Book Report of Novel The Bluest Eye

Summary

            The Bluest Eye is a story of Afro-American people in the USA. There is a black girl named Pecola. She is a girl from an Afro-American family. Her parents were not an ideal family. Her father is a drunken man and her mother who was very devout with Christianity. But her mother have misinterpretation of the Idea of God in white culture and as the result, she identified her husband as a devil. And the story told us that Pecola and her family became the victim of the social-cultural system which racist and patriarchal. And as kid she is the worst victim of this social-cultural condition.

As a kid in her family, she became the victim of the violence of her mother and being raped by her father. In her society, she also became the victim of racism. It was drawn well when a white boy cheated and insulted her. Her desire to get the bluest eye though she is an Afro-American was drawing an influence of cultural value which also victimizes her. She wanted to be as like as the white people by having the bluest eyes though it is impossible.  The story also told about the problem of her parents which influenced their relationship and their way of life. As a climax of the story, the result of all problems, Pecola experienced a psychological illness and became crazy. But in the middle of this tragic story we still have Frieda and Margaret who became her friends and trying to help her.

Setting-Place      

            The setting of the story is near at 1941 and the place is in the USA exactly at Lorain in Ohio, in the north of USA near Lake Erie which separate USA and Canada. And there is another place like Kentucky, at the south of Ohio where Cholly Breedlove and Pauline have met before marriage. The climate of this area is consisting of four seasons which became a setting of each part of the story.

Characters

            The major characters in the story are Pecola, Cholly Breedlove and Pauline. Cholly Breedlove is a drunken man with sober eyes. He has no father because his father left her mother when she was pregnant. Cholly was taken by his aunt called Jimmy who gave him name. Cholly did not recognize as the son of his father when he found him and tried to speak with him. He also did not know about her mother. He never knew how to be a parent of children and have a great psychological need of being warm with women. Beside Pauline as his wife, he also has Darlene as his playmate. But it is not enough for him. Because lack of responsibility and awareness of being father and about the psychological matter, he raped his only daughter Pecola. He has a bad habit as a drunken man. And because of the misinterpretation of God in the white culture, Pauline as his wife identified him as devil only because of his skin and bad habit.

            Pauline is a good wife. She was good in housekeeping. She collected egg, repaired the fence, and other housekeeping. The stillness and isolation both calmed and organized her when her parents went for work and the other children went to school. Her parents lived in Kentucky and her mother got a job for cleaning and cooking for white people. Some of her brother are joined the army, one sister died and two got married. She also has a devout life by being a good Christian. She prays and goes to the Church routinely. She directs Pecola not to follow her father and tried to give her a good understanding about Christian life to her. She is a good mother but too possessive to Pecola so that sometimes do violence to her. 

   The minor characters are Margaret, Frieda and their parents as the people who received Pecola after her parents are in the middle of conflict. Margaret and Frieda became good viewers and sometimes gave their point of view in the story. There are also some minor character which became an instrument to draw the unfair society to the Afro-American people such as Maureen, Junior and her mother Geraldine, Woodrew Cain, Buddy Wilson, Janie Bug, and Bay Boy. Samson Fuller a gambler, Cholly’s father who reject his existence.

Theme

            The theme of the novel is the victim of racism and patriarchal system.

Symbol

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.

If we planted the seeds, and said the right words over them, they would blossom, and everything would be all right. (Page 3)

Our flowers never grew. I was convinced that Frieda was right, that I planted them too deeply. (Page 205)

I talk about  how I did not plant the seed too deeply, how it was the fault of the earth, the land of our town.(Page 206)

The author used the symbol of seed of flower which can’t grow as an opening and closing of the narration. Seed is a product of plant which will become a new life if it is planted. But they can’t grow if the way of planting and the soil didn’t support them. This symbol became a good symbol of the whole story. Pecola and all other children are the seeds. They grow in the middle of social-culture where they live. The unfair of the system of the society will hamper them to grow. The children who lived in this system are as like as the seeds which can’t to grow and die in the garden. Pecola, Cholly, and also Pauline are the real victim of this system.

There is two massages from the symbol, first the critics of racism and patriarchal system and the second is invitation to build a better life. The first massage is to change the values which exist in the society. It’s not enough if the white people imposed to change their point of view to the black people. But there are massages to all people to change their point of view about racism by the equality of human being. And the second massage is about the responsibility of human to make a better condition for the children to grow. It’s mean that sex must in the bound of love and marriage. Because of so many cases that make many children were rejected by their parents, so there is a big responsibility of the society to help them. The people must help them to grow because of their potency to become the new Cholly. Their potency to build a better life must be up hold and it must be support by the society.

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