Because of racism and her own personal background, Pauline neglects her family and allows Pecola to be victimized. One reason that Pauline turns out the way she does is that she always felt inadequate. Growing up Pauline blamed her foot for her constant source of humiliation. “The easiest thing to do would be to build a case out of her foot.” “That is what she herself did” (Morrison 110). In addition, once she moved to Ohio she had to contend with regional and social class barriers to norms of beauty that she had never imagined. For example, she couldn't keep up with latest fashion and this takes a big toll on her spirit. “Pauline felt uncomfortable with the few black women she met.” “They were amused by her because she did not straighten …show more content…
One way Paulie copes is by losing herself in Hollywood films, by styling hair like Jean Harlow in order to feel prettier.Of course, Pauline can never really be Jean Harlow. She will always fall short. Pauilie’s concern of how she measures up to white culture influences Pecola to have unattainable beauty standards. When Pauline loses her tooth, she gives up on becoming Jean Harlow and instead focuses on serving the Fishers in their white perfection. In order to cope with the fact that she may never live up to society's standard of beauty, Pauline pretends that the Fisher, kitchen, money for groceries, and their daughter are hers. This elaborate fantasy Pauline creates for herself leads her to push her children away. This can be seen in her treatment of Pecola when Rosemary accuses Claudia of hitting her. Mama looks at Pecola. “You too!” she said” “Child of mine or not” She grabs Pecola and Spun her around. (Morrison 31) Pauline punishes Pecola for nothing. Even though Pauline felt sorry for what she did, she is still taking her anger out on Pecola who in the moment was innocent and afraid of her changing body. Pauline washed Pecola and showed her that she could be a
Pauline Breedlove’s racial self-loathing began when she was a young girl. Pauline first perceives herself as ugly when she is left with a limp foot after impaling it on a nail. This limp foot sets the basis for her feelings of “separateness and unworthiness” as a child (Morrison 111). Pauline’s family then moves from Alabama to Kentucky to look for employment, therefore exposing her to even more isolation. Because Pauline is often alone, she develops a love for organizing and cleaning her house. Arranging items gave Pauline a sense of control and “when by some accident somebody scattered her rows” Pauline was delighted and “never angry” because it “gave her a chance to rearrange them again” (111). As she grew older, Pauline fantasized about men and fell in love with Cholly Breedlove. Pauline’s sense of worth and beauty soon became defined by Cholly’s perception of her, as she finally felt as if “her bad foot was an asset” (116). Pauline’s obsession with beauty and order stays with her throughout her adulthood. She constantly escapes from her dysfunctional life and enters a fantasy when watching movies starring beautiful white actresses. However, Pauline faces a reality check when her tooth falls out after biting into a piece of candy at the movies. This incident causes Pauline to accept her ugliness, which intensifies her self-loathing.
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 powerlessness of Pauline is one of the first things we see as a reader when we meet her. One of the main aspects of the powerlessness we see was that she “wasn’t much
This jumps out at me because it accentuates the correlation between her upbringing and the way she views herself now. For example, Pecola has no access to such teachings as Geraldine, indicating that this now may make her more inferior to her due to her lack of social mannerisms. Because of this, Pecola views herself as
The character of Pauline tries so desperately to fit into society's typecast of beauty that she loses the ability to love herself for who she is as well as her ability to appreciate what she does have. For example, when Pauline is made to feel inferior by other black women, Morrison emphasizes, "Pauline felt uncomfortable with the few black women she met. They were amused by her because she didn't straighten her hair. When she tried to make up her face as they did, it came off rather badly. Their goading glances and private snickers at her way of talking... and dressing developed in her desire for new clothes" (Morrison 118). Pauline is aggravated because of her physical appearance. She feels ugly and wants to fit in with society's women. She tries fitting into what is thought by those around her to be the ideal characterization of beauty instead of accepting herself for whom she is. Pauline Breedlove's insecurities only deepen as a result of her attempts to look a certain way. In addition, when Morrison explains how Pauline would rather be around nice things at work than at her own
She is raped and impregnated by her father, Cholly and this wrong is never truly righted. Her mother decided at the time of her birth that Pecola was ugly. Pecola’s mother either ignores and neglects her or abuses her. Pecola, Frieda, and Claudia visit her mother, whom she calls Mrs. Breedlove, at work where she is the nanny and housekeeper to a young white girl. While visiting her, she knocks over a blueberry pie and burns her legs.
In the novel, Morrison condemns the idea of living by one’s perception of one’s value rather than through the truth, which leads to negative implications. Pauline Breedlove creates an elaborate fantasy world, in which the household of her white employers becomes hers. Morrison indicates that Pauline “[looks] at their houses, [smells] their linens, [touches] their silk draperies, and [loves] all of it” (Morrison, 127), to suggest that Pauline has formed an attachment to what she believes is hers. The way she refers to “[her] floor...[her] floor...[her] floor” (107), after her daughter Pecola accidentally spills a tart at the Fishers’ house, implies that Pauline views that household as a parallel reality, with the white girl as her daughter, and the clean kitchen as her kitchen. Morrison depicts another illusion in which Pauline strives to become a paragon of virtue—by being “an active church woman, [not] drinking, smoking or carousing” (128). She believes she “[fulfills] a mother’s role conscientiously when she points out [the father’s] faults to keep [the children] from having them” (129). But in reality, Pauline fails to embody that role, often “neglecting her house, her children, her man” (127) and “fighting [her husband] with a darkly brutal formalism” (43). Morrison’s depiction of Pauline’s delusive mindset consequently leads to harmful effects, like the emotional abandonment of her family. Her
have white beauty is so strong that she eats Mary Jane candies, fantasizing that the candies will
Even though she can 't pinpoint where her ugliness is she can pinpoint what people find attractive. When we are first introduced to Pecola she is awe at the narrator’s(Claudia) sister (Frieda) Cup. The cup has a picture of Shirley Temple. The cute button noses girl with the curly blond hair that took all of our hearts with dancing and singing. I 'm the passage it states “... white Shirley temple cup. She was a long time with the milk and gazed fondly at the silhouette of Shirley Temple’s dimpled face. Frieda and She had loving conversation about how cu-ute Shirley Temple was.”(Bluest Eyes, Morris pg. 19) Pecola ready had it on her mind that Shirley Temple was beautiful, that Shirley Temple was the beauty standard and that she was not. At a young age Pecola realized that she might not be seen as pretty this a issue that can be seen quite often in the black community. In 2011 a young lady heard a small child declare herself hate a girl no older than 5 years old stated “mommy I want to be white; I don 't want to be brown anymore” (source 5, Courtney) as horrifying as it may seem most children don 't understand why they are black when white people seem to get more things in life. The media shows nothing but white people winning in life and black people be portrayed as thugs, killers and lazy. Even in movies and tv shows we are seen as villains while white people are given this essence
After she meets Pecola, her concerns go to Pecola. She explains about each and every incident that occurs to Pecola and the reasons behind leading to those incidents. According to Claudia, the narrator of the story, not just Pecola but it was the Breedlove family members who treated themselves the uglier rather than the society. Only the difference is that they make a different mindset deal with it. The narrator vividly mentions by saying, “Then you realized that it came from conviction, their conviction/And they took the ugliness in their hands, threw it as a mantle over them, and went about the world with it” (Morrison 39). This explains more of what they were dealing with. It is impossible to make them believe that they aren’t relentlessly and aggressively ugly (38). Being young, vulnerable and more importantly, female, Pecola is the one who gets abused frequently and endures the damage in greater
Society continues to rape Pecola through its refusal to acknowledge her as a human being. Since society thinks she is “ugly”, no one needs to care for or love her. For example, one of the biggest insults that her peers use for teasing boys is using Pecola as the insult.
In another episode in the novel, when Pecola is on her way to buy her Mary Janes, the reader is able to realize the extent of the impact this idealization had (and still has) on African-American as well as many other cultures. Morrison makes a point to emphasize the fact that this affected everyone in the novel, whether the character admired or despised this ideal. Mrs. Breedlove "passed on" to Pecola the insecurity she had "acquired" throughout her life. Her insecurity and self-hate had been in her since her childhood but it was made worse by her emulating the movie actresses.
Besides the inherent self-confident issue, the outside voice from community is also affecting Pecola’s view. For example, in the “accident” when Pecola went into Junior’s house, Junior killed the cat and impute to Pecola. His mother, Geraldine, saw Pecola was holding the dead cat. Without any thought and didn’t even ask for the truth, Geraldine simply called Pecola a “nastylittle black bitch.” This event, again, reinforces Pecola’s view of what beauty means.
Pauline eventually meets Cholly, who is Pecola’s biological father, and they fall in love. "He seemed to relish her company and even to enjoy her country ways and lack of knowledge about city things. He talked with her about her foot and asked, when they walked through the town or in the fields, if she were tired. Instead of ignoring her infirmity, pretending it was not there, he made it seem like something special and endearing. For the first time Pauline felt that her bad foot was an asset. And he did touch her, firmly but gently, just as she had dreamed. But minus the gloom of setting suns and lonely river banks. She was secure and grateful; he was kind and lively. She had not known there was so much laughter in the world." (Morrison, p. 115)
With some background knowledge on Pauline, the mother of Pecola, it’s easier to understand some of Pecola's core traits. There are parallelisms between Pecola and Pauline. They find their reality too harsh to deal with, so they become fixated on one thing that makes them happy, and they ignore everything else. Pecola's desire for blue eyes is more of an inheritance that she received from her mother. One of Pauline’s own obsessions was back when she was fascinated with the world of the big pictures. As long as they can believe in their fantasies, they're willing to sacrifice anything else.