The Bluest Eye Reflection

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Make-up Assignment for Seminar 3 The novel, The Bluest Eyes discusses many interesting themes during the course of the story, for example incest, prostitution, domestic violence, child molestation as well as racism. However, I think that the overall theme of the novel is highlighting how internalized white beauty standards form and cripple the lives of black girls and women. The reason as to why I believe that this is the main theme that Morrison wanted to convey in her novel is because there are implicit messages that whiteness is superior are everywhere throughout the book. Toni Morrison explains that the story of the novel came out of a childhood conversation she could never get out of her mind. She remembers a young black girl she knew …show more content…

Pecol’as father sexually abuses her. Not once, but twice does her rape her - first while she’s washing by the sink and later when she was lounging on the couch. The reason as to why I believe this is such an important and monumental part of the story is because after the rape, Pecola exemplify the ugliness of self-hatred in the PoC community. She moves with her mother to the outskirts of town, illustrating symbolically how the community has pushed her to the brinks of …show more content…

Pecola, for example, is a feeble and weak child at the beginning of the novel, and by the end of the story, she has been almost completely broken by the cruelty she experienced. The reason as to why Pecola develops into this kind of character is because of the black community’s self-hatred and acceptance of its own ugliness. As I have mentioned before, the author of the story disclose that she purposely tells Pecola’s story from other points of view in order to keep Pecola’s grace and, to some degree, her enigma