's @thebooklizz Instagram Post where she mentions feeling unsettled after reading a Morrison. That is what I felt too, after reading this one. It made me uncomfortable with its truth.P.S. I read this book as a part of Toni Morrison Book Club by Aayushi @_penandpapers, where we pick up one book by the author every month. This was the February pick.This is also my entry for Prompt 18 of the Reading Women Challenge 2018: A Book by a female Nobel Prize winner.Originally posted on:My Blog @ Shaina's Musings

I want to read everything that Toni Morrison wrote. Starting with this one.

Toni Morrison's - The Bluest EyeRating - 4/5Published in 1970, The Bluest Eye resonates even 50+ years later under circumstances that are unfathomably different.The book tells the story of an ugly young black girl which represents the colour and class conflict of the times. The complexity of inferiority is today determined by factors other than colour but, the idea of feeling inadequate still gnaws silently and at times violently at the skin of the youth.Toni Morrison has hence been able to deliver a story that will be told and shared forever...The Bluest Eye is written in an uncompromising voice and has distasteful sexual imagery that may violate the principles of few. But, having said that one will have to look under the cover and reason with the psychological impact the characters have had in their lives...The book is often innocent and flows with the gentleness of a childhood.A must-read!......

From the starting page till the last, this is a captivating book that really stays with you long after you have read it.

The story the different seasons the portray of stories characters all master chef’s kisses 😘 cannot wait to read more books of Morrisons’ the humanisation of even perpetrators side by side victims and the effects of childhood abuses n traumas on children n es females the character of Pecola Frieda Claudia u want to hug them & adopt them & protect them from this cruel world society n esp males

It didn’t live upto the hype for me. It’s written in a very beautiful language , of course but somehow failed to strike a deep chord within me. I found The Illicit Happiness of Other People , by Manu Joseph far more touching and devastating than this one.

Good one

1993 Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison’s debut novel The Bluest Eyes.Pecola Breedlove, a young protagonist, reflects the numerous people in the world, who often feel themselves to be inferior and often will compare themselves with innumerable other people to define themselves as a total failure. Pecola is a dark complexioned girl and she believes that whiteness is beautiful and that she is ugly. To add insult to injury, her father Cholly Breedlove often drinks, her mother is unattached, and the two of them often scold and beat one another. Pecola’s life turns to be difficult… Cholly Breedlove rapes her daughter Pecola Breedlove and her mother fails to believe her words. Later Cholly does the inhumane act the second time impregnating her. People look at Pecola as a bad omen. Unlike the rest of the neighborhood, the two friends of Pecola, Claudia and Frieda want the baby to live. The young girls sacrifice the money they have been saving for a bicycle and plant marigold seeds. "We had dropped our seeds in our little plot of black dirt just as Pecola's father had dropped his seeds in his own plot of black dirt". They believe that if the flowers live, so will Pecola’s baby. But the flowers refuse to bloom, and Pecola’s baby dies a stillborn. Pecola understands that people hate her and largely this hatred is due to her ugly face. She finds a solution for her trouble. She believes that if she has a pair of blue eyes, she will be loved by every single person and her life will be transformed positively. She goes to a Mystic, who is not a genuine one, asking for a blue pair of eyes. He assures Pecola for the bluest eyes. How Pecola gets the bluest eye fills the latter pages of the novel. Oh…hold your horses. Sorry, the girl doesn’t get in real; only in her mind does she manage to get the bluest eyes. The final pages reveal how she loses her mind and soliloquies to herself thereby gravely making the readers sob.