In the book, The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison gets across a very powerful idea that is found in every society today. Although the book is written during the 1940’s and most of the events that occur mirror that time period, the main idea transcends to this day and age. It describes a family full of ugliness, which was assumed to them for no particular reason, “by their conviction”. I’m concretely studying a section from one chapter of this intense story, from pages 28 to 33.
In this section of the novel a short, but yet significant description of the main characters is given. From additional information, I know that Pecola is the innocent and self-hated main character, but doesn’t seem so in this section. What is most intensely described is the continuous fight or arguments between the “drunken” Cholly and “Mrs. Breedlove.” Once again Cholly came home drunk, and Mrs. Breedlove, simply for arguing asked for coal, when she knew she could go herself or get her children to go. After a sneeze, Mrs. Breedlove threw a bucket of fresh water at his husband and then a big fight went along, leaving Cholly “dead” (unconscious) on the floor. “Following this, a description of the way Sammy and Pecola saw these continuous fights in their world. Sammy intends to escape from this threat, and Pecola wants to disappear, and blames it all on her ugliness.
This section, as the whole novel, is writing in third person, and contains deep descriptions of the same story through different points of view. These descriptions are harsh, but yet very direct, for an easier visualization of the characters. The tension is gradually built trough the description of the characters, providing detailed intimate feelings of them. Reading this section we understand each character, as Morrison reveals in a deep manner the most inner thoughts of each character. The language makes this novel even easier to understand and picture, as it conveys the culture of the main characters.
The novel is divided into short sharp sections to provide a more disjointed look towards the story and therefore make the descriptions deeper and drag the reader into a full description with tension, imagery, feelings, thoughts, fights, self-hatred, etc. The paragraphs seem to be divided in the same way, each paragraph to look at what occurs in the different characters. I.e. through Pecola’s eyes or in Sammy’ head. There is a deep irony through the novel contrasting the name “breed love”; and the reality that the family has to face. At the beginning of the section of the novel, a full deep description of the family is given. “They were poor and black”, “crooked noses”; “high cheekbones”, “regular hairlines”, “shapely lips”, but you still couldn’t find the source for their ugliness.
This story concerns many themes, which are still in society today. Pecola wants to have blue eyes, when usually white people only have blue eyes. At the end of the novel Pecola is destroyed due to the aggression around her, she thought her family position was her fault, because of her ugliness. The story in many ways deals with internal and external ugliness, and the way people can believe things if they are confident, “they stayed there because they believed they were ugly”.
At the time this novel was written, black people had a lower status, and this was an influence on the story as the main characters, especially Pecola, want to get rid of this status. There is a strong message sent in this section, not only the pity for the children, but a question to own ideals. Should we really judge people, to the point of not wanting their presence, by the external look? Or should we rather know them interiorly? Where black people depreciated just because of their skin colour, which is only a difference in melanin? The author gets this message across by using a black and poor family as an example, and states how ridiculous this really is, and how the main characters (Pecola, and Sammy) are destroyed by what is around them.
From what I have read of the novel, I think that it is a sophisticated story that deals with strong society issues, that has a deep and tragic story of a poor family that is destroyed partly due to the people around them. I would like to read the entire novel, and I think it’s a very intense and drags the reader’s attention to make it think about many different themes. This story relates to out topic, abusive relationships, and this abuse is portrayed by Cholly and Mrs. Breedlove, that are continually discussing because of their need to. “This violent breaks in routine, that were themselves routine”, made Mrs. Breedlove “more splendid in her tasks, and herself”.
This relationship needed violence in their lives “to make their lives more tolerable” and they were both victims and abusers, making an even more complicated relationship full of discussions and fights. These relationships are abusing themselves, mentally and physically, “knocking him right back”, “he stuck her several times in the face.” But this violence doesn’t finish here; it also creates grandiose disasters beyond the daughter and sun of this couple. This is a piece of a novel and it doesn’t give direct ideas towards our final production, but it does increase our knowledge with examples of this abusive relationships, and it gives us knowledge about the different consequences that this has beyond others, and how they react to it.
