The passages are bold and stunning and yes, heavy and heartbreaking. Let me be clear though, this book is brilliant. Although, two parents so immersed in their own trauma that they don’t emotionally nourish their daughter and a young Black girl who feels invisible doesn’t seem like too much of a stretch.
While Pecola is always present she’s often on the sidelines, invisible. While those backstories provide some of the Bluest Eye’s most significant moments, I can’t help but feel we’re missing more of Pecola’s voice. Morrison spends a significant amount of time on the backstories of Pecola’s mother and father, and through these stories we better understand what they bring to the table as parents. Pecola Breedlove has always been made to feel ugly, both by the white community and her own Black community. Her stories, while for everyone, speak to an audience that have lived lives colored by that reality.
Morrison doesn’t need to tell you about systemic racism or inter-generational trauma in simplistic terms – she’s going to show you. As expected with Toni Morrison, though, this is so much more than that. A simple premise – the story of a young Black girl who wishes to be beautiful, to have blue eyes.
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