New York : Vintage International, 2007, c1970
xiii, 205 p. ; 21 cm.
The first thing to say about this novel, by Nobel Prize winning author, Toni Morrison, is that it is an amazing first novel. It richly conveys the texture of the lives of three African American girls in a town in Ohio in the 1940s - focusing on one especially pitiful girl, Pecola, who is treated by all as "ugly" and is obsessed with wanting blue eyes.
It is a gritty novel of childhood cruelties, bonds of sisterhood, the dynamics of race, class and sexism. Poverty, incest, domestic violence, alcoholism, pedophilia and prostitution all come under scrutiny in Morrison's tale.
For me the most vexing aspect of the novel revolves around a male character who rapes his daughter. The author ventures to enter into the mind of the perpetrator and - frankly - ends up creating a false and "artistic" artifact out of this act of sexual violence. I say this with some trepidation, realizing that all artists take risks in trying to enter into scenarios and personalities that are radically distinct from their own. Often such risks produce stunning works of art. However, my assessment is that Morrison grossly misses the mark on this one, and ends up with a rather fanciful, empathetic, and even sympathetic portrayal of the rapist.
Considered as part of the body of work of Morrison, Bluest Eye, is definitely worth reading and, as I said is a powerful and very readable book. I just think it deserves a hard look at it's shortcomings. As I told a friend, my feeling after reading the book [regarding the character who commits the incest/rape] was, "She doesn't know what she's talking about. She doesn't have any business going there...."
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