“The Bluest Eyes” – Toni Morrrison

Written by – Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison (born Chloe Anthony Wofford), is an American author, editor, and professor who won the 1993 Nobel Prize in Literature for being an author "who in novels characterized by visionary force and poetic import, gives life to an essential aspect of American reality."

Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed African American characters; among the best known are her novels like, The Bluest Eye, Song Of Solomon, and Beloved, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988. In 2001 she was named one of "The 30 Most Powerful Women in America" by Ladies' Home Journal.

 Character list:

  Pecola Breedlove

  Cholly Breedlove

  Pauline "Polly" Breedlove

  Sam Breedlove

  Auntie Jimmy

  The Fishers,etc

Main issue in the Novel:

-        Whiteness is beauty

-        Beauty is subjective

-        Love  is only as good as the lover

-        Gender disparity

-        Sacrifice

-        Sexual desire

About the Novel:

In The Bluest Eye, Pecola Breedlove's father rapes her. When Pecola's baby dies, she goes mad. Pecola spends the rest of her days speaking to her imaginary friend about her blue eyes, which were given to her by Soaphead Church.

The "bluest eye" refers to the blue eyes of the blond American myth, by which standard the black-skinned and brown-eyed always measure up as inadequate.

At the beginning of the novel, Pecola Breedlove goes to live with Claudia and Frieda's family, the MacTeers, after her father Cholly burns down their old house.

Sometime after the Breedloves move into a new house, Cholly rapes Pecola, impregnating her. When she learns of the pregnancy, she goes to see Soaphead Church, the town's spiritual advisor, and asks him to give her blue eyes. Pecola's request is not for more money or a better house or even for more sensible parents; her request is for blue eyes — something that, even if she had been able to acquire them, would not have abated the harshness of her abject reality.

When Pecola's baby dies, she's driven mad by grief and abuse, and she spends the rest of her days staring into mirrors, talking to her imaginary friend about her big blue eyes.

So, The bluest Eyes provides an extended depiction of the ways in which internalized of the ways in which internalize white beauty girls and women. Nine-year- old Claudia and ten year- old Frieda Mac Teer live in Lorain Ohil, with their parents. It is the end of the great depression, and the girl’s parents are more concerned with making ends meet than with lavishing attention upon their daughters, but there is an undercurrent of love and stability in their home.

So, The Bluest Eye remains one of Tony Morrisons's most powerful, unforgettable novels- and a significant work of American fiction.

“Far From The Madding Crowd” – By Thomas Hardy

Written By: Thomas Hardy

One of the most renowned poets and novelists in English literary history, Thomas Hardy was born in 1840 in the English village of Higher Bockhampton in the county of Dorset. Hardy is primarily a storyteller and should be viewed more as a chronicler of moods and deeds than as a philosopher.

Character list:

·         Gabrial Oak

·         Bathsheba Everdene

·         Sgt. Francis frank Troy

·         William Boldwood

·         Fanny Robin, etc.

About the Novel:

 Far from the Madding Crowd (1874) is Thomas Hardy's fourth novel and his first major literary success. The novel Far from the Madding Crowd, which raises many questions about society, religion, morals, and the contrast between a good life and its rewards, is bound to make us  curious about the author who brings them up.

In Far From the Madding Crowd almost all the scenes and incidents takes place in the world which is away from the superficial glittering light of city. Hardy shows the differentiated between rural people and city people. City people are more cunning, selfish, arrogant, etc.

In the novel the protagonist Gabrial Oak is very much close to the nature and also to the animals and he could predict what will happen with the change in the atmosphere.

Gabrial Oak fall in love with Bathsheba and also wants to marry with her. Bathsheba attracted towards the glittering light of city same as Bathsheba attracted towards the glittering light of city people but she cannot saw the shadow under the light and trapping by Troy. She was not aware about the evil mentality of Troy. She married with Troy and after marriage she comes to know about the reality of Troy. Boldwood also wants to marry with Bathsheba but he couldn’t marry. So, at the end out of revenge motif he killed Troy and Bathsheba goes with the hero- Gabrial oak.

Fanny Robin one of the important character in this Novel, who is victim of Troy and also of society. She wasn’t accepted by Troy and society. She suffering a lot compared to the other characters. Even in the novel of Hardy not only female characters but male characters also suffer.

So, we can conclude that, Thomas Hardy’s novel “Far From the Madding Crowd” is a romantic tragedy. In which, Hardy lets us know the politics of being a woman in 1870 England through his characters' actions, opinions and privileges. Life, it seems, is never easy, but once in a while it is light – hearted plesure.

“Heart Of Darkness” – By Joseph Conrad

Author: Joseph Conrad

Joseph Conrad is remembered for novels like Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim, which drew on his experience as a mariner and addressed profound themes of nature and existence. Joseph Conrad is remembered for novels like Heart of Darkness and Lord Jim, which drew on his experience as a mariner and addressed profound themes of nature and existence. A writer of complex skill and striking insight, but above all of an intensely personal vision, he has been increasingly regarded as one of the greatest English novelists.

Type of Work: novella

Setting: on the deck of the Nellie; the Congo River 

Main Characters: Marlow, Mr.Kurtz, The Manager, The Accountant, The Harlequin, The Intended, Kurtz’s Native Mistress

Motifs: journey; darkness of civilization

About The Novella:

Heart of Darkness is structured as a Frame tale, not a first-person narrative. Marlow's story is told by the anonymous narrator who listens to Marlow on the deck of the Nellie. Conrad's frame narrator, like the reader, learns that his ideas about European imperialism are founded on a number of lies that he wholeheartedly believed. By the end of the novella, Marlow's tale significantly changes the narrator's attitude toward the ships and men of the past. Only the narrator — and the reader — understand Marlow's initial point: "Civilized" Europe was once a "dark place," and it has only become more morally dark through the activities of institutions like the Company.

Charlie Marlow finds work as a ship's commander for a trading company in Africa, near the Congo River. He travels from France to the western African coast on a steamer, then takes a boat to the trading company's Inner Station.

On his journey, Marlow is appalled by the conditions of the black slaves. He arrives to find that the boat he was to command has sunk to the bottom of the river. It will take months to repair.

Marlow repeatedly hears about a man named Kurtz, who also works for the trading company. There are many rumors about Kurtz: that he's ill, that he's going to be promoted, that he and Marlow are alike.

Marlow later learns that Kurtz was the one who ordered an attack on the boat. He appears to have gone mad, and the natives worship him like a god. After Kurtz dies, Marlow returns to Europe.

“The Namesake”- By Jhumpa Lahiri

About The Auther

The novel “The Namesake” is written by Indo - American writer Jumpa Lahiri. Jhumpa Lahiri was a Bengali Indian woman writer. She spent her childhood in India and at young age she migrates to America. In 1999, Lahiri published her first short story collection entitled Interpreter of Maladies. Jhumpa Lahiri is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author known for works of fiction like Interpreter of Maladies, The Namesake, Unaccustomed Earth and The Lowland. What she feels is presented in this novel. Two generation makes vast difference. One prefer to old culture where as another accepting newer one.

Key Facts about The Namesake

• Full Title: The Namesake
• When Written: 2003
• Where Written: First published in part by the New Yorker, in June 2003
• When Published: September, 2003
• Literary Period: Contemporary
• Genre: Contemporary Immigrant Fiction, Bildungsroman
• Setting: Calcutta; Massachusetts; New York
• Climax: Debatably, in a novel whose scope spans three decades, the climax comes when Gogol’s father, Ashoke, dies unexpectedly, causing Gogol to return toward his family, leave Maxine, and ultimately marry Moushumi.
• Point of View: Third person omniscient narrator, sometimes with the added perspective of a specific character

 Character list

1)    Ashoke Ganguli

2)    Ashima Ganguli

3)    Nikhil/Gogol Ganguli

4)    Sonali Ganguli

5)   Moushumi Mazoomdar

About The Novel

 

The Namesake is The story of Bengali – Indian family in America. This navel based on one family. All characters have their individual problem. Two generation suffering for their perspective about their life but they fit in such kind of a box from where they can’t move an inch. If they move than it is a problem for another.

In The Namesake, a Bengalese couple name their son after the Russian writer Nikolai Gogol. The name frustrates Gogol, just as his parents' traditional values embarrass him. After his father dies, Gogol becomes more interested in his family's heritage and marries a Bengalese woman named Moushumi. In the end, they divorce, and Gogol takes comfort in memories of his father.

Ashoke, an engineering student at MIT, consents to an arranged marriage with Ashumi. He names their son Gogol after the Russian writer. Gogol hates his name and disavows his Bengalese heritage for most of his adolescence.

After Ashoke died, Gogol finally takes an interest in his heritage. He marries Moushumi, a Bengalese woman, but their marriage crumbles after Moushumi has an affair.

In the end, Gogol takes comfort in a book of Nikolai Gogol's stories. He knows now that Ashoke was reading Gogol before he got caught in a train accident, and that the page he tore out during the crash alerted medics to his presence in the midst of the wreckage.

So, we can conclude that whatever things  happens in this Novel because of the SAKE of NAME. The life of Gogol becomes pathetic because of the two cultures, two identities, two nations and moreover two NAMES.