My God, this book.
It’s so hard to review classics, which admittedly is not often an issue for me. My reading history contains almost no classics. I didn’t go to school after the fifth grade, so I was never assigned any for school, and although I’ve always been an avid reader, I’ve never picked up classics on my own. I took a lit class last semester, and every single assigned reading, I thought “Well, I’m going to hate this.” Every single time, it totally blew my mind. Every single one, I couldn’t believe it had been out in the world all these years and everyone wasn’t talking about it all the time. I recognized things that more modern books had borrowed from each thing, and I felt my mind expand.
So this semester I took another lit class, which is totally unrelated to my degree. But I felt like I still wasn’t going to be good about picking up classics, and I wanted my mind to grow a little more. Which brings us to The Bluest Eye. Another one I probably would’ve gone my whole life without reading. Another one that completely knocked the wind out of me.
What can I possibly say about this book? It’s 46 years old. Probably everyone has read it. It’s basically about a young Black girl in the 1940s whose life is a total nightmare. Most of the chapters are about someone else, but it always circles back to Pecola. The writing is astonishing. The story is excruciating. I… just… wow. This review leaves a lot to be desired but I just can’t even find the right words.
Massive, towering, enormous content warning for sexual abuse.
On a similar note, I’ve tried pushing myself to read more classics. While I’ve been successful, I’ve been reading more sci-fi than literary fiction.
There’s something daunting about literary fiction that always repels me to some degree. Not because it’s bad, but because I always get intimidated by it.
Toni Morrison has always been on my periphery, but I’ve not yet made the leap. Why four stars instead of five?
Because the subject matter is so dark and emotionally draining. It’s horribly graphic at times about things that will make you absolutely sick to your stomach. It’s impossible (for me) to finish a book so unremittingly grim and say “Wow, I loved that book!” and give it five stars, no matter beautiful it is.
Ah, I understand that.
Have you read Gone Girl? If so, how would it compare to that?
(Gone Girl is my barometer for how unpleasant something is to read.)
I didn’t read the book, but I did see the movie, so do with this as you wish – I very much suspect this one is more upsetting. There’s at least one graphic rape scene, and it’s a child.
This is in my TBR pile. I think I read it in college, but I have forgotten it if I did, so it’s worth going back. Toni Morrison is a treasure. Have you read Beloved?