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Causes Of Demise In Toni Morrison's Novel 'The Bluest Eye'

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Pietro Elie F Band 3/8/17 TBE essay 1st Draft: How Pecola’s parents caused her demise In Toni Morrison’s novel The Bluest Eye, Pecola Breedlove lives a life of suffering and self-hatred and winds up going insane. There are many causes of her insanity, but the primary one is her parents’ poor treatment and neglect of her. Morrison uses different points of view at different points in the novel to show that Pecola’s demise is brought about by the way her parents treat her. The household where Pecola grows up is full of hatred and hostility, and these qualities are transferred to Pecola, leading her to hate herself. Early in the novel, an omniscient or all-knowing narrator tells us all sorts of things that lead us to believe that the Breedloves are …show more content…

For example, the narrator says that Mrs. Breedlove’s quarrels with Cholly “gave grandeur” (41) to the household; in them, “she could display the style and imagination of what she believed to be her own true self.” (41) The narrator also states that Mrs. Breedlove “needed Cholly’s sins desperately” (42) because these allow her to feel morally superior to him. And Cholly, by hating her, can “[pour] out on her all of his inarticulate fury and aborted desires.” (42.) The omniscient point of view allows Morrison to convey these things to the reader immediately and directly. The omniscient narrator gives us access to Pecola’s thoughts and feelings. When her parents, Cholly and Pauline Breedlove, have a violent altercation, Pecola lies and watches while praying for them to stop. Their constant fighting makes her feel suicidal: “she struggled between an overwhelming desire that one would kill the other, and a profound wish that she herself could die.” (43) Self-hatred will lead to depression and then to insanity, and here is a perfect example of her self-hatred -- she wants to die--that is caused by her

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