The Bluest Eye
Part 2 and 3
The Bluest “i”
Quiz






1. What insulting phrase to Claudia and Frieda
hurl at Maureen Peel after she has insulted them
– calling them black and ugly?
2. Who’s visiting with Mr. Henry when Claudia
and Frieda get home from school after their
encounter with Maureen Peel?
3. Why does Jr. hate the cat?
4. Why do Frieda and Claudia need to find Pecola
on the afternoon that Mr. Henry has “molested”
Frieda?
5. Although Mrs. Breedlove believes that her
damaged foot killed her dreams, the narrator
believes that, instead, it was
_____________________.
6. What is it that Mrs. Breedlove loves about
making love to her husband?
Your Assignment
 You’ve
been appointed to be the
discussion leader for The Bluest Eye
in your book group.
 Pose three questions you’d like your
book group to address when they
meet to talk about novel.
Stuff to discuss - 1.
The shift between Claudia young
and Claudia old – p. 65, for example,
and p. 74. Is this a problem? Why or
why not?
 2. Imitation of Life p. 67, and piece
from CLC p. 328
– Plot summary
– Connection between Pauline and Delilah
– Name connection Pecola/Peola (328)
More Stuff
3. What is the Maginot Line? P. 77 –
connection/symbolism?
 4. Why the typing of Geraldine, before we
meet Geraldine? How does it match or
double Gerladine’s typing of Pecola at the
end of the chapter? Where do you find
other examples of doubling or pairs or
opposites of doppelgangers in the novel?
 5. Morrison’s sarcasm. (p. 92, for
example) Does it work? Is it too obvious?

More Stuff
 6.
Pauline’s section. How does it
work to move back and forth
between the two voices?
 7. Beauty/Romantic love. (p. 122)
 8. Is Morrison asking you to forgive
Pauline’s “sins” because of the
trauma/trials of her past? Is this a
kind of “excuse” you can accept?
Friday’s Quiz







1. Why would it be dangerous for Cholly to hate
the white men who interrupt his “tryst” with
Darlene?
2. “Only a ___________ would sense, know
without knowing that he knew, that Cholly was
free. Dangerously free.”
3. What is a misanthrope?
4. Why does Velma leave Elihue Micah
Whitcomb? (AKA Soaphead Church)
5. List 3 things in Soaphead Church’s cigar box.
6. What is it that Frieda and Claudia want to
hear grownups say about Pecola?
7. X-tra credit ?
Morrison’s Afterward
 P.
210 – Her focus
 P. 211 – her intent
 P. 215 – her meditation on her
success and failure
For Friday: Themes
 1.
Many critics have approached the
novel in the context of the rise of
African American writers, assigning
significance to their revision of
American history with their own
cultural materials and folk traditions.
– How do you see Morrison revising
history, working with African American
materials, reworking white American
materials, using folk traditions? Any
examples?
Themes

2. Others have considered the ways The
Bluest Eye uses conventional grotesque
imagery as a vehicle for social protest.
– What is the grotesque?
 Wolfgang
Kayser – focuses on terror and fear, the
negative grotesque, to express alienation,
estrangement, and the terrifying disorder underlying
daily life in the 20th century.
 Mikhail Bakhtin – emphasizes the elements of play,
humor and renewal, the positive grotesque, to
express the idea of change and transformation, the
regenerative reality behind the surface of everyday
life.
– Is there some sense of social protest here?
How does it hinge from her use of the
grotesque?
Themes
 3.
Scholars also have been attracted
to The Bluest Eye by its
deconstruction of "whiteness" along
racial, gender, and economic lines.
– What connections do you make between
Morrison’s construction of whiteness in
this novel and her comments about
whites’ construction of the Africanist
presence in her theory?
Themes
 4.
Feminists have equated the
violence of the narrative with selfhatred wrought by a wide range of
illusions about white American
society and African American
women's place in it.
– Can you separate the racial and
gendered themes of the novel? How are
they entwined? Is the novel as much
about Cholly’s victimization as it is
about Pecola’s?
Themes

5. Some critics have examined the
influence of environment on the novel's
characters, identifying stylistic affinities
with literary naturalism.
– What do you know about naturalism?
– What other naturalist texts have you read?
– Is Morrison making a plea for the
“faultlessness” of her characters based on their
position in the universe?
– Did this work for Crane and Dreiser? Does it
work for Morrison?
Themes

6. Other readers have offered Marxist
interpretations of the novel's formal
aspects in terms of the ideological content
of its representation of African American
life.
– Is this a comment on the evils of capitalism?
– Where is that commentary on the economic
system foregrounded?
– How is slavery, for example, at the heart of
Soaphead Church’s story?
– How does Morrison’s reference to Imitation of
Life support a Marxist reading of the text?
A summing up by the critics
Acknowledging Morrison's achievement in
the novel, critics have generally acclaimed
The Bluest Eye for
 1) deconstructing a number of literary
taboos with its honest portrayals of
American girlhood, 2) its frank
descriptions of intraracial racism or
"colorism" in the African American
community, and,
 3) its thoughtful treatment of the
emotional precocity of prepubescent girls.
