Thursday and Friday, November 7 and 8...The Bluest Eye in class essay.

Due on Friday: Week 1, vocabulary 2

In class on Thursday and Friday: essay on Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye.
Below is a copy of the handout.

Here's a 25 point bonus. Write your response on a piece of paper and include your name. Put your response in the tin on Parker's desk before class starts on Thursday. Here's the question: What is the name of the mental disease with which Pecola is afflicted at the end of The Bluest Eye?

Essay: The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison.

Due at the end of class on Friday, November 8.

REMEMBER THAT ANYONE ON A FIELD TRIP ON EITHER THURSDAY OR FRIDAY IS STILL RESPONSIBLE FOR HANDING IN THE COMPLETED ESSAY BY FRIDAY AT 3 PM. After that time, your essay is only worth 50 points.

Perception is a key element in Morrison’s The Bluest Eye: how the individual is perceived or is seen by others, how the individual internalizes that perception, and how the individual perceives others. The interaction of these perceptions helps to create and reinforce the individual's sense of identity or lack of a sense of identity.

"Each night Pecola prayed for blue eyes. In her eleven years, no one had ever noticed Pecola. But with blue eyes, she thought, everything would be different. She would be so pretty that her parents would stop fighting. Her father would stop drinking. Her brother would stop running away. If only she could be beautiful. If only people would look at her."

In a five paragraph essay, explain how Toni Morrison’s develops the theme of beauty in the novel The Bluest Eye.

How to organize your essay:

Introduction / paragraph 1

1.        Hook sentence: define beauty and its role in society.

2.        Who is Pecola? What is she searching for and why?

Paragraph 2

1.       How does Morrison begin the novel? Why is the setting and publication date important?

2.       How is Pecola introduced? Describe this girl and how Claudia and her peers react to her? What type of people does Pecola admire? Think of a school figure. Analysis statement? How does this environment feed into Pecola’s ideas of beauty?

Paragraph 3

1.       What is Pauline like? Her background? Where does she work? And how does she interact with her daughter when the girl comes to collect the laundry? Analysis statement: How does this reinforce Pecola’s personal conception of beauty?

Paragraph 4

1.       Discuss the connection between Cholly’s raping Pecola and his idea of beauty. (This ties into his initial relationship with Pauline.) Analysis statement: How to reconcile this perversity of beauty and suffering or pain?

Conclusion / paragraph 5

       How does Morrison link beauty with culture and environment through the character of Pecola?  What happened in the 1960’s that began to change this perception for black Americans?

Transition Words

Words that can be used to show location:

above	behind	by	near	throughout
across	below	down	off	to the right
against	beneath	in back of	onto	under
along	beside	in front of	on top of
among	between	inside	outside
around	beyond	into	over

Words that can be used to show time:

while	first	meanwhile	soon	then
after	second	today	later	next
at	third	tomorrow	afterward	as soon as
before	now	next week	about	when suddenly
during	until	yesterday	finally

Word that can be used to compare two things:

likewise	also	while	in the same way
like	as	similarly

Words that can be used to contrast two things:

but	still	although	on the other hand
however	yet	otherwise	even though

Words that can be used to emphasize a point:

again	truly	especially	for this reason
to repeat	in fact	to emphasize

Words that can be used to conclude or summarize:

finally	as a result		i
lastly	therefore	all in all	because

Words that can be used to add information:

again	another	for instance	for example
also	and	moreover	additionally
as well	besides	along with	other
next	finally	in addition

Words that can be used to clarify:

that is

for instance

in other words