Acceptance And Negation Of The Blue Eye

Toni Morrison is the first black woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. Her works show deep concern for black women's life. The traditional study of her first novel—The Bluest Eye—has mostly focused on the structure of the novel and the damaging effects of white value-system on black women. The author herself has enjoyed high praise for her elaborate arrangements of the novel and her vivid portrayals of black women's lives in American society. By contrast, several black women characters in the novel who take a negative attitude toward the white standard of beauty have attracted little attention of the critical world. Given Morrison's deep concern for black women's fate and future, this thesis intends to make a feminist study of The Bluest Eye and explore Morrison's ultimate aim in creating the novel—to seek the way to authentic and whole existence for the black women and the black race in general.This thesis consists of four chapters. After a brief introduction to Toni Morrison's life and her literary achievements, Chapter I presents a survey of the critical responses to The Bluest Eye and points out the purpose and significance of the study. Chapter II deals with the theoretical perspective—the black feminist criticism. The author traces the emergence and development of black feminist criticism and then introduces mainly Barbara Smith's two viewpoints for black feminist criticism: First, black feminist criticism involves both racial and sexual politics; second, attention should be paid to black women's autonomy.Based on Smith's viewpoints for black feminist criticism, Chapter III, the main part of the thesis, explores Morrison's ultimate aim in creating the novel by analyzing black women's different responses to white standard of female beauty: acceptance and negation. This chapter is subdivided into two sections. Centering on the black women who accept and internalize this white standard and get lost or even end up in tragedy in striving for the white beauty, the first section demonstrates Morrison's strong condemnation of the racist and sexist standard of beauty. The second section, by presenting the black females who achieve a relatively authentic and whole existence by adhering to their own black culture and tradition, reveals Morrison's concern for black women's way to a better life.By comparing black women's different responses to white standard of beauty and their resultant fate, Chapter IV comes to the conclusions: Firstly, as a black woman writer, Morrison cares much about the experiences of black women in her writing, which is demonstrated in her portrayals of the black women; secondly, Morrison's ultimate aim in creating The Bluest Eye is to seek the way to authentic and whole existence for the black women and the black race in general—Morrison, through the sharp contrast, demystifies the whitebeauty and appeals to her black sisters to love their black selves and to be deeply rooted in the fertile soil of black culture so as to live whole and realize themselves; thirdly, from the outset of her literary career, Morrison is devoted to developing the unique feminine cultural traditions that black women have developed in spite of their oppression; lastly, the study of The Bluest Eye has realistic significance.