The Bluest Eye and God Help the Child: Toni Morrison and her Interrupted Children

Abstract

Toni Morrison was an African American writer who dedicated her works to the Black community experience with a special focus on family issues, womanhood and motherhood, and the legacy of the ancestors. This dissertation focuses on the analysis and comparison of her first and last novel, The Bluest Eye and God Help the Child, drawing attention to the issue of childhood when marred by physical and psychological abuse. Specifically, this dissertation will demonstrate how the two main characters, Pecola and Bride – who follow two different paths but share many similarities – most of all, they can be identified as “interrupted children” with the support of the theories concerning the ‘normal individual’ and environmental factors as defined by the pediatric psychiatric Donald W. Winnicott. The analysis will also address how Toni Morrison entrusts to adults the responsibility to heal the wounds and restore normalcy in the children who can finally abandon the status of “interruption.”