A review by shoshin
The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

dark emotional sad tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

I read this book for two reading challenges: one covering women who have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, the other for reading banned books.

I can see why this book has been banned, and while I'm very much against banning books, this one would need careful and thoughtful discussion with teens who read it. I was especially disturbed by

the sympathetic way Morrison portrayed Charlie, who raped and impregnated his 11-year-old daughter and was portrayed a merely being swept up in the moment because his daughter reminded him of his wife when they first met

. On the whole, I wasn't all that impressed with the book. Morrison has an afterword in which she expresses her own dissatisfaction with how it was received vs what her goals were in writing it. Knowing her goals, I see what she was trying to do, but ultimately agree with her later-in-life assessment that she missed the mark. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Child abuse, Drug abuse, Emotional abuse, Incest, Misogyny, Pedophilia, Racism, Rape, Sexual content, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, and Violence

Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Bullying, Blood, Grief, Death of parent, Pregnancy, and Abandonment

Minor: Child death and Miscarriage