The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
I have a copy to give away.
Quiet as it's kept, there were no marigolds in the fall of 1941. We thought, at the time, that it was because Pecola was having her father's baby that the marigolds did not grow. (First line)
The novel, written in a 'speakerly' tone which allows the author to jump to different times and places, in the way gossip does, tells not only the story of Pecola - a young black girl, who wishes her eyes would turn blue so she would be beautiful - but others in the community who touch and are touched by her, by her life, by her "ruin" at her father's hands.
The Bluest Eye, as the title suggests, is consciously looking at the attitudes of (some) black people to white people and their concepts of beauty. Pecola's mother believes that she is ugly, and has instilled this belief in her children so that they "wore their ugliness, put it on, so to speak, although it did not belong to them." (p38) The narrator, at the time child of about Pecola's age (12) is puzzled by the admiration for white people, the popularity of the lighter girls at school like the half-white Maureen, and the different treatment that people give pretty white girls like Shirley Temple, in the street, and at school. Both Pecola and the narrator, Claudia, it seems, are as black as it gets, but they react to it differently. Pecola worships Shirley, Claudia destroys the cold white doll babies she gets given at Christmas and is puzzled as to how to be grateful for them. Claudia still has some confidence, which Pecola, with her burden of ugliness and her unstable home life, does not.
The abuse described in the first line, with that mix of backyard gossip and childish misunderstanding, is the final step in the disintegration of Pecola's family. The end result - although not the method - seems inevitable as the characters are revealed, as we discover how their lives have been shaped: Cholly's parent's abandoned him casually, Mrs. Breedlove's life has been shaped by a broken foot which never grew right, and the white people she works for, who are neither able to take care of themselves nor understand how she lives. She has become the 'perfect servant', and fights for their comfort, instead of that of her own family: washes their floors, cooks their meals, does their laundry with far more attention than she can afford to give her own family's at the end of the day. The parents are struggling to make their lives livable without much concern for what their children can survive. Mrs. has cast Cholly as her cross to bear, and relies on the church and her work. Cholly relies on alcohol to make the cage of unemployable responsibilty bearable.
By contrast, there is the family of the narrator, who are Respectable, and the whores who live upstairs from the Breedloves, who aren't, and glimpses of other families and types of people around the town: a scale of desperation and poverty, and respectability and thrift. Claudia's family have food in the icebox, and the children play, and have childish concerns. Claudia and her sister are strong minded and outspoken. The whores upstairs don't talk to Pecola any differently than they do to each other, and tell her stories of men she doesn't really understand. Class comes through: who you can and can't speak to - the whores, as "ruined" women are out of bounds for the girls. In turn, "Their only respect was for what they would have described as "good Christian colored women." The woman whose reputation was spotless" (p.56).
The author also uses the device of a Peter-and-Jane style of story, told in full at the beginning with all its assumptions about life and beauty, then retold as the drama unfolds, and the seemingly innocent lines get tied to more macabre events. It's a very interesting and effective device.
The novel effortlessly draws the reader into the world of the working class black neighbourhood in small town Ohio in the '60s, however alien that might be to their experience: the novel resonates and sings.
See also: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Their Eyes Were Watching God Zora Neale Hurston
Copyright: 1970
Read it if: If you can get hold of a copy.
Don't if: You don't want to know.
Rating: *****
Quiet as it's kept, there were no marigolds in the fall of 1941. We thought, at the time, that it was because Pecola was having her father's baby that the marigolds did not grow. (First line)
The novel, written in a 'speakerly' tone which allows the author to jump to different times and places, in the way gossip does, tells not only the story of Pecola - a young black girl, who wishes her eyes would turn blue so she would be beautiful - but others in the community who touch and are touched by her, by her life, by her "ruin" at her father's hands.
The Bluest Eye, as the title suggests, is consciously looking at the attitudes of (some) black people to white people and their concepts of beauty. Pecola's mother believes that she is ugly, and has instilled this belief in her children so that they "wore their ugliness, put it on, so to speak, although it did not belong to them." (p38) The narrator, at the time child of about Pecola's age (12) is puzzled by the admiration for white people, the popularity of the lighter girls at school like the half-white Maureen, and the different treatment that people give pretty white girls like Shirley Temple, in the street, and at school. Both Pecola and the narrator, Claudia, it seems, are as black as it gets, but they react to it differently. Pecola worships Shirley, Claudia destroys the cold white doll babies she gets given at Christmas and is puzzled as to how to be grateful for them. Claudia still has some confidence, which Pecola, with her burden of ugliness and her unstable home life, does not.
The abuse described in the first line, with that mix of backyard gossip and childish misunderstanding, is the final step in the disintegration of Pecola's family. The end result - although not the method - seems inevitable as the characters are revealed, as we discover how their lives have been shaped: Cholly's parent's abandoned him casually, Mrs. Breedlove's life has been shaped by a broken foot which never grew right, and the white people she works for, who are neither able to take care of themselves nor understand how she lives. She has become the 'perfect servant', and fights for their comfort, instead of that of her own family: washes their floors, cooks their meals, does their laundry with far more attention than she can afford to give her own family's at the end of the day. The parents are struggling to make their lives livable without much concern for what their children can survive. Mrs. has cast Cholly as her cross to bear, and relies on the church and her work. Cholly relies on alcohol to make the cage of unemployable responsibilty bearable.
By contrast, there is the family of the narrator, who are Respectable, and the whores who live upstairs from the Breedloves, who aren't, and glimpses of other families and types of people around the town: a scale of desperation and poverty, and respectability and thrift. Claudia's family have food in the icebox, and the children play, and have childish concerns. Claudia and her sister are strong minded and outspoken. The whores upstairs don't talk to Pecola any differently than they do to each other, and tell her stories of men she doesn't really understand. Class comes through: who you can and can't speak to - the whores, as "ruined" women are out of bounds for the girls. In turn, "Their only respect was for what they would have described as "good Christian colored women." The woman whose reputation was spotless" (p.56).
The author also uses the device of a Peter-and-Jane style of story, told in full at the beginning with all its assumptions about life and beauty, then retold as the drama unfolds, and the seemingly innocent lines get tied to more macabre events. It's a very interesting and effective device.
The novel effortlessly draws the reader into the world of the working class black neighbourhood in small town Ohio in the '60s, however alien that might be to their experience: the novel resonates and sings.
See also: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Their Eyes Were Watching God Zora Neale Hurston
Copyright: 1970
Read it if: If you can get hold of a copy.
Don't if: You don't want to know.
Rating: *****