Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye provides insight into the injustices of racism and poverty in America in the mid-1900s through the perspective of nine-year-old Claudia and ten-year-old Frieda MacTeer. Living in Lorain, Ohio, with their parents, the MacTeers take in a young girl as a resident named Pecola. Pecola is a young black girl who throughout the story is critiqued, shamed, and virtually destroyed due to the corrupt morals of her society. Morrison describes how African-American girls during this time period were encouraged to aspire to be white. All of the female African-American characters in the novel have grown up in a society that does not find them beautiful or even worthy of being looked at. Pecola is constantly identified by her ugliness, and she fixates on what society deems to be a symbol of beauty and purity – blue eyes. Pecola's belief that blue eyes will make her beautiful shows two specific effects of racism on young African-American girls: low self-esteem and envy of whiteness. Clearly, the desire to escape poverty and the limiting circumstances of their social conditions is a common feeling among the characters in the novel. Several characters construct and perpetuate fantasies or beliefs about transcending their circumstances. For Pecola, a belief that if she had blue eyes she would have an ideal life guides her; for Pecola's mother, movies provide that same hope and escape. Claudia and Frieda find courage in the fertility of the earth as they associate growing seeds with the wellbeing of other characters.
These characters create fantasies in the attempt to find comfort and adapt to their society, but what they end up finding is isolation and lack of fulfillment as their fantasies cannot satiate their desires. The literary lenses I will use to demonstrate Morrison's intent will be based on Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye's various literary theories.
Her first novel, "The Bluest Eye," was published in 1970. ... In 1965 she started writing 'The Bluest Eye." ... " The characters in the bluest eye show exactly why such a movement was needed. ... Pecola Breedlove is the central figure in "The Bluest Eye." ... "The Bluest Eye" focuses on Pecola Breedlove, a lonely adolescent black girl in the late 1940's. ...
Bluest Eye Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye is about the life of the Breedlove family who resides in Lorain, Ohio, in the late 1930s. ... She wants the bluest eye. ... Names play an important part in The Bluest Eye because they are often symbolic of conditions in society or in the context of the story. The name of the novel, "The Bluest Eye," is meant to get the reader thinking about how much value is placed on blue-eyed little girls. ... There are two major metaphors in The Bluest Eye, one of marigolds and one of dandelions. ...
Toni Morisson's novel The Bluest Eye is about the life of the Breedlove family who resides in Lorain, Ohio, in the late 1930s. ... She wants the bluest eye. ... The narrative structure of The Bluest Eye is important in revealing just how pervasive and destructive social racism is. ... Names play an important part in The Bluest Eye because they are often symbolic of conditions in society or in the context of the story. The name of the novel, "The Bluest Eye," is meant to get the reader thinking about how much value is placed on blue-eyed little girls. ...
The Bluest Eye, written in 1940 by Toni Morrison, is constructed to reveal a very powerful point that applies not only to the book, but also to many societies of the present day. ... The ideas and views present in The Bluest Eye are related to beauty and what makes one beautiful. ... In the opening of The Bluest Eye, the passage from the Dick and Jane story, becomes a representation of an ideal white person's life. ... The cup that bears Shirley Temple's image is blue and white, symbolizing the eye and skin color of the idealized white society. ... She becomes the society that woul...
The variety of passionately displayed themes, interactions, and events presented in The Bluest Eye provide an understanding of Toni Morrison's inner thoughts and beliefs which were highly impacted by her various life experiences. ... In The Bluest Eye, Morrison thoroughly uses her previous experiences in aid to create the feeling of hardship and the melancholy tone of the novel. ... The Bluest Eye was Morrison's first novel. ... Moses expresses the fact that in traditional blues songs, the singer is the subject, however, in The Bluest Eye, Claudia tells Pecola's story instead,...
In the novel, The Bluest Eye, by Toni Morrison, the evils inflicted upon blacks by a white society indoctrinated by the inherent beauty of whiteness and ugliness of blackness are thoroughly depicted. ... The Bluest Eye is a bitter novel that vividly reflects the way in which blacks were treated unfairly, and more important, how most blacks were unable to resist oppression from whites during the late nineteenth century. ... Maybe they'd say, "Why, look at pretty-eyed Pecola. ... More important though, The Bluest Eye, goes beyond its value as a work of literature. ... As a result, blacks...
The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye tells the sad story of Pecola Breedlove, a poor prepubescent black girl, who wants to be loved and cared for by her family and society. ... She idolizes images of blond haired, blue-eyed white girls like Shirley Temple. ... In this story, postwar middle-American black communities use the image of Shirley Temple in the same way southern creoles created the infamous "paper bag test- to exclude darker skinned blacks from the higher tiers of African American society. ... But African-Americans can't change this aspect of society. ......
The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye tells the sad story of Pecola Breedlove, a poor prepubescent black girl, who wants to be loved and cared for by her family and society. ... She idolizes images of blond haired, blue-eyed white girls like Shirley Temple. ... In this story, postwar middle-American black communities use the image of Shirley Temple in the same way southern creoles created the infamous "paper bag test- to exclude darker skinned blacks from the higher tiers of African American society. ... But African-Americans can't change this aspect of society. ... a...
The Eyes of Society In The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, the central theme is society's negative influence on the individual. ... Bobby loves Pecola Breedlove" and get an immediate response of anger from the boy. ... In The Bluest Eye, Claudia MacTeer provides a child's point of view-sometimes from an adult perspective while an omniscient voice relates information unknown by Claudia, like Pecola's thoughts. ... For example, the name of the novel, The Bluest Eye, is meant to get the reader thinking about how the desire for blue eyes dominated society and ruined ...