Characters In Toni Morrison's 'The Bluest Eye And' The Things They Carried

Pecola discussing their fondness of Shirley Temple. The only one who seems to have a disdain

The concept of physical beauty and desire to conform to a prescribed definition of what is considered beautiful can destroy a person's life. In Toni Morrison's novel, The Bluest Eye, many characters are obsessed with attaining the idealist definition of what is considered beautiful. The characters of Geraldine, Pauline, and Pecola all believe that physical perfection leads to acceptance; however, it is the same belief that causes their personal downfalls and prevents them from recognizing their own inner beauty.

Throughout all of history there has been an ideal beauty that most have tried to obtain. But what if that beauty was impossible to grasp because something was holding one back. There was nothing one could do to be ‘beautiful’. Growing up and being convinced that one was ugly, useless, and dirty. For Pecola Breedlove, this state of longing was reality. Blue eyes, blonde hair, and pale white skin was the definition of beauty. Pecola was a black girl with the dream to be beautiful. Toni Morrison takes the reader into the life of a young girl through Morrison’s exceptional novel, The Bluest Eye. The novel displays the battles that Pecola struggles with each and every day. Morrison takes the reader through the themes of whiteness and beauty,

The narration of Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye is actually a compilation of many different voices. The novel shifts between Claudia MacTeer's first person narrative and an omniscient narrator. At the end of the novel, the omniscient voice and Claudia's narrative merge, and the reader realizes this is an older Claudia looking back on her childhood (Peach 25). Morrison uses multiple narrators in order to gain greater validity for her story. According to Philip Page, even though the voices are divided, they combine to make a whole, and "this broader perspective also encompasses past and present... as well as the future of the grown-up Claudia" (55).

Toni Morrison introduces us to Claudia, a young African American girl, in her book The Bluest Eye. Claudia displays a mature voice—showing awareness of her environment’s social constructions and how the people around her interact with them. Claudia is gifted a doll for Christmas. Morrison uses this doll to symbolize the standard of beauty that Claudia is growing up with—blue eyes and blond hair. Right away the doll causes Claudia distress and confusion, not understanding why she was given the doll. Claudia’s responses to the doll display her viewpoint of society’s standard. She ends up “dismembering” the doll, stating that her initial intention was to “discover the dearness, to find the beauty, the desirability” of the doll (Morrison 20). However,

The Bluest Eyes by Toni Morrison is a short novel that revolves around a young girl named Pecola Breedlove who is a victim to incest and rape by her own father Cholly. In the town Lorain, Ohio Pecola becomes friends with a young nine year old girl named Claudia MacTeer and her ten year old sister Frieda. The MacTeer family takes in Pecola Breedlove when her father Cholly attempts to burn her house down and hits her mother, Pauline. Pecola is described as a quiet and soft spoken. Her life at home is difficult because of the domestic violence and her father’s abuse of alcohol. Pecola is under the impression that if she were prettier her parents would be nicer to each other. She equalizes beauty with whiteness. She begins to pray for a pair of pretty blue eyes so the world can view her differently and change the way she sees the world. Soon after Pecola returns home she gets raped. The town soon finds out after Pecola becomes pregnant and although everyone in town wants the baby dead, Claudia and Frieda hope the baby lives. Pauline and Pecola pickup and move after Pecola loses the baby and starts to lose her sanity. In the end Pecola sees a psychic to obtain the blue eyes and she really believes he gave her blue eyes. The major theme in this novel outside of incest is how race is perceived in the eyes of young girls and how it is associated with beauty and purity. Among the theme of race are love, sex, innocence, and the roles of black women. Race to Pecola revolved around

Love is a concept that we all desire, the feeling of acceptance, protection and comfort relieves a heavy weight on one’s heart. The novel, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, displays multiple interpretations of love. Morrison’s main character, Pecola Breedlove an eleven year old African American girl, displays the best example of love because she unselfishly took on the burdens of her family, friends and society. This burden makes her feel ugly; so she wishes to change her outward appearance, specifically her blue eyes, and wants to change the world around her. Pecola Breedlove naturally craves for acceptance, love and protection from her family, friends and society.

The Bluest Eye Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye uses symbolism to show Pecola’s desperation for beauty. Pecola constantly prays to have blue eyes. “It had occurred to Pecola some time ago that if her eyes...were different, that is to say, beautiful, she herself would be different” (Morrison 46).

The Bluest Eye, published in 1970, is a novel born from the author’s experience with a little black girl who wanted blue eyes, an effect of “racial self-loathing” (Morrison 210). The novel explores a similar, but much more extreme story: the story of Pecola Breedlove. Pecola is a little black girl living not only in a world that divides itself by race and is prejudiced against black people, but also amidst a family that holds conflict and divisions within itself. Morrison’s novels are known for their themes of racial ideology, beauty standards, and identity (Lister), and The Bluest Eye is no different. Through the subject of its story and the author’s use of language, Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye explores the dangers of racially-based beauty

Society’s perception of women is based on certain characteristics; Toni Morrison demonstrates this through her characters. Claudia, the youngest character, represents innocence that is conflicted between her own sensible judgment and what is expected of her. Pauline internalizes expectations, and lives accordingly, but lacks self-identity. Having no sense of self she finds herself seeking validation from those who should not affect her. The Bluest Eyes by Toni Morrison focuses on the hardships that women of color face when seeking acceptance from society. She depicts how detrimental it is to believe that a woman’s self worth is determined by society’s unrealistic standards of beauty and femininity.

“If only the eyes saw souls instead of bodies, how very different our ideals of beauty would be”. Toni Morrison shows, to the black community and to the world, how white supremacists and false convictions on beauty and self-worth can cause serious mischief if believed and taken to heart. Throughout the book, the character who exemplified the best repercussions of racism through her actions was Pecola Breedlove. A very passive little girl who was lacking self-esteem and parental guidance buys into the sinkhole of society's perception of beauty and race resulting in believing herself to be one of the ugliest girls in the world. In the Bluest Eye, Morrison uses Pecola and the characters in Pecola's life such as China, Poland, and Miss Marie

The narrative shift also serves to compare how Pecola and Claudia react to the concept of blue eyes as the ultimate beauty and shows the psychological strength of each girl.

For decades there has been an ongoing discussion on society’s standards of beauty and what makes someone beautiful. In Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye she challenges white standards of beauty. Just like today, the society in Loraine, Ohio establishes a standard of beauty, and this beauty is defined as being as close to white as possible, having blonde hair, blue eyes, and a “Jack and Jill” family. Most of the characters in The Bluest Eye attempt to conform to society’s standards (complicating this idea) and believe if they can achieve at least one of the aspects of beauty their life will be better and they will be treated in higher regards. Through the female characters of Pecola, Claudia, Maureen, Geraldine, and Rosemary it is prevalent that there is a spectrum of beauty and the person who is closest to this standard, white skin, blonde hair, and blue eyes, is considered pretty and is respected by society, while a person who is not close to this standard is considered ugly and is treated poorly by society. By ascribing to society’s expectations of beauty, Geraldine extends the role of white supremacy and undermines her own self-worth.

     In the novel, The Bluest Eye, Toni Morrison incorporates various techniques, such as her use of metaphors, the ironic use of names, and the visual images that she uses. The theme of The Bluest Eye, revolves around African Americans’ conformity to white standards. A woman may whiten her skin, straighten her hair and change its color, but she can not change the color of her eyes. The desire to transform one’s identity, itself becomes an inverted desire, becomes the desire for blues eye, which is the symptom of Pecola’s instability.

Toni Morrison wrote The Bluest Eye in order to discuss race, gender, and class. She does a careful and intentional dance along the axis of oppression she is speaking on. Her pointed stories of abuse, self loathing, and rape are juxtaposed to the soft imagery of nature. The book is separated into four sections named after the seasons. Rarely does a page go by where Morrison does not wax poetic about marigolds, or set a scene with forsythia. And yet, though she uses these images to soften the setting in which atrocities take place, they are often used in such a manner that the harshness of the events bleed into the imagery. Creating the malevolent force that is nature in the novel, and the streak of ironic imagery that runs through Morrisons writing.