The Color Purple And The Bluest Eye Essay

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison and The Color Purple by Alice Walker are two modern works of literature that initially unsettled and deeply shocked people around the globe. Both novels give us an insightful view on the inhumane treatment that African-Americans had to endure during the ‘60s and ‘70s in a white, male-dominated America. Pecola Breedlove is an eleven year old girl who is socially victimized and is absorbed with the idea that the only way to be “beautiful” is by having blue eyes and blonde hair like Shirley Temple. She is almost painfully optimistic in a very antagonistic white society who continually reminds her of her “blackness” or “ugliness”. When we are first introduced to Pecola, she is homeless. She is teased by her school boys Bay Boy, Woodrow Cain, and light-skinned Maureen Peal. Her only true friend is Claudia, one of the narrators of the novel. Pecola is sexually abused by Cholly Breedlove, her father. The incestuous rape scenes are nearly impossible for a reader to comprehend – but to understand Cholly’s action of raping his own daughter, it

He start to choke me, saying You better shut up and git used to it.”(Walker, 1980, pg.3). After Celie’s mother passed away due to the illness, Alfonso continues to mercilessly rape Celie . Celie thinks that her father has murdered both her children but in fact, he has sold them. He then brings a new woman to his home. He now wants to get rid of Celie and that’s why she is forced to marry Mr. Johnson, so that he can rape her younger sister, Netty, as well. Due to this fear, Netty flees from the house and takes refuge in Celie‘s house. But here she finds that Mr. Johnson, her sister‘s new husband want to have sexual intercourse with her and she has to flee once again from male dominance. Netty had to strive very hard to maintain her chastity throughout the