Claudia and Race

From the beginning of The Bluest Eye, I became very interested Claudia’s conflict with race. Her disinterest with the white baby dolls and hatred for Shirley Temple struck me as way to display her discomfort with her own race. I also found it interesting how the adults urged Claudia to play with the white dolls because they assumed that it “represented what they thought was [her] fondest wish” (Morrison 20). when in reality Claudia would only tear the dolls to pieces Later Claudia remarks that when adults see a white child, they treat them much more gently than they treat a black child. Claudia asks, “What made people look at them and say ‘Awwwww,’ but not for me?” (Morrison 22). It is very evident that Claudia’s hatred towards the white dolls and the white girls originates from jealousy of how the white girls are treated. Claudia also stated that her feelings towards the dolls converted from “pristine sadism to fabricated hatred, to fraudulent love” (Morrison 23) so I am interested to see how the race relations will play out for the rest of the novel.