علی اصغر امامی پور

Establishing the framework of the discussion based on Henry Louis Gates’ The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism (1988), in which he elaborated on the unorthodox tendency among the black writers to read, repeat, imitate, and revise each other’s texts, the present article aims at analyzing the first novel of Toni Morrison (1931- ), The Bluest Eye (1970), so as to highlight the instances in her work in which the readers can see her Signifying on Langston Hughes (1902-67), as an earlier Afro-American poet. To fulfill such an aim, a very concise characterization of the blues and jazz music, which are the built-in features of Hughes poetry, is given in order to pave the way for the article to make some intellectual connections between Morrison and Hughes. The study reveals that Hughes, as one of the significant voices of Harlem Renaissance, has inspired Morrison as a later black writer especially through his poetry. The recurrence of such themes as the unfair treatment the blacks are subject to, longing for freedom, an urge for unity between the blacks, the importance of the blacks all through the history, and the struggle to make one’s dreams come true, all in all, are discernible in the novel of Morrison, The Bluest Eye. In other words, considering Gates’ The Signifying Monkey, the paper concludes that Morrison was Signifying on Hughes, as one of the pivotal poets of the black history, when she penned her novel.