The Bluest Eye

The Bluest Eye is the first novel written by American author Toni Morrison and published in 1970. It takes place in Lorain, Ohio (Morrison's hometown), and tells the story of a young African-American girl named Pecola who grew up following the Great Depression. She is consistently regarded as "ugly" due to her mannerisms and dark skin. As a result, she develops an inferiority complex, which fuels her desire for the blue eyes she equates with "whiteness".

The novel is told mostly from Claudia MacTeer's point of view. Claudia is the daughter of Pecola's temporary foster parents. There is also some omniscient third-person narration. The book's controversial topics of racism, incest, and child molestation have led to numerous attempts to ban the novel from schools and libraries in the United States.

In 1941, in Lorain, Ohio, nine-year-old Claudia MacTeer and her ten-year-old sister Frieda live with their parents, a tenant named Mr. Henry Washington, and Pecola Breedlove, a temporary foster child whose house was burned down by her unstable, alcoholic, and sexually abusive father. Pecola is a quiet, passive young girl who grows up with little money and whose parents are constantly fighting, both verbally and physically. Pecola is continually reminded of what an "ugly" girl she is by members of her neighborhood and school community. In an attempt to beautify herself, Pecola wishes for blue eyes. Additionally, most chapters' titles are extracts from the Dick and Jane paragraph in the novel's prologue, presenting a white family that may be contrasted with Pecola's. The chapter titles contain sudden repetition of words or phrases, many cut-off words, and no interword separations.

The novel, through flashbacks and various vignettes, explores the younger years of both of Pecola's parents, Cholly and Pauline, and their struggles as African Americans in a largely White Anglo-Saxon Protestant community. Cholly was abandoned by his parents at a young age and was raised by his aunt. His attempts to find his father led him to being spurned. Further humiliation came to him during his first sexual encounter, when two white men found him and made him continue even though he was paralyzed with fear at being discovered by the two men. He met Pauline at a young age, and they quickly wed, moving from Kentucky to Lorain. They initially loved each other, but their relationship gradually deteriorated over time, resulting in Cholly feeling trapped and uninterested. Pauline has a chronic, persistent belief that true, romantic love is reserved for beautiful people, and because she considers herself ugly, she encourages Cholly's behavior. Her belief that she is ugly greatly parallels Pecola's inferiority complex. Pauline now works as a servant for a wealthier white family, where she claims that she feels most alive.

At some point, Pecola leaves the MacTeers and returns to living with her parents. One day in the novel's present time, while Pecola is doing dishes at her home, a drunk Cholly finds her and rapes her. His motives are confusing, seemingly a combination of both love and hate. He leaves her to be discovered by Pauline, who does not believe Pecola's story and beats her. The community learns of Pecola's assault, and not long after, it is discovered that she is pregnant. Following the assault, a vignette depicts Pecola seeking the help of Soaphead Church, a cunning and deceptive man who pretends to be a spiritual healer. Pecola asks Soaphead to help her obtain blue eyes, and he tricks her into feeding a dog poisoned meat. When the dog dies, Pecola believes that her wish has been granted, and her mental state begins to sharply decline.

Claudia and Frieda are the only two in the community who hope for Pecola's child to survive in the coming months. Consequently, they give up the money they had been saving to buy a bicycle, instead planting marigold seeds with the superstitious belief that if the flowers bloom, Pecola's baby will survive. The marigolds never bloom, and Pecola's child, who is born prematurely, dies. In the aftermath, a dialogue is presented between two sides of Pecola's deluded imagination, in which she indicates conflicting feelings about her rape by her father. In this internal conversation, Pecola speaks as though her wish for blue eyes has been granted, and believes that the changed behavior of those around her is due to her new eyes, rather than the news of her rape or her increasingly strange behavior.

Claudia, as narrator a final time, describes the recent phenomenon of Pecola's insanity and suggests that Cholly, who died in a warehouse following the death of Pecola's baby, may have shown Pecola the only love he could by raping her. Claudia laments her belief that the whole community, herself included, has used Pecola as a scapegoat to make themselves feel prettier and happier.

When asked about her motivations for writing The Bluest Eye in an interview, Morrison stated that she wanted to remind readers "how hurtful racism is" and that people are "apologetic about the fact that their skin [is] so dark". Reminiscing about her own experience, she recalled: "When I was a kid, we called each other names but we didn't think it was serious, that you could take it in." Expanding on this point of self-esteem, Morrison elaborated that she "wanted to speak on behalf of those who didn't catch that [they were beautiful] right away. [She] was deeply concerned about the feelings of ugliness." As seen throughout The Bluest Eye, this idea of "ugliness" is conveyed through a variety of characters. For example, Pecola, the main character, wishes for blue eyes as a way to escape the oppression that results from her having dark skin. Through Pecola's characterization, Morrison seeks to demonstrate the negative impact racism can have on one's self-confidence and worth. As she concluded in her interview, she "wanted people to understand what it was like to be treated that way".