Violence, And Domestic Violence In Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye, the plot of the novel largely focuses on the story of one character, Pecola. Pecola’s character suffers repeated and excruciating instances of violence in various forms throughout the book, whether in her broken and volatile family or in the unfriendly environment of the outside world. Three types of violence stand out for both their prominence in the book and for their impact on Pecola’s life: sexual violence, emotional violence, and domestic violence. These different forms oftentimes overlap, sometimes all three occurring at once. In The Bluest Eye, a toxic combination of sexual, emotional, and domestic violence shatter Pecola’s youthful innocence and leaving her largely alone and uncared for, sending her …show more content…
From birth, Pecola was shouldered with significant societal disadvantages: she was poor, black, and part of an explosive family environment. Furthermore, for most of her life, Pecola had been considered ugly by those around her. Even her own mother, just after her birth, commented emphatically, “but Lord she was ugly” (Morrison 126). She was berated by Maureen Peal, who declared, “I am cute! And you ugly!” (Morrison 73). This lifetime of putdowns left Pecola wanting to change dramatically who she was and how she looked, most notably her desire to have blue eyes. As a dark-skinned, dark-eyed young girl, the idea of blue eyes was an unreachable dream for Pecola that left her constantly desiring more and only fueled her self-loathing. These emotional traumas were only exacerbated by the emotional neglect she experienced from her family at home. Pecola’s mother Pauline, disappointed in her own life, immersed herself in her work, neglecting “her house, her children, her man,” relegating them to “afterthoughts one has just before sleep” (Morrison 127). Furthermore, her father, when he was even home, was either drunk or recovering from being so, and rarely, if ever, served his paternal role to Pecola. With this daunting absence of attention and care from her parents, Pecola suffered …show more content…
The two types of violence described above, sexual and emotional, have the most profound and destructive effect on Pecola when they occur within her own family. Even with the various forms of emotional violence she suffers outside the home, Pecola could have handled this and lived a normal life if her family had been there to support her. Instead, her home and family environment was a textbook example of a shattered home. Her father’s alcoholism both drained the family’s funds and energy, and led Cholly to neglect most of his paternal duties. Her mother’s strong distaste for her own family led her to neglect and abuse Pecola from birth, leaving her absent of any caring parental figure. Beyond this massive emotional hole in Pecola’s life, she also suffered physical abuse at the hands of her parents. When Pecola accidentally dropped the berry cobbler in the kitchen of Pauline’s employer, Pauline “was on Pecola, and with the back of her hand knocked her to the floor,” and then “yanked her up by the arm, slapped her again…” (Morrison 109). Furthermore, Pecola’s parents fought frequently and violently, with a “darkly brutal formalism” (Morrison 43). In their small, compact house, there was nowhere for Pecola to run to. She was forced to witness