'Bluest Eye'

Despite knowing that they are "nicer, brighter," they cannot ignore "the honey voices of parents and aunts and the obedience in the eyes of [their] peers, the slippery light in the eyes of [their] teachers" when Maureen is around or the topic of conversation (74). The way Maureen dresses and behaves in front of adults is not the only way she affects Claudia and Frieda. With racist comments such as, "What do I care about her old black daddy...[and] you ugly! Black and ugly black e mos. I am cute," she infuriates the girls, for in their eyes Maureen is black too. Racist attitudes like Maureen's affect the poorer, darker blacks and can eventually lead them to think racist thoughts of their own.

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison takes place in Ohio in the 1940s. The novel is written from the perspective of African Americans and how they view themselves. Focusing on identity, Morrison uses rhetorical devices such as imagery, dictation, and symbolism to help stress her point of view on identity. In the novel the author argues that society influences an individual's perception on beauty, which she supports through characters like Pecola and Mrs. Breedlove. Furthermore, the novel explains how society shapes an individual's character by instilling beauty expectations. Morrison is effective in relaying her message about the various impacts that society has on an individual's character through imagery, diction, and symbolism by showing that

It has always been assumed that races have a certain look; a person can always tell what a person is by their mannerisms, their speech and the overall way they carried themselves even if they looked a certain way. However, this is mainly due to stereotypes that have long plagued our society and what one “expects” someone to look like just based on the negative connotations that are associated with skin complexion. When we read certain literature, the description of the character is the first thing that we look for as it is a way for us to somewhat bond with the character and attempt to see the story through their eyes. Toni Morrison’s Recitatif explores how the author describes each character not expressing their race leaving a bit of mysery to the reader and attempts to breaks down the stereotypes that exist for each race. Through a literary analysis, the reader is able to see those stereotypical assumptions about the color of one’s skin and how they should cease to exist in any world whether it is literal or figurative.

Throughout Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye, she captures, with vivid insight, the plight of a young African American girl and what she would be subjected to in a media contrived society that places its ideal of beauty on the e quintessential blue-eyed, blonde woman. The idea of what is beautiful has been stereotyped in the mass media since the beginning and creates a mental and emotional damage to self and soul. This oppression to the soul creates a socio-economic displacement causing a cycle of dysfunction and abuses. Morrison takes us through the agonizing story of just such a young girl, Pecola Breedlove, and her aching desire to have what is considered beautiful - blue eyes. Racial stereotypes of beauty contrived and nourished by

The Bluest Eye, written by Toni Morrison, demonstrates the internal struggles that plagued the African American working class due to the socioeconomic conditions during the early 1940s. These external pressures shaped the lifestyles of the characters both in their internal struggles and their physical surroundings. Pauline Breedlove unknowingly displays her own internal conflicts through the way in which she keeps her own home. Additionally, she further demonstrates her battle with acceptance and her obsession with beauty in the way she cares for the home of the Fishers. Another character, Geraldine, keeps her home clean with an obsessive determination. However,

“The Bluest Eye” by Toni Morrison, is a story about the life of a young black girl, Pecola Breedlove, who is growing up during post World War I. She prays for the bluest eyes, which will “make her beautiful” and in turn make her accepted by her family and peers. The major issue in the book, the idea of ugliness, was the belief that “blackness” was not valuable or beautiful. This view, handed down to them at birth, was a cultural hindrance to the black race.

The desire to feel beautiful has never been more in demand, yet so impossible to achieve. In the book “The Bluest Eye”, the author, Toni Morrison, tells the story of two black families that live during the mid-1900’s. Even though slavery is a thing of the past, discrimination and racism are still a big issue at this time. Through the whole book, characters struggle to feel beautiful and battle the curse of being ugly because of their skin color. Throughout the book Pecola feels ugly and does not like who she is because of her back skin. She believes the only thing that can ever make her beautiful is if she got blue eyes. Frieda, Pecola, Claudia, and other black characters have been taught that the key to being beautiful is by having white skin. So by being black, this makes them automatically ugly. In the final chapter of the book, the need to feel beautiful drives Pecola so crazy that she imagines that she has blue eyes. She thinks that people don’t want to look at her because they are jealous of her beauty, but the truth is they don’t look at her because she is pregnant. From the time these black girls are little, the belief that beauty comes from the color of their skin has been hammered into their mind. Mrs. Breedlove and Geraldine are also affected by the standards of beauty and the impossible goal to look and be accepted by white people. Throughout “The Bluest Eye” Toni Morrison uses the motif of beauty to portray its negative effect on characters.

She erases the blackness of the woman to justify her actions, a common endeavor in white America’s exploitation of the black body. This endeavor is evident of the

Toni Morrison is a truly extraordinary woman. She is the first African-American woman writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993. She is considered as one of the greatest modern female writers to exert a major influence on African American literature. Especially, she has created black female characters through a unique writing style and various symbols in her novels. Through Morrison’s works, she describes black women in America have been victimized by race, gender and class. They are ignored by not only white men, but also their own husband or same race. The Bluest eye (1970) is the one of the most outstanding novels to express inferiority complex of black women about the standard of beauty made by white and destructive effect of losing their identity in Black community. This paper is going to analyze two female

In a time where racial hierarchies were deemed as the standard of moral law, segregation, discrimination, and inequality was seen on every corner of industrial America. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison centers around the life of Pecola Breedlove, a young African American girl who lives in an abusive, broken home desperately yearning for blue eyes. Morrison’s novel is able to provide a clear depiction of how racial prejudice and idealized standards of white beauty contribute to the demoralization and subjugation of African American women in an era of deep racial divides. Characterized by allusion, symbolism, dialectical language, and a plethora of other literary devices, Morrison is able to display the unfortunate plague of self - hatred in the

The novel The Bluest Eye written by Toni Morrison is subjected on a young girl, Pecola Breedlove and her experiences growing up in a poor black family. The life depicted is one of poverty, ridicule, and dissatisfaction of self. Pecola feels ugly because of her social status as a poor young black girl and longs to have blue eyes, the pinnacle of beauty and worth. Throughout the book, Morrison touches on controversial subjects, such as the depicting of Pecola's father raping her, Mrs. Breedlove's sexual feelings toward her husband, and Pecola's menstruation. The book's content is controversial on many levels and it has bred conflict among its readers.

The Bluest Eye is a novel written by Toni Morrison that reveals many lessons and conflicts between young and adult characters of color. The setting takes place during the 1940s in Lorain, Ohio. The dominant speaker of this book is a nine year old girl named Claudia MacTeer who gets to know many of her neighbors. As a result of this, Claudia learns numerous lessons from her experience with the citizens of Lorain. Besides Claudia, The Bluest Eye is also told through many characters for readers to understand the connection between each of the adults and children. Many parents in the novel like Geraldine and Pauline Breedlove clearly show readers how adults change their own children. Furthermore, other adult characters like Cholly Breedlove

Morrison offers contradictory clues about Twyla and Roberta’s race throughout the short story. These clues serve the purpose of confusing the reader and, in doing so, illuminating the reader’s own prejudices and assumptions about race. When Twyla first meets Roberta, she recalls her mother, Mary’s, advice about people of Roberta’s race, “…they never washed their hair and they smelled funny” (2820). Hair has a racially charged history in the United States, especially surrounding black people’s hair. Negative opinions on afro-textured hair have been a part of racism against black people since the introduction of slavery. Despite the seemingly clear connection between negativity and afro-textured hair hinting that Roberta is black, Mary’s comment remains ambiguous since the same prejudice can be

I am the father of a 7th grader attending Chelan Middle School. I am writing to you about the book The Bluest Eyes, written by: Toni Morrison I am grossed out from this book by the content this book, with all respect I ask for this book to be removed from the Chelan School District.

This quotation is written in the last chapter of “The Bluest Eye” in this quote Claudia tries to explain to us the readers what the story is about. She describes love as something that has the potential become a force that is twisted the example to this is that Claudia explains how Cholly is the only person who loves Pecola “enough to touch her”. Cholly raped Pecola and if that is seen as love in this novel it shows how twisted the view of love is. Although love said to be healing to be able to lift you up from unending despair, Claudia believes that love is good enough as the lovers thus if the lover has sadness the love he gives will not do much. This is why people in the novel are unable to love each other well. She believes love cam become