Symbolism in The Bluest Eye

In The Bluest Eye, the marigold represents innocence for Pecola and the MacTeer girls. The planting of the marigold seeds are symbolically compared to the rape of Pecola Breedlove. The death/lack of growth of the marigolds equates to the death or loss of innocence.

"We had dropped our seeds in our own little plot of black dirt just as Pecola's father had dropped his seeds in his own plot of black dirt. Our innocence and faith were no more productive than his lust or despair. What is clear now is that of all of that hope, fear, lust, love, and grief, nothing remains but Pecola and the unyielding earth, Cholly Breedlove is dead; our innocence too. The seeds shriveled and died; her baby too."

For the girls, Shirley Temple and the little blue cup represent "true beauty." The beauty standards for them and all little girls of the time is pale skin, blue eyes, and curly blond hair. In addition to diminishing the girls' self-worth, these standards impact their relationships with others.

In the novel, Claudia states "I couldn't join them in their adoration because I hated Shirley. Not because she was cute, but because she danced with Bojangles, who was my friend, my uncle, my daddy, and who ought to have been soft-shoeing it and chuckling with me."

Because of the Shirley Temples of the world, the idealized, beautiful child, Claudia in particular develops an intense hatred for white girls.

"The truly horrifying thing was the transference of the same impulses to little white girls. The indifference with which I could have axed them was shaken only by my desire to do so. To discover what eluded me: the secret o the magic they weaved on others."

In the novel, dolls are a physical representation of everything black girls are not. For Claudia, a major secret is hidden inside these dolls: the standard of beauty that she appears to lack. She mutilates dolls gifted to her in search of this secret and ultimately develops a hatred for them and the real girls that the dolls resemble.

"I had only one desire: to dismember it. To see of what it was made, to discover the dearness, to find the beauty, the desirability that had escaped me, but apparently only me. Adults, older girls, shops, magazines, newspapers, window signs - all the world had agreed that a blue-eyed, yellow-haired, pink-skinned doll was what every girl child treasured."

The Dick and Jane books represent the "ideal" life: two attractive white children living in a pristine white house, with happily married parents. Morrison uses these to show the contrast between such an idealized family with the lives of the MacTeers and Breedloves.

The first two pages of the novel contain an excerpt from a Dick and Jane book, gradually twisted throughout. These excerpts deteriorate from proper punctuation to run-on sentences to a meaningless string of letters.

"Here is the house. It is green and white. It has a red door. It is very pretty. Here is the family. Mother, Father, Dick, and Jane live in the green-and-white house. They are very happy. See Jane. She has a red dress. She ants to play. Who will play with Jane? See the cat. It goes meow-meow. Come and play. Come play with Jane. The kitten will not play. See Mother. Mother is very nice. Mother, will you play with Jane? Mother laughs. Laugh, Mother, laugh. See Father. He is big and strong. Father, will you play with Jane? Father is smiling. Smile, Father, smile. See the dog. Bowwow goes the dog. Do you want to play with Jane? See the dog run. Run, dog, run. Look, look. Here comes a friend. The friend will play with Jane. They will play a good game. Play, Jane, play."

The blue eyes Pecola relentlessly pursues symbolize white beauty and innocence. 

"It had occurred to Pecola some time ago that if her eyes, those eyes that held the pictures, and knew the sights - if those eyes of hers were different, that is to say, beautiful, she herself would be different. . . . If she looked different, beautiful, maybe Cholly would be different, and Mrs. Breedlove too. Maybe they'd say, 'Why, look at pretty-eyed Pecola. We mustn't do bad things in front of those pretty eyes.'"

As the story progresses and Pecola's rape and pregnancy is brought to light, she uses blue eyes as her coping mechanism to hide her suffering.

"A little black girl years for the blue eyes of a little white girl, and the horror at the heart of her yearning is exceeded only by the evil of fulfillment."

Pecola's internal dialogue with her imaginary friend also depicts the blue eyes in this way. Pecola attributes the strange looks and detached behavior towards her as jealousy of her eyes.