Adult women, having learned to hate the blackness of their own bodies, take this hatred out on their children. Mrs. Breedlove shares in the conviction that Pecola is ugly, and lighter-skinned Geraldine curses Pecola's blackness. Claudia remains free from this worship of whiteness, imagining Pecola's unborn baby as beautiful in its blackness. Once Claudia reaches adolescence, she too learns to hate herself, as if racial self-loathing is a necessary part of maturation.
It is through the actions and emotions shown by adults that hatred evolves in the memories of the children. Claudia's hatred is evident towards Shirley Temple: "Not because she was cute, but because she danced with Bojangles, who was my friend, my uncle, my daddy, and who ought to have been soft-shoeing it and chuckling with me. Instead he was enjoying, sharing, giving a lovely dance thing with one of those little white girls whose socks never slid down under their heels." Pecola's memories and ideals that form, connect beauty with being loved and believes that if she possesses blue eyes, the cruelty in her life will be replaced by affection and respect. These hopeless desires and unforgettable memories lead ultimately to the emotional and psychological mutilation of Pecola. .
Memories are also seen as the foundation of A. E. Housman's To an Athlete Dying Young. Through the allusion of the line: "Shoulder-high we bring you home.", This poem holds, as its main theme, the premature death of a young athlete as told from the memories of a fond friend serving at his funeral. "The time you won your town the race/ we chaired you through the market- place/ Man and boy stood cheering by/ and home we brought you shoulder high/." The first stanza demonstrates the narrator's most impacting memories of the deceased athlete. These lines of the poem, being of an optimistic nature, denote the athlete's positive impact on the narrator's ideals and memories he has.