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Beauty in The Bluest Eye

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In Toni Morrison's 'The Bluest Eye', racism, and beauty arer portrayed through the setting, mood, tone, and detailed imagery. Throughout the book we are provided with multiple quotes with a broadened analysis of how whiteness is the typical standard of beauty, which misinterprets the life of black woman and children. "Only her tight tight eyes were left. They were always left ...." (45). After an intense altercation between Mrs. Breedlove and Cholly Pecola prays to god in her bedroom. She asks god to make her disappear, and he does. But she could never make her eyes disappear. No matter how hard she tried. This quote relates to the cultural concept of beauty because Pecola didn't have pretty blue eyes like the white girls did. Toni Morrison is trying to show how if Pecola's eyes were blue her life wouldn't be as bad as it is. We know this because all the little girls that have blue eyes are white and they're life are far better off than Pecola. (such as Maureen Peal) 'She was never able, after educating in the movies, to look at a face and not assign it to some category in the scale of absolute beauty, and the scale was one she absorbed in full from the silver screen.' (122) Pauline manifested the white definition of beauty and perceived people as valuable or not in juxtaposition. She even despised herself because she was not beautiful according to the standards that had been set by white people. We can concur to this statement due to the way Pauline describes the movies. Se talks about how good the white men treat their women, and how big and clean their houses where. She says after seeing all of this 'cleanliness' it made it hard for her to come home to Cholly, because of the idea of beauty created by the white community. The times where she was the happiest was when she was at the theater watching the lives of white people. But when she went back to her own life she was unhappy. 'Certain seeds will not nurture, certain fruit it w

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