The novel has landed on the American Library AssociationвЂ™s (ALA) Top Ten Most Challenged Books list because itвЂ™s considered вЂњsexually explicit,вЂќ вЂњunsuited for age group,вЂќ and вЂњcontains controversial issues.вЂќ (The book ranked at number 15 on ALAвЂ™s Top 100 Banned/Challenged Books list from 2000 to 2009.) But why are the issues raised in the book вЂњcontroversialвЂќ? MorrisonвЂ™s portrait of the fatalities of racism still scares people, including those who sit on school and library boards. And 50 years after it was originally published, The Bluest Eye still illuminates MorrisonвЂ™s deft ability to make Black girls feel and be seen. She becomes вЂњa winged but grounded bird, intent on the blue void it could not reach-could not even see-but which filled the valleys of the mind.вЂќД«reedloveвЂ™s mental and emotional demise is a slow drowning, a spiritual death that leaves behind a husk of a person, which is what makes MorrisonвЂ™s debut so profound: It captures a collection of brutalities with the swiftness of a sharpened knife. But by the end of the book, sheвЂ™s alone and ostracized, grief and abuse having driven her to madness. SheвЂ™s a Black girl without any real sense of home, so she develops a mask that she uses to stay вЂњconcealed, veiled, eclipsed-peeping out from behind the shroud very seldom.вЂќ From the bookвЂ™s first pages, it seems almost inevitable that Breedlove will succumb to tragedy, becoming a victim of her circumstances and her surroundings. IS IT POSSIBLE TO ESCAPEВ A SYSTEMВ that has intentionally set you up to fail? How can we dismantle a system that teaches us that the lies that feed self-hatred are the gospel truth? In Toni MorrisonвЂ™s 1970 debut novel, The Bluest Eye, beauty is a social privilege enforced by white supremacy and 11-year-old Pecola Breedlove is the perfect victim.

The bluest eye quotes about beauty