Genre Fiction
![Toni Morrison - [object Object] author](https://res.cloudinary.com/readsomnia/image/upload/authors/a_B000APT7NQ.jpg)
The Bluest Eye (Vintage International)
NATIONAL BESTSELLER • From the acclaimed Nobel Prize winner-a powerful examination of our obsession with beauty and conformity that asks questions about race, class, and gender with characteristic subtly and grace.
In Morrison's acclaimed first novel, Pecola Breedlove-an 11-year-old Black girl in an America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all others-prays for her eyes to turn blue: so that she will be beautiful, so that people will look at her, so that her world will be different. This is the story of the nightmare at the heart of her yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment.
Here, Morrison's writing is "so precise, so faithful to speech and so charged with pain and wonder that the novel becomes poetry" (The New York Times).
In Morrison's acclaimed first novel, Pecola Breedlove-an 11-year-old Black girl in an America whose love for its blond, blue-eyed children can devastate all others-prays for her eyes to turn blue: so that she will be beautiful, so that people will look at her, so that her world will be different. This is the story of the nightmare at the heart of her yearning, and the tragedy of its fulfillment.
Here, Morrison's writing is "so precise, so faithful to speech and so charged with pain and wonder that the novel becomes poetry" (The New York Times).
Editorial Reviews
A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK!
"So precise, so faithful to speech and so charged with pain and wonder that the novel becomes poetry." -The New York Times
"A profoundly successful work of fiction. . . . Taut and understated, harsh in its detachment, sympathetic in its truth . . . it is an experience." -The Detroit Free Press
"This story commands attention, for it contains one black girl's universe." -Newsweek
"So precise, so faithful to speech and so charged with pain and wonder that the novel becomes poetry." -The New York Times
"A profoundly successful work of fiction. . . . Taut and understated, harsh in its detachment, sympathetic in its truth . . . it is an experience." -The Detroit Free Press
"This story commands attention, for it contains one black girl's universe." -Newsweek
Readers Top Reviews
JacquelinePauline
This is the first book I've read by Toni Morrison. The language and prose are phenomenal in bringing the narrative to life. At first, I wasn't sure about the writing. For example, Toni heads several chapters with paragraphs that has no spaces and seems to fall short of a meaning however, this is all very much part of the overall theme of the lives of a poor black family in the 1940's with the emphasis on the protagonist Pecola who prays for Blue eyes so she can be like her white schoolmates. Themes such as incest, rape and feeling like an outcast are well-addressed. I lingered in the 'Afterword' chapter as Toni expressed and summarized the writing of The Bluest Eye in such a way that I will be reading this novel again with these moments in mind.
An amazing, gut-wrenching, sad book, which should be required reading for all Americans, yet I gave it 4 stars because I didn't enjoy it at ALL. Toni Morrison does not flinch from the barest of truths about racism - both in terms of the way beauty has been historically portrayed in a fair-skinned, blue eyed, blonde idealistic way, and in terms of the historical and present day racism facing African-American children in America. As I read this book, I happened to see an ad for new dolls with natural black hair, and I was so glad. Morrison tells the story of poor Pecola, a set upon, tragic little girl with a damaged mother and a vicious, abused father, Polly and Cholly in a series of stories that intertwine. Pecola comes to live with another family with two fiestier, funnier little girls. This somehow makes her even more tragic. Morrison shows how chance encounters affect the characters view of themselves growing up, and how this in turn hurts their children. She uses language that no one else dares use, and is critical of the way that some African-Americans have willingly enabled a racist culture that holds their own children back while prioritising others. Sexual abuse is another central theme. I can't help but think that this is in part autobiographical. I loved it, but hated it too. It made me so angry and so sad, but I am glad I gave it my time. I don't think I will ever be able to forget this book.
AnonKeglan Jacq
Wish I could give this book negative stars. Quite simply; it is pornographic, degenerate and perverted. How twisted a person’s mind has to be to first imagine and then write on paper is disturbing. The book leaves you feeling filthy. The vulgar nature of the content destroys any redeeming qualities this book might of had. Knowing this book is what is being taught in college/ap classes it is now easy to understand how/why American Society is collapsing. Terrible, terrible book.
Shanaye AnonKegla
I’ve never really wanted blue eyes but I’ve always felt ashamed of my blackness growing up. I was always Black Gyal or Blackie. I was never Shanise. I was always, “nothing too black is good” or “your cousins are prettier than you because they’re lighter”. So I’ve always wanted, lighter skin, smaller shoulders, a straighter nose and a prettier face. I grew up though, I grew when my smile was seen and I was told how beautiful it was. I grew into myself, mentally and emotionally and I learned to love me in ways that my family could not. Now at 30, I am so beautiful, inside and out. This black skin that I proudly wear is evident of that. I wouldn’t want to be anything but a black woman. The essence of colorism in the black community was captured in all its glory in this book. The wanting to be something you’re not, Pecola, while accepting what you are, Claudia, captured two sides of the same coin when it comes to black lives. The love of whiteness and the hatred of blackness that was taught to our ancestors is still heredity even in today’s society. This is a book that all black girls and boys need to read. This should be a right of passage. Toni Morrison did a great job with this book. The Bluest Eyes invoked anger, pity, laughter and pride in 2689 pages of magnificent! I read it all in one go, I dear not put it down because I was so enthralled. Thank you.
FlowerSystemShana
This book is really difficult to read if you're sensitive to themes of child sexual abuse, general child abuse, racism, and some animal abuse. Honestly, if you've been abused I wouldn't recommend it unless you have to read it for a class because it takes the perspective of the rapist during the rape scene which was really difficult for me to read personally. HOWEVER, if you haven't experienced abuse, this is a really important book. It gives you an important and vastly underrepresented perspective on the ways systems built on racism and neglect fail children of color and allow for horrific things to happen to them, and the narration of the book is actually beautiful and very compelling. It is hard to read, it is difficult subject material, but push through it. It's a good and worthwhile book.
Short Excerpt Teaser
Nuns go by as quiet as lust, and drunken men and sober eyes sing in the lobby of the Greek hotel. Rosemary Villanucci, our next-door friend who lives above her father's cafe, sits in a 1939 Buick eating bread and butter. She rolls down the window to tell my sister Frieda and me that we can't come in. We stare at her, wanting her bread, but more than that wanting to poke the arrogance out of her eyes and smash the pride of ownership that curls her chewing mouth. When she comes out of the car we will beat her up, make red marks on her white skin, and she will cry and ask us do we want her to pull her pants down. We will say no. We don't know what we should feel or do if she does, but whenever she asks us, we know she is offering us something precious and that our own pride must be asserted by refusing to accept.
School has started, and Frieda and I get new brown stockings and cod-liver oil. Grown-ups talk in tired, edgy voices about Zick's Coal Company and take us along in the evening to the railroad tracks where we fill burlap sacks with the tiny pieces of coal lying about. Later we walk home, glancing back to see the great carloads of slag being dumped, red hot and smoking, into the ravine that skirts the steel mill. The dying fire lights the sky with a dull orange glow. Frieda and I lag behind, staring at the patch of color surrounded by black. It is impossible not to feel a shiver when our feet leave the gravel path and sink into the dead grass in the field.
Our house is old, cold, and green. At night a kerosene lamp lights one large room. The others are braced in darkness, peopled by roaches and mice. Adults do not talk to us -- they give us directions. They issue orders without providing information. When we trip and fall down they glance at us; if we cut or bruise ourselves, they ask us are we crazy. When we catch colds, they shake their heads in disgust at our lack of consideration. How, they ask us, do you expect anybody to get anything done if you all are sick? We cannot answer them. Our illness is treated with contempt, foul Black Draught, and castor oil that blunts our minds.
When, on a day after a trip to collect coal, I cough once, loudly, through bronchial tubes already packed tight with phlegm, my mother frowns. "Great Jesus. Get on in that bed. How many times do I have to tell you to wear something on your head? You must be the biggest fool in this town. Frieda? Get some rags and stuff that window."
Frieda restuffs the window. I trudge off to bed, full of guilt and self-pity. I lie down in my underwear, the metal in the black garters hurts my legs, but I do not take them off, because it is too cold to lie stockingless. It takes a long time for my body to heat its place in the bed. Once I have generated a silhouette of warmth, I dare not move, for there is a cold place one-half inch in any direction. No one speaks to me or asks how I feel. In an hour or two my mother comes. Her hands are large and rough, and when she rubs the Vicks salve on my chest, I am rigid with pain. She takes two fingers' full of it at a time, and massages my chest until I am faint. Just when I think I will tip over into a scream, she scoops out a little of the salve on her forefinger and puts it in my mouth, telling me to swallow. A hot flannel is wrapped about my neck and chest. I am covered up with heavy quilts and ordered to sweat, which I do, promptly.
Later I throw up, and my mother says, "What did you puke on the bed clothes for? Don't you have sense enough to hold your head out the bed? Now, look what you did. You think I got time for nothing but washing up your puke?"
The puke swaddles down the pillow onto the sheet -- green-gray, with flecks of orange. It moves like the insides of an uncooked egg. Stubbornly clinging to its own mass, refusing to break up and be removed. How, I wonder, can it be so neat and nasty at the same time?
My mother's voice drones on. She is not talking to me. She is talking to the puke, but she is calling it my name: Claudia. She wipes it up as best she can and puts a scratchy towel over the large wet place. I lie down again. The rags have fallen from the window crack, and the air is cold. I dare not call her back and am reluctant to leave my warmth. My mother's anger humiliates me; her words chafe my cheeks, and I am crying. I do not know that she is not angry at me, but at my sickness. I believe she despises my weakness for letting the sickness "take holt." By and by I will not get sick; I will refuse to. But for now I am crying. I know I am making more snot, but I can't stop.
My sister comes in. Her eyes are full of sorrow. She sings to me: "When the deep purple falls over sleepy garden walls, someone thinks of me. . . ." I doze, thinking...
School has started, and Frieda and I get new brown stockings and cod-liver oil. Grown-ups talk in tired, edgy voices about Zick's Coal Company and take us along in the evening to the railroad tracks where we fill burlap sacks with the tiny pieces of coal lying about. Later we walk home, glancing back to see the great carloads of slag being dumped, red hot and smoking, into the ravine that skirts the steel mill. The dying fire lights the sky with a dull orange glow. Frieda and I lag behind, staring at the patch of color surrounded by black. It is impossible not to feel a shiver when our feet leave the gravel path and sink into the dead grass in the field.
Our house is old, cold, and green. At night a kerosene lamp lights one large room. The others are braced in darkness, peopled by roaches and mice. Adults do not talk to us -- they give us directions. They issue orders without providing information. When we trip and fall down they glance at us; if we cut or bruise ourselves, they ask us are we crazy. When we catch colds, they shake their heads in disgust at our lack of consideration. How, they ask us, do you expect anybody to get anything done if you all are sick? We cannot answer them. Our illness is treated with contempt, foul Black Draught, and castor oil that blunts our minds.
When, on a day after a trip to collect coal, I cough once, loudly, through bronchial tubes already packed tight with phlegm, my mother frowns. "Great Jesus. Get on in that bed. How many times do I have to tell you to wear something on your head? You must be the biggest fool in this town. Frieda? Get some rags and stuff that window."
Frieda restuffs the window. I trudge off to bed, full of guilt and self-pity. I lie down in my underwear, the metal in the black garters hurts my legs, but I do not take them off, because it is too cold to lie stockingless. It takes a long time for my body to heat its place in the bed. Once I have generated a silhouette of warmth, I dare not move, for there is a cold place one-half inch in any direction. No one speaks to me or asks how I feel. In an hour or two my mother comes. Her hands are large and rough, and when she rubs the Vicks salve on my chest, I am rigid with pain. She takes two fingers' full of it at a time, and massages my chest until I am faint. Just when I think I will tip over into a scream, she scoops out a little of the salve on her forefinger and puts it in my mouth, telling me to swallow. A hot flannel is wrapped about my neck and chest. I am covered up with heavy quilts and ordered to sweat, which I do, promptly.
Later I throw up, and my mother says, "What did you puke on the bed clothes for? Don't you have sense enough to hold your head out the bed? Now, look what you did. You think I got time for nothing but washing up your puke?"
The puke swaddles down the pillow onto the sheet -- green-gray, with flecks of orange. It moves like the insides of an uncooked egg. Stubbornly clinging to its own mass, refusing to break up and be removed. How, I wonder, can it be so neat and nasty at the same time?
My mother's voice drones on. She is not talking to me. She is talking to the puke, but she is calling it my name: Claudia. She wipes it up as best she can and puts a scratchy towel over the large wet place. I lie down again. The rags have fallen from the window crack, and the air is cold. I dare not call her back and am reluctant to leave my warmth. My mother's anger humiliates me; her words chafe my cheeks, and I am crying. I do not know that she is not angry at me, but at my sickness. I believe she despises my weakness for letting the sickness "take holt." By and by I will not get sick; I will refuse to. But for now I am crying. I know I am making more snot, but I can't stop.
My sister comes in. Her eyes are full of sorrow. She sings to me: "When the deep purple falls over sleepy garden walls, someone thinks of me. . . ." I doze, thinking...
