The Bluest Eye Cholly Breedlove Quotes

Never did he once consider directing his hatred toward the hunters. Such an emotion would have destroyed him. They were big, white, armed men. He was small, black, helpless. His subconscious knew what his conscious mind did not guess – that hating them would have consumed him, burned him up like a piece of soft coal. (3.6.61)

Cholly is unable to hate the white men because hating them would have destroyed him, as they are socially and legally more powerful than him. Instead, he transfers his hate to the women in his life.

Three women are leaning out of two windows. They see the long clean neck of a new young boy and call to him. He goes to where they are....They give him lemonade in a Mason jar. As he drinks, their eyes float up to him through the bottom of the jar....They give him back his manhood, which he takes aimlessly. (3.8.82)

Cholly presumably encounters Miss Marie, Poland, and China here, but the text leaves this ambiguous. He has fun with them and rediscovers his masculinity.

What could he do for her – ever? What give her? What say to her? What could a burned-out black man say to the hunched back of his eleven-year-old daughter? If he looked into her face, he would see those haunted, loving eyes. The hauntedness would irritate him – the love would move him to fury. How dare she love him? Hadn't she any sense at all? What was he supposed to do about that? Return it? How? (3.8.87)

Cholly's self-hatred seems to rear its head right before he rapes Pecola. He doesn't understand how such an innocent creature could love him.