Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street, written in 1984, and Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye, first published in 1970, are both aimed at adolescent audiences but deal with deep, often disturbing themes about serious social conditions and their effects on children. Both books are told in the first person; both narrators are young girls, living in destitute neighborhoods, who witness the harsh realities of life for those who are poor, abused, and hopeless, although the narrators themselves manage to survive their tough environments with their wits and strength intact. The books are more than simple literary exercises written merely to amuse or delight their audiences; both authors attempt to provoke their readers to think about the social issues their novels present. This research will discuss the specific goals of each of these novels and the effectiveness of each author's attempt to attain them among both adolescent and adult audiences.
The plot in The Bluest Eye is the tragedy of Pecola Breedlove, an African-American girl whose fondest wish is to miraculously awaken one day with blue eyes, thinking that perhaps it will make her mother attentive and her father loving:
It had occurred to Pecola . . . that 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 (Morrison 46).
Pecola's misery is so complete, so deep, that she convinces herself that her only hope for a better life rests in changing her eye color. Even more pathetically, "Each night, without fail, she prayed for blue eyes . . . Although somewhat discouraged, she was not without hope" (Morrison 46). Pecola was doubly tragic in that she placed all her hope in something which could never really happen and,...