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1-Page Summary of The Bluest Eye
Overall Summary
In 1941, Claudia and Frieda MacTeer live in an old house near the end of the Great Depression. Their mother is strict and punishes them often out of concern for their well-being, but she loves her daughters very much. Their father works hard to keep the family afloat by taking in boarders like Henry Washington (whom they call Mr. Henry) and Cholly Breedlove’s daughter Pecola because he burned down his own home while drunk. The girls love Shirley Temple because she is beautiful with white features, but Claudia disagrees with them about that.
Eventually, Pecola and her family move back to the apartment where they live. Her life is hard because her father is an alcoholic who beats people up and her mother neglects the children. The parents fight all the time, which leads to physical violence in their house. Pecola’s brother tries to run away from home but he can’t do that because he’s a young black boy; however, Pecola can’t escape either because she’s a girl. She believes that she’ll remain ugly for the rest of her life and won’t be accepted by others unless she has blue eyes like those of white people.
The reader learns about Pecola’s parents. Her father, Cholly Breedlove, was abandoned as a baby and later turned away by his father after searching him out. During Cholly’s first sexual experience, two white men stumble upon him and the girl he was with and force him to continue the sexual act as they watch. This humiliating incident leads Cholly to develop a hatred for women. He lives a dangerously free life, and feels tied down after getting married. Pecola’s mother, Mrs. Breedlove has always felt isolated because of her lame foot but she also hated herself due to her belief that she is ugly which came from seeing beautiful actresses on movies who made her feel inferior than them so she became obsessed in being like those movie stars while working for a white family makes her despise herself more than ever before making her believe that being black is an embarrassment since it only brings misery instead of joys in life as well as having children makes her become more self-absorbed believing that everything she does is just for their benefit even if it means sacrificing what matters most such as love or happiness despite all these things happening around here still doesn’t stop Mr. And Mrs Breedlove from treating each other badly which eventually causes the death of their daughter Pauline (Pecola) when Mr Breedlove rapes Pauline then leaves home without saying goodbye leaving Mrs Breeding alone with no one but God to help heal the pain caused by both husband and daughter’s departure leading up to this tragedy
One day, Cholly comes home drunk and sees Pecola washing the dishes. He feels a mixture of tenderness for her and hatred because he knows that he is not able to care for her. He also experiences guilt about his inability to take care of her. In an act of desperation, he rapes Pecola in front of the kitchen sink. Mrs Breedlove beats Pecola when she finds out what happened between them. Later on, Pecola visits Soaphead Church to ask him if she can get blue eyes like all the other girls at school have gotten from their contact lenses. Soaphead Church tricks her into killing his dog by poisoning it so that it will die soon afterwards, telling her that if it acts funny after ingesting the poison then she’ll be granted with blue eyes as well as eternal life (as implied by its death).
In the summer, Claudia and Frieda sell marigold seeds to save money for a new bike. They learn that Pecola has been impregnated by her father. Unlike the rest of the community, they want the baby to live. They sacrifice their money and bury it near Pecola’s house so that she can have enough funds for her child’s care. The girls plant marigold seeds in their backyard as well, believing that if they grow, their prayers will be answered and Pecola’s baby will live. However, despite all of this effort from them both and everyone else involved with trying to help out Pecola (including Mr. Henry), nothing grows from those seeds—the baby dies anyway. Afterward, Pecola goes mad, believing she has blue eyes like Miss Maudie taught her about earlier on in the story when describing how people used to think someone could tell what color eyes one had just by looking at them. The entire community disowns her after this incident because they believe she is cursed or possessed by an evil spirit. She lives isolated in her own world thereafter.
