Key Characters in The Bluest Eye

Breedloves

The Breedloves are a family who aren’t like your traditional family. The family live in this abandoned store, they fight and argue with each other, and they are mean to each other. They don’t treat each other with respect. The children Pecola and Sammy don’t refer to their parents as Mom and Dad they call them Mrs. Breedlove and Cholly. This was one ugly poor family as Morrison said, “They lived there because they were poor and black, and they stayed there because they believed they were ugly” (Morrison 38). Mrs. Breedlove controlled her ugliness like an actor would do. Sammy used his ugliness to frighten people and hurt them. Pecola hid behind hers like a curtain. The meaning of their ugliness wasn’t that they were ugly to the eye. They were ugly because of their personalities. “It was as though some mysterious all-knowing master had given each one a cloak of ugliness to wear, and they had each accepted it without question” (Morrison 39).

~Sade

MacTeers

            Morrison includes multiple families throughout the story to offer complex representations of familial life. While the Breedloves are grotesque, the MacTeers are loving. There are four members of the MacTeer family: Mama, Daddy, Frieda, and Claudia. Claudia serves as the narrator in some sections of the novel. We learn about the community and the setting from her. Her perspective as a young black girl who comes from a supportive family contrasts greatly with Pecola who comes from an unloving family.

            ~Dr. H

Mr. Henry

            The reader is introduced to Mr. Henry in the “Autumn” section. When Mr. Henry was introduced in the novel, he seemed nice, friendly, and like an outgoing type of guy. He was very friendly with Frieda and Claudia. They liked him. “He smelled wonderful……. He smiled a lot, showing small even teeth with a friendly gap in the middle” (Morrison 15). “We loved him, even after what came later, there was no bitterness in our memory of him” (Morrison 15).  Their Dad even cracked a smile when he was playing with the girls. It seems as if he’s going to have a pretty close connection with the girls. Especially with him moving into the house. He now lives with the MacTeers and rents a room from them. However, the novel foreshadows that he will create some problem in the future with the family.

            ~Stephen

China, Poland, and Ms. Marie

Three prostitutes live above the Breedloves’ storefront home. The three women China, Poland, and Miss Marie are the first people in the community to be nice to Pecola. Most people are cruel to her, so that’s why she sticks around them. Pecola and the ladies discuss various topics she is curious about such as love, sexuality, beauty, and race. These women are probably not the best people to receive advice from, but she still likes them. Their poor advice often includes lies and misinformation which contribute to her state of misunderstanding.

            ~Luc