This family consists of the mother Pauline, the father Cholly, the son Sammy, and the daughter Pecola. The Bluest Eye is about the life of the Breedlove family who resides in Lorain, Ohio, in the late 1930s. Toni Morison’s The Bluest Eye: Summary & Analysis.
Pecola has a very hard life and at the age of eleven, she gets raped by her father, which results in a pregnancy.The Bluest Eye is Toni Morrison’s first novel in which the author challenges Western standards of beauty and demonstrates that the concept of beauty is socially constructed. She believes that the only way she can be beautiful and accepted is if she has blue eyes like the white actress, Shirley Temple, or the white dolls she gets every year for Christmas. Throughout The Bluest Eye, Pecola is told she is ugly from a very young age. Pecola’s life is told from the point of views of herself, Claudia, and an omniscient narrator. Carter 3 Taylor Carter DecemA6 Krygier The Bluest Eye The Bluest Eye is a tragic story about a young girl black girl, named Pecola. Title Page Contents Copyright Toni Morrison Biography The Bluest Eye Book Summary About The Bluest Eye Character List Summary and Analysis Fragment 1: Here.
In The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison uses symbolism, narrator point of view, and allusions to the 1930’s childhood book, Dick and Jane, to show that society’s perception of white beauty can affect many girls, in the black community, aking them feel envy and hatred, towards those who have white features. Pecola is now constantly terrorized by the thought that someone could have bluer eyes than her, for she wants the bluest eye. At the end of the novel, Pecola became crazy and began thinking that she has blue eyes. When Pecola’s baby dies, so does some of her. Claudia, another black girl in the story, is the only one who wants Pecola’s baby to live, but tragically it didn’t.
Although, two characters, Claudia and Pecola, acknowledge the lue eyes in different ways. The blue eyes symbolize the beauty and prestige that is associated with being white. Having blue eyes is defined as something to be treasured by Morrison, in her novel. “All the world had agreed that a blue-eyed, yellow-haired, pink-skinned doll was what every girl treasured” (21). In the novel, the image of perfect beauty would be someone with white skin, blonde hair, and most importantly blue eyes.
Even if she is black, with brown eyes, she feels blue eyes will solve all of her problems. Pecola, finally, comes to the conclusion that having blue eyes would make her beautiful. Pecola, on the other hand, conforms to the white perceptions of beauty and often tries to “discover the secret of the ugliness, the ugliness that made her ignored or despised at school, by teachers and classmates like” (45). Claudia views the blue eyes partnership with beauty, with hostility. To see of what it was made, to discover the dearness, to find the beauty, the desirability that had escaped me, but apparently only me” (20). “I only had one desire to dismember it.
Once, while her parents, Cholly and Mrs. She thinks they will somehow give her an unbothered white life. Not only does Pecola think blue eyes will give her beauty, but that they are going to change her way of viewing things.
“‘My eyes… I want them blue’” (174). The bluest eye turns into the saddest eye, when Pecola asks a charlatan for her beloved eyes. Near the end of The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison made those blue eyes symbolize something else, something sad.
The Bluest Eye Introduction + Context. Next, Toni Morrison uses narrator point of view to argue that white beauty can have an effect on women in the black community’s.The Bluest Eye Chapter 5 Summary & Analysis LitCharts. The symbol of the blue eyes shows the reader the effect that white beauty can have on one’s life, with Claudia, who is now filled with hatred and hostility, and Pecola who was once filled with envy, but is now deranged. The blue eyes symbolize beauty that is associated with being white and Pecola’s insanity. She ecomes terrorized by that thought that “there is somebody with bluer eyes than mine, then maybe there is somebody with the bluest eyes” (203).
She hates anyone or anything that is labeled as beautiful by society and felt “hatred for all the Shirley Temples of the world” (19). She doesn’t understand why everyone thinks white is beautiful and often thought, “what made people look at them and say, AClaudia doesn’t agree with societies perceptions on what’s beautiful, while many black women submit to the beauty standards, Claudia fights against them. Unlike Pecola, Claudia does not seem envious of the white perceptions of beauty, she feels hatred and confusion. She is in the first person, and tells the story of what has happened to Pecola by what she saw. Claudia is the first and last point of view Morrison uses in the Bluest Eye. They all offer different perspectives on what beauty is and how it affects them.
“I destroyed white baby dolls…The truly horrifying thing was the transference of the same impulses to little white girls” (24). As Claudia’s narrative continues, the reader can see her feeling more resentment and hostility towards the white girls. She often admits to destroying the white baby dolls that have “glassy blue eyeballs” (21).
I fixed my hair up like I’d seen hers on a magazine” (123). “I ‘member one time I went to see Clark Gable and Jean Harlow. Pauline gets lost in those movies and even did her hair like that of a white actress, to make herself feel prettier. The narrator once described how Pauline felt when she went to movies, to watch white actors. The second point of view Morrison uses is a third erson omniscient, by using this, Morrison can show different perspectives on beauty and effects it has on other characters in the book, like Pauline Breedlove.
Morrison strategically placed Claudia’s narrative before Pecola’s. Claudia also acts as Pecola’s foil. Morrison uses other points of views first to tell Pecola’s story, so the readers think they understand her. Pecola’s point of view is the last point of view Morrison uses. By using this third person omniscient point of view, it gives Morrison a way to show another perspective, in ways that couldn’t if Claudia were the only narrator.
Right before your very eyes’” (204). I’m just going away for a little while. ‘Will you come back then? Of course I will.
The famous “Dick and Jane” narratives were always happy and simple. Lastly, Toni Morrison uses allusions to the 1930’s childhood book, Dick and Jane, to urther show the effects that the white perception of beauty can have on a black women. Morrison uses Pecola’s point of view to really prove what can happen, if white beauty is considered the only beauty. The reader really doesn’t know until the very end that Pecola has lost her sanity due to society’s perspectives on beauty. She is the one who has been most affected and obsessed with being the white kind of beautiful.
The reader would think it was going to be a nice novel, but then Morrison takes out all the punctuation spaces and capitalizes all the words from he narrative. Mother, Father, Dick, and Jane live in the green- and-white house. Morrison starts The Bluest Eye out with a narrative of Dick and Jane.
Once, Morrison was describing the many broken and dirty houses that were in the black community. The chapters are most often about the black women’s dark and ugly world, which is ironic since the chapter titles are about a white, sanitized, and beautiful world.The Dick and Jane narratives often had this irony. Morrison uses the corrupt version of the narrative and breaks them up to be the title of each chapter. The allusion to The Dick and Jane narrative shows us the happy, white and middle class world. After this, Morrison starts the novel. The narrative begins to look a little corrupt.
“HEREISTHEFAMILYMOTHERFATHERDICKANDJANETHEYLIVEINTHEGREENANDW HITEHOUSETHEYAREVERYHAPPY (49) The Breedloves are everything but happy, and each haracter from the Dick and Jane narrative matches one from the Breedlove family. It was about Pecola’s parents and her brother, Sammy. Another time, Morrison was telling about how ugly the Breedloves were, and how often Pecola’s parents fought.
“SEEFATHERHEISBIGANDSTRONGFATHERWILLYOUPLAYWITHJANEFATHERISSMIL INGSMILEFATHERSMILESMILE” (132). In the chapter where Pecola is raped by her father, the chapter’s title is conveniently the part about the father, from the Dick and Jane narrative. Morrison shows us Jane’s world and the compares it with Pecola’s twisted life, like when Cholly raped Pecola.
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