Reviews with content warning for Excrement - The Bluest Eye

Well I'm glad I read it, but I can't say I enjoyed the experience. Morrison's prose is incredibly poignant and poetic, however this novel feels more like a series of vignettes than a true narrative, and the characters feel more like symbols than real people. Also, it served a purpose in the story, but the way bodily functions and sexual urges were described practically had me retching in real life. On one hand, that's really a credit to Morrison's writing that she was able to affect such a physical response, but also, it really contributed to how unpleasant parts of this novel were to read.

But again, that's kind of the point. This isn't supposed to be an easy read. It's horrifying, but it's meant to be because Morrison wants to depict how intergenerational trauma and internalized racism have affected the Black community. So for that reason, I found this hard to rate. In terms of getting its message across, I give this book 5 stars. But I just hated this experience of reading this so much (seriously, watch out for all the content warnings) that I can't really rate it higher.

Content Warnings

bennybooks's review against another edition

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challenging dark sad medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Even though it’s nonlinear storytelling was not what I was expecting, the content was just too good to be mad at it

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lynxpardinus's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad

4.5

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booksjessreads's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

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

5.0

I feel like any words I could write about any Toni Morrison book could never do her work justice.

This book was not what I was fully expecting, and I think this made me appreciate it more. Told from multiple points of view and through a seasonal perspective of the events Pecola ensures, it details the complexity of the ways in which beauty, culture, poverty, colourism and sexism intertwine.

I think the things that have completely astounded me about this novel is its purpose and its language. What I love about this, is that Morrison tells the story in a structured way, allowing us to understand the psychological motivations and histories of the characters. She shows us that the characters should not be excused for their behaviour, but simply showing us what made the characters the way that they are. In her forward and afterword, Morrison mentions how she wanted to fragment the chapters into different perspectives, seasons etc. and allow the reader to piece the story together. Whilst she looks in retrospect and felt this didn't work for the novel, I think it works well and made the novel effective.

This novel is short but it is packed with so much heavy content. It is beautifully written - each sentence flows into one another. I don't think I have read lyrical writing quite like this. There is a lot that is packed into its 212 pages, but I appreciated every page and the story and messages told through her work. I am highly anticipated her other novels and am eager to get into them.

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lizziaha's review against another edition

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4.25

The language in this book is so wonderful. Each word tumbles into the next—a pace that I occasionally wanted to slam the brakes on due to the perverse and horrific things the words depicted. But the words tumbled on, slipping and sliding and settling in my brain. It’s odd, because they seemed comfortable at first, but quickly became restless as Morrison’s words stayed in my brain long after I’d put down the book.

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ruthypoo2's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This is the first book by Toni Morrison that I've read. Her writing is lovely and lyrical despite the story in this case being told primarily from the perspective of older children and dealing with some genuinely painful and ugly human behavior. Additionally, I listened to the audiobook as the narrator is Toni Morrison, and in this case, I felt it really enhanced the experience hearing a story in the voice of the author.

The Foreward of the book sets the tone by starting with the following, "There can't be anyone, I am sure, who doesn't know what it feels like to be disliked, even rejected, momentarily or for sustained periods of time. Perhaps the feeling is merely indifference, mild annoyance, but it may also be hurt. It may even be that some of us know what it is like to be actually hated - hated for things we have no control over and cannot change."

The primary individual in the story, the one with a common thread throughout, is eleven-year-old Pecola Breedlove. She's a demure child already broken down by a harsh life of indifferent parents and the taunts of too many bullies, sometimes school children and sometimes family. The most common and reliable narrator in the book is eight-year-old Claudia MacTeer. She and her twelve-year-old sister, Frieda, are as true of friends to Pecola as anyone in her life will be. The story is set in a time right after the Great Depression, as the country is recovering. Claudia shares how her and Frieda's life is comfortable, and they live in a sometimes harsh, but happy and stable home. One day Pecola enters their life and from this point the reader learns about other characters with Claudia as the narrator or via third person narrative with inset narratives, resulting in differing people's experiences at differing points in time. These inset first person narratives give the reader more of the backstory, or formative years, for various characters in the story. I thought this was a great way to create an immersive experience for the reader.

This book deals with many heavy subjects, and chief among them is how young Pecola was dealt a very bad hand in life and ended up accepting as truth that her life was of little value because of the way she was talked to, talked about, treated, and mistreated. Pecola's idea of a perfect life was associated with whiteness and having blue eyes, so maybe if she had blue eyes, she could escape her painful life.

This book really feels like it's a story you're hearing from some intelligent but cautious children living in a complex world where they understand a lot more than you want to believe children that age should know. They're self-sufficient because they have to be and, in many ways, this makes them able to survive the hazards and ugly truth that comes into their lives. While there are really rough edges to this story, the resilience of child narrator Claudia helps make it easier to digest when some characters in the book do not get a happy ending.

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vanesst's review against another edition

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challenging emotional tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.5

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seanamcphie's review against another edition

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challenging dark reflective sad slow-paced

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

4.5

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