In the novel, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison readers are taken through the daily lives of African Americans who face numerous trials and tribulations. Already faced with the harsh reality of being inferior to the white race. There have been many families in this story who have had to deal with this stigma, however it seemed like the Breedloves had it twice as hard. A series of social problems that African Americans were victims of in the 1940s and 1960s, such as rape, interracial prejudice, and mental illness. First, it's important to state that Toni Morrison's real life is actually related to the true story, The Bluest Eye. Just as the little girl telling the story was nine in 1941, so was Morrison. Another similarity is that one particular family, the MacTeers, endured many hardships during the Great Depression, as did Morrison's. While also stating that one of the characters, Claudia, grew up listening to her mother play the violin, just like Morrison did. How can you love if you have never received love? Neglected as a child by your mother, dismissed by your father. It seemed that Cholly, Pecola Breedlove's father, had had a pretty rough life. Not forgetting the racist white men who made him have sex with that girl right before their eyes. The humility and ridicule he constantly felt. When he met and got Pauline pregnant with Pecola, he even wondered how it would be possible for him to love her when he still had so much anger in his heart. The situations or especially the things that happened in this story seemed to influence or better yet influence the African. Americans are represented differently in this reading. Rape is one of them. In particular, this left quite a bit of paper on the problems that African Americans had within their own culture. The concept of beauty was quite harsh when a light skin like Maureen Peal was seen as beautiful. He also stated, "I'm cute and you're ugly." Meanwhile, someone with darker skin like Pecola was perceived as ugly. If she was pretty – and if anything could be believed, she was – then we weren't. And what did it mean? We were inferior. More beautiful, brighter, but still less. ...And all along we knew that Maureen Peal was not the Enemy and not worthy of such intense hatred. The Thing to fear was the Thing that made it beautiful, and not us. (Morrison, 75) Either you accepted the ridicule and in return believed it yourself or you knew your self-worth and reacted. African American women seemed to have faced it all, but the challenge of moving forward was the most difficult of all.