The Bluest Eye :: essays research papers

The Bluest Eye is a brilliantly written novel revealing the fictional trauma of an eleven-year-old d knowledgehearted girl named Pecola Breedlove. This story takes place in the t throw of Lorain, Ohio during the 1940s. It is told from the perspective of a young girl named Claudia MacTeer. She and her sister, Frieda, become witness to the terrible plights Pecola is unintentionally draw up through. Pecola chooses to hide from her disabling life behind her clouded dream of possessing the invariably so cherished bluest of eyeball. The Breedloves constant bickering and ever so growing poverty contributes to the emotional downfall of this little girl. Pecolas misfortune is obtained through the touch of her fathers hand and the voice of her partnerships struggle with racial separation, anger, and ignorance. Her innocence is harshly ripped from her grasp as her father rapes her limp existence. The communitys anger with its own insecurities is taken out on this poor, ugly, black, non- ideal, young girl. She shields herself from this sorrow behind her neurotic plea for blue eyes. But her eyes do not exchange the pain of carrying her fleeing fathers baby. Nor do they protect her from the shady eyes of her neighbors. Though this book discuses negative and disturbing situations, it teaches a very positivist lesson. The theme of The Bluest Eye is that of depending on outside influences to become aw be of unmatchables own beauty and to fabricate ones own self image can be extremely damaging. I note that Toni Morrison showed this through each of her characters especially the obvious, Pecola Breedlove. One incident, for example, is when Claudia, Frieda, Pecola, and Maureen Peal, a well-loved beauty of Lorain, are walking home from school. As the girls saunter down the street, they begin to bicker. The dialogue ends with Maureen stomping away and establishing the fact that she is indeed cute. Claudia then thinks to herself, If she was cute--and if anything could be believed, she was--then we were not. And what did that conceive? We were lesser. Nicer, brighter, but still lesser. Dolls we could destroy, but we could not destroy the honey voices of parents and aunts, the allegiance in the eyes of our peers, the slippery light in the eyes of our teachers when they support the Maureen Peals of the world. What was the secret? What did we lack? Why was it important? And so what?. . . And all the time we knew that Maureen Peal was not the Enemy and not worthy of such cold hatred.