“Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish on its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.” This statement, said by Albert Einstein, restates one of the main themes of Toni Morrison’s novel, The Bluest Eye. This novel takes us through the life story of a young African American girl named Pecola, who grows up during times of prejudice and racism. This story portrays Pecola as an ‘ugly,’ dark-skinned girl compared to the whites around her. Since she’s being marginalized for her race and is seen as the opposite because she is black, Pecola gains a desire for blue eyes, which she equates with being white. In this novel, the author shows how prejudice and marginalization can affect a person's mind by using the thoughts and interactions between different characters. However, instead of just focusing on white hatred against people of color, The Bluest Eye takes another approach to racism by exploring the hierarchy of power within marginalized cultures such as African Americans living in America.
Throughout the novel, the themes of prejudice between whites and blacks are prevalent, as the author portrays blacks as inferior. For example, right in the beginning when Pecola goes into a candy store to buy herself some penny candy, the foreign store owner already makes up his mind about Pecola, solely upon her skin tone and her marginalized race: “The distaste must be for her, her blackness… and it is the blackness that accounts for, that creates, the vacuum edged with distaste in white eyes,” (Morrison 49). Racism is shown here because Pecola knows that the owner of the store sees her, but she also notes that he does not view her as entirely human, because of her darker skin tone as well as non-blue eyes. Knowing that he does not know anything about her, Pecola can only assume that what caused this prejudice against her is her eye color, which is not blue. She believes that because she has dark eyes, the white foreigner cannot see her through his blue eyes for he can only see those who look like him. Pecola is marginalized because she does not look like the influences around her with blonde hair, a pale face, and most importantly, blue eyes. Throughout the novel, the narrator portrays the thoughts of the community around her. Readers are shown that blackness is tied to ugliness, while whiteness is linked to purity and innocence. By only seeing her skin tone and knowing her race, the store owner has already made up his mind about the type of person Pecola is. Pecola also notes that she is a full American born in Lorain, Ohio, yet she is still treated worse than a white foreigner. Pecola noticed that it did not matter where she came from; people would always treat her inferior to them based on her eye color.
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Toni Morrison also takes another approach to prejudice throughout her novel; instead of focusing only on the prejudices between whites and blacks, she blurs these binary opposites by portraying the types of prejudice between people of the same race. This form of social hierarchy within the black community is spawned by the desire to be seen as ‘more white,’ which symbolizes power. In this novel, there are very few main white characters, yet prejudice remains throughout the novel as a whole. Since this novel revolves around many black characters, the theme of ‘whiteness’ exists symbolically. Not only is race defined by one’s skin tone, but it is also defined as one’s cultural background and how one behaves within the community. The author identifies ‘whiteness’ with cleanliness, innocence, and value, while“blackness” is associated with dirtiness, immorality, and worthlessness. For example, Pecola, Frieda, and Claudia, young African American children, regard dirty places as where they should belong: ‘“We could go up the alley and see what’s in the trash cans,’ [said Pecola]” (Morrison 26). These particular ways of viewing race become internalized differently between different characters which ultimately leads to forms of racial self-hatred among many of the novel’s protagonists. Throughout The Bluest Eye, characters base themselves on other blacks in their society to determine their social status. For example, Geraldine tries to gain rank in her society by attempting to keep herself as well as her family from being classified as ‘black.’ “She had explained to him the difference between colored people and niggers. They were easily identifiable. Colored people were neat and quiet; niggers were dirty and loud,” (Morrison 87). Racism is shown here, but instead of being based on skin tone, it is based on behavior. In this quote, Geraldine tells her son, Junior, that if he keeps acting like a ‘lower-class black child’, white children will not want to play with him. She asks him to be less rambunctious and ‘dirty’, but instead act more civilized. Even though Geraldine and her family are black, due to the fact they dress better and have more money than most other black people in their neighborhood, they consider themselves better than the other blacks. Readers can see that even among African Americans, there is still competition for power to become ‘more white.’
These different forms of prejudice in the novel are what ultimately lead Pecola to long for blue eyes. Since she is only a young kid, she believes that changing her eyes can somehow alter the reality around her, making her only see the positive aspects of life: “It had occurred to Pecola some time ago that if her eyes, those eyes that held the pictures, and knew the sights—if those eyes of hers were different, that is to say, beautiful, she would be different,” (Morrison 46). This quote is significant to the overall theme of the novel because it describes how Pecola longs to have blue eyes. To Pecola, having these blue eyes would allow her to appear beautiful, and allow her to see the positive aspects of her life instead of the traumatizing, painful scenes around her, such as her parents’ constant fighting. It shows how Pecola longs to have blue eyes and look like white people, but this is an impossible desire to achieve and would ultimately not fix Pecola’s situation. Since black people were always being marginalized in her community and seen as inferior to whites, these prejudices led Pecola to hate herself for her race and look. Considering she was only a young girl, hearing and witnessing other’s racist opinions of black people, led her to truly believe that blacks were inferior and considered ugly. Throughout her life, Pecola was forced to witness violent fights between her parents and was even a victim of rape by her father. In her mind, the only solution to ‘alter reality’ is if she has blue eyes. She believes that if she had blue eyes, their beauty would help others become pure and innocent again. In Pecola’s mind, the color of one’s skin and eyes can influence how one is treated and what one is forced to witness.
In conclusion, Toni Morrison’s novel, The Bluest Eye, portrays a hierarchy of power within the African Community where members of the African Community are so oppressed in the white society that they yearn for power and any form. Due to this longing for power, many African Americans end up exerting what little power they have on another fellow African-American, to feel ‘more white’ as well as higher in rank. By examining a variety of prejudices, Toni Morrison can portray how marginalization in a white society affects not only African Americans within the white community itself but also their interactions with other African Americans in the black community.
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