Beauty in "The Bluest Eye"

page 62
Safe on the other side, [Maureen Pearl] screamed at us, "I *am* cute! And you ugly! Black and ugly black e mos. I *am* cute!"
...
We were sinking under the wisdom, accuracy, and relevence, of Maureen's last words. If she was cute--and if anything could be believed, she *was*--then we were not. And what did that mean? We were lesser. Nicer, brighter, but still lesser. Dolls we could destroy, but we could not destroy the honey voices of parents and aunts, the obedience in the eyes of our peers, the slippery light in the eyes of our teachers when they encouraged the Maureen Pearls of the world. What was their secret? What did we lack? Why was it important? And so what? Guileless and without vanity, we were still in love with ourselves then. We felt comfortable in our skins . . . And all the time we knew that Maureen Pearl was not the Enemy and not worthy of such intense hatred. The *Thing* to fear was the *Thing* that made *her* beautiful, and not us.

Questions:
1) The narrator says "we were still in love with ourselves then." How old do you think she is now, when she is re-telling this story? Ask yourself this at various stages of the book.

2) Exactly who or what is the *Thing*?

Comments:
I am not sure I believe the narrator when she says "And all the time we knew that Maureen Pearl was not the Enemy" -- this seems much like the voice of an adult re-arranging the past to suit their present-day way of thinking. She would like to think she didn't resent MP for her beauty but was she conscious of the "real" Enemy at such a young age?

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