The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

On the first day of our Women in Literature class, we discussed the required reading and the main subject matter of reading the different experiences of (mainly colored) women. As a white female, I thought a bit that though this theme of the class would be extremely interesting, I wondered how much I would actually be able to relate to the characters, as visually and racially, they would be different from me. I assumed that their color would be the driving force in their novels. But in class, our professor made the point that though the heroines of our class novels would represent an image of a different race/ culture/ ethnicity, they are not meant to be a universalized version of that particular race/ culture/ ethnicity. In fact, to see, for example Pecola or Claudia from The Bluest Eye as a universalization of all black women's struggles would be a degradation of these unique and substantial characters. With this in mind, I was able to throw away my own sense of "otherness" and actually see myself in these characters, despite their additional struggle with racism.
When I read The Bluest Eye I mentally used both my similarities with the characters and our differences with them to understand who they were. Similarly to me, the characters have hardships within their families. They feel the sense that what they are given and who they are is simply not enough. Growing, possibly more so as a female or otherwise, I see that a lot of people are never getting enough of what they need to feel fullfilled. Additionally, they sometimes can't fill in the blanks of dissatisfaction with their own inner strength. When Claudia discusses her parents, especially her mother on the day that she is sick in bed, being more afraid of her mother than comforted by her presence, I felt how relatable Claudia is in the sense that sometimes, no matter what the issue, your parents can't always give you what you need. It has nothing to do with their intention or how much they love you, sometimes, something is just lacking.
Pecola, on the other hand, in the case of her appearence, is unattractive, her ugliness drives her to hate herself and her hatred toward herself allows her to become enveloped in ugliness. Most girls I know have some belief that they are too unattractive to get what they want out of life. Whether or not they are actually pretty is irrelavent. Most women just feel that if they were a little prettier, or could infact just be able to call themselves "pretty" 80 percent of their problems would be solved in life. With this mentality, girls wait for and subconciously beg for vocalized apporval of their appearence. When they get it, they typically have a mental sigh of relief. When none of their life's problems are actually solved, they assume that the previous approval was falsely given and that they are still not attractive enough, instead of recognizing the truth that no matter how pretty a woman is, it will never prove to actually solve any problems. I believ this cycle is similar to young Pecola's.
I used the diffences in the characters of The Bluest Eye to allow myself a new understanding. obviously, the issue of race and poverty are great in this novel. I've felt strained or hurt in my own life by conditions that are out of my control, but never have I felt marginalized and controlled by the sorts of hardships that these girls experience. imagining a life were the mainstream world in an unyielding manner hates, castigates, degrades people to the extent that they don't even get to own their victimhood, but in turn perpetuate the hatred in hating themselves and defending the oppressors is something I have never felt and barely gotten to know in my own suuroundings. Trying to understand how that feels and then applying it the characters and in turn knowing these characters and trying to understand how such oppresion could harm their sense of self, made The Bluest Eye vastly more interesting.