1. Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye
A presentation by
SungHyeog Park, Jackie Scher, and
Dylan Fowler

2. The Author: Toni Morrison
• African-American novelist, editor, and
professor
• Born in Lorain, Ohio
• Wrote ten novels
• The first, The Bluest Eye was published in
1970
• Has received the Nobel Prize in Literature and
the Pulitzer Prize in Literature among other
awards

3. The Bluest Eye: A Banned Book
• Challenged and banned by several school
districts for its explicit sexual content
• Never banned by the Federal Government
• Most recent example:
– Challenged in 2012 in Connecticut’s Brookfield
High School curriculum

4. Plot Summary
• The prologue begins by describing a picturesque family and
their house
• Claudia, the narrator of the prologue, believes that there
were no marigolds in the Fall of 1941 because Pecola was
having her father’s baby
• The novel begins with the Macteer household gaining two
new members, Mr. Henry and Pecola Breedlove
• Two major moments in Pecola’s maturation occur
– Pecola receiving her first period
– When Pecola and Claudia begin to wonder how they could get
someone to love them

5. Plot Summary
• Pecola describes her previous living situation to the reader.
• While her parents were fighting, Pecola prays for blue eyes
and says that she has been praying for that for years.
• Later, a store clerk refuses to fully acknowledge Pecola when
she is purchasing candy.
• Pecola longs to be like the blue eyed blonde haird girl on the
candy wrapper.
• Pecola visits the three prostitutes that live above her family’s
storefront apartment

6. Plot Summary
• The new girl at school, Maureen Peal, enchants her
classmates and is the envy of Frieda and Claudia
• On the walk home from school one day, Frieda, Claudia, and
Maureen stop a group of boys from bullying Pecola
• The girls have a falling out with Maureen and Maureen calls
them ugly
• At home, Claudia and Frieda encounter Henry with two of the
prostitutes introduced earlier in the novel

7. Key Words
• Roomer: a tenant (used to describe Mr. Henry)
• Outdoors: Homelessness
• Switch: A flexible rod used for corporal punishment
• Mary Janes: Peanut butter and molasses candy that
depicts a Caucasian girl on its wrapper
• High yellow dream child: A light-skinned person of
mixed Caucasian and African heritage (used to
describe Maureen)

8. Themes
• Whiteness as the Standard of Beauty
• The Ways Race and Class affect positions in
Society
• Sex and Love
• Perception vs. How One is Perceived

9. Modern Relevance: Ukrainian Barbie

10. Discussion Questions
• What role does nature play in the novel?
• How does the idea of beauty imposed on
Claudia and Pecola affect their actions in
throught this part of the novel?
• What are some other modern examples of
society’s description of beauty negatively
impacting individuals?