The Work

Written in the form of a series of letters, Alice Walker’s novel portrays the transformation of an African American woman from a physically and psychologically abused person to what Walker has elsewhere called a “womanist”—a strong and independent person who recreates herself out of the legacy of her maternal ancestors. Under her friend Shug’s influence, Celie matures into a person courageous enough to challenge the traditional social values that have kept her down. The book has been criticized for its realistic depictions of domestic violence, incestuous and homosexual relationships, and its ostensibly irreligious themes. Many schools and libraries have banned the book.

In 1986 the book was filmed by Steven Spielberg with Walker serving as a consultant. Although the film earned eleven Academy Award nominations, it won no Oscars—possibly because of the strong criticism it had received from prominent African Americans. Several critics, including authors Ishmael Reed and Charles Johnson, complained that both the novel and the film did harm by helping to perpetuate negative stereotypes of African American men. They suggested that Walker should focus her work on intercultural rather than intracultural conflicts. Other critics also argued that the film’s glossy Hollywood production values betrayed Walker’s original thematic intention.

Bibliography

Banks, Erma Davis, and Keith Byerman. Alice Walker: An Annotated Bibliography, 1968–1986. New York: Garland, 1989. A thorough catalog of writings by and about Walker, this bibliography includes numerous book and poetry reviews. An introductory essay provides an overview of Walker’s life and her literary contributions.

Buncombe, Marie H. “Androgyny as Metaphor in Alice Walker’s Novels.” College Language Association Journal 30, no. 4 (June, 1987): 419–427. Offers a helpful look at the treatment of sex roles in The Color Purple in comparison to Walker’s other novels.

Butler-Evans, Elliott. Race, Gender, and Desire: Narrative Strategies in the Fiction of Toni Cade Bambara, Toni Morrison, and Alice Walker. Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1989. Insightful comparative study of the relationship between narrative technique and politics in three African American women writers. Bibliography.

Christian, Barbara. “Alice Walker: The Black Woman Artist as Wayward.” In Black Women Writers, 1950–1980: A Critical Evaluation, edited by Mari Evans. Garden City, NY: Anchor/Doubleday, 1983. Examines thematic patterns in Walker’s work. Points out issues inherent in the role of the Black female artist, such as the need for conflict leading to change.

Christophe, Marc-A. “The Color Purple: An Existential Novel.” CLA Journal 36, no. 3 (March, 1993): 280–291.

Davis, Thadious M. “Alice Walker’s Celebration of Self in Southern Generations.” In Women Writers of the Contemporary South, edited by Peggy Whitman Prenshaw. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 1984. Focuses on themes and patterns apparent in Walker’s work, from her poetry through The Color Purple. Shows Walker’s need to resolve her intellectualism with her rural roots.

Evans, Mari, ed. Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation. Garden City, NJ: Anchor Press, 1984. Three excellent essays on the novels of Alice Walker. Includes a biography and selected bibliography. Discusses Walker’s work in the context of African American women’s writing.

Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., and K. A. Appiah, eds. Alice Walker: Critical Perspectives Past and Present. New York: Amistad Press, 1993. The most comprehensive and well-written collection of essays on Walker. Contains reviews, essays, and interviews. Includes chronology and bibliography.

Harris, Trudier. “From Victimization to Free Enterprise: Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” Studies in American Fiction 14 (Spring, 1986): 1–17. Focuses on the movement from domination to liberation in Walker’s female characters.

Hite, Molly. The Other Side of the Story: Structures and Strategies of Contemporary Feminist Narrative. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1989. Discusses Walker’s fiction as an attempt to create an opposing view to the dominant stories of culture. Analyzes her relationship to language and her relationship to narrative tradition.

Iannone, Carol. “A Turning of the Critical Tide?” Commentary 88 (November, 1989): 57–59. Discusses the political dimension of Walker’s fiction. Claiming that Walker writes from a militant, feminist standpoint, Iannone contends that praise for The Color Purple results from “literary affirmative action.” Ironically, Iannone notes, the down-and-out characters in Walker’s work move toward more conventional, middle-class lifestyles.

Marvin, Thomas F. “Preachin’ the Blues: Bessie Smith’s Secular Religion and Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” African American Review 28, no. 3 (Fall, 1994): 411–422.

Parker-Smith, Bettye J. “Alice Walker’s Women: In Search of Some Peace of Mind.” In Black Women Writers (1950–1980): A Critical Evaluation, edited by Mari Evans. Garden City, NY: Anchor Press-Doubleday, 1983. Celie affirms herself and finds the strength that she needs by discovering that God is within, that God is herself.

Proudfit, Charles L. “Celie’s Search for Identity: A Psychoanalytic Developmental Reading of Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” Contemporary Literature 32, no. 1 (Spring, 1991): 12–37. Proudfit offers a good example of a psychoanalytic approach to the development of Celie’s self-concept.

Taylor, Carole Anne. “Humor, Subjectivity, Resistance: The Case of Laughter in The Color Purple.” Texas Studies in Literature and Language 36, no. 4 (Winter, 1994): 462–483.

Towers, Robert. “Good Men Are Hard to Find.” The New York Review of Books, August 12, 1982, 35–36. This often-quoted review points out major flaws in The Color Purple, including the book’s contrived and overly dramatic plotting. Towers, however, concludes that the poetry of Celie’s language transcends the novel’s imperfections.

Tavormina, M. Teresa. “Dressing the Spirit: Clothworking and Language in The Color Purple.” Journal of Narrative Technique 16, no. 3 (Fall, 1986): 220–230. A study of language in relationship to sewing and quilting as they relate to the development of the self.

Walker, Alice. In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanich, 1983.

Walker, Alice. Living by the Word: Selected Writings, 1973–87. San Diego: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988. These essays provide an opportunity to get to know Alice Walker as a person. The earlier volume provides numerous insights into the writing of The Color Purple, the latter on Walker’s reactions to its reception.

Watkins, Mel. “Some Letters Went to God.” The New York Times Book Review, July 25, 1982, 7. Comprehensive review of The Color Purple consisting of analysis of theme and technique. Author notes the weakness of Nettie’s stiff voice yet praises the effective implementation of epistolary style.

Willimon, William H. “Seeing Red over the Color Purple.” Christian Century 103 (April 2, 1986): 319. Highly negative review of the film and novel versions of The Color Purple. Author considers the characters stereotypical, dishonest portrayals of Black Americans.

Pa’s Home

Pa’s home is the rural Georgia home in which Celie and Nettie live together as young sisters. This place serves as a frame for the novel, which begins and culminates in this small frame house. Despite the severe psychological and physical abuse to which the girls are subjected in this place, the home is where their formative bonding occurs. Although the girls are treated like slaves in their own home, this place of origin endures throughout the novel as a constant reminder of their only identification as family and the primary source of motivation for a desperately hoped for reconciliation.

The culmination of the novel is directly linked to this place. At the end of the novel, Celie takes possession of the home. The significance of this act is threefold. First, it serves as a validation of her hard-won independence. The house becomes a place in which she makes the important decisions concerning upkeep. After this change occurs, the home becomes prosperous and its inhabitants are at peace, in contrast to Celie’s early years in the home under male leadership. The house also serves as a reward for the faithful endurance of the sisters. Their long suffering results in a happy reunion in the place of their childhood trauma. Finally, the place is a symbol of transformation. Its inhabitants are emotionally transformed into vibrant characters, symbolized by the house’s physical and structural reconstruction.

Mr. _____’s House

Mr. _____’s house is Celie’s home after she marries the unnamed Mr. _____. Representing the nadir of her existence, this house becomes her descent into hell, though the hellishness of the place is masked by its outward appearance within a social context that prohibits a woman from rising to the level of her abusive husband. What goes on behind closed doors in this home is protected by the sham of traditionally accepted behavioral norms and social custom. Within this house, Celie is continuously mistreated by Mr. _____, the ultimate insult coming when he brings his ailing mistress, Shug Avery, into the home and Celie is expected to care for her. In her marriage home, as in her childhood home, Celie has no control over her destiny and receives no more affirmation as a person than an enslaved person might have.

Memphis

Memphis is a Tennessee city famous for its night life, where Shug Avery, a singer and performer, makes her home. In Memphis, Celie lives with Shug in relative luxury, enjoying the amenities of Shug’s healthy income. Celie learns a trade and, with Shug’s support and economic sense, eventually makes great strides toward becoming financially successful as the owner and manager of her fashion business. Celie’s tenure in Memphis is important because it is the first time in her life that she is free from the bondage of abusive men. For the first time, Celie becomes aware of her options and begins to see herself as a valuable human being.

Olinka Village

The Olinka village is the West African village where Celie’s two children are raised by Nettie and the place where Nettie spends most of her life separated from her beloved sister. The primitivism of this jungle place contrasts with the modernization of America, but more important, despite the obvious contrast, this place is used to parallel the journeys of Celie and Nettie. In both places, the ramifications of female subjection to men are indicated. This village also serves to presuppose the limitations of paganism, apparently contrasting with the Christian background and home of Nettie. However, the reality suggested by the author is that American Christianity, when reinforcing traditional relationships that obscure abuse and prevent female ascension and equality, is suspect.

Harpo’s Home

Harpo’s home is another ordinary home in the impoverished rural Southern setting of this novel and a place in which female retaliation to physical abuse occurs. Like his father, Harpo abuses his wife; however, Sophia fights back before eventually leaving him. Her action contrasts with Celie’s endurance of mistreatment. Left alone, Harpo transforms his home into a juke joint. Shug later sings there, and Squeak also begins her singing career at this place, so this is one place where a woman can be celebrated, provided she is talented and attractive. In contrast to the abusive family relations, the juke joint becomes a place where men in the community gather to celebrate their existence; however, their celebrations are little more than masks to cover the serious mistreatment of women.

Miss Millie’s Home

Miss Millie’s home is the home of the white mayor and wife, where Sophia finds herself unjustly sentenced to twelve years of maid service for refusing to cower to Miss Millie. This home serves to remind readers of another layer, beyond the home, in a social nexus that encumbers a Black woman seeking validation and independence. Readers see the awful price of racism that Sophia endures because she has sufficient dignity to stand her ground, but her stance contrasts with Celie’s tranquil endurance.

Samuel’s Home

Samuel’s home is the home of a local minister, who will become a missionary to Africa, which becomes Nettie’s home when the girls are separated. It is the closest thing to a positive traditional view of domesticity in the novel. However, even this home, despite its overt piety and compassionate motives, reinforces female subjection.

Alice Walker’s latest fiction is a marvel of words, rhythms, cadences; a singing of faith in the strength and survival skills of Black women; a testament to sisterhood; a tribute to a belief in humanity and a supreme being; an optimistic affirmation that people such as Celie will not merely survive, or “endure,” like William Faulkner’s Dilsey: they will joyfully prevail.

In structure, imagery, and theme, this novel speaks universals by narrating the richness and complexity of the lives of a community of Black people—especially the women of that community—in the rural South in the 1920s and 1930s. Yes, there are differences—Black/white, male/female, educated/ uneducated, traditional African/American—and the novel does not gloss over those differences or belittle their importance in history and culture. The tone of the book at times is bitter about the experience of Black people, in this country and in colonial Africa, but, as in all good fiction, the specificity of one woman’s experience helps the reader to recognize commonalities—in being female, in being human—and is ultimately an affirmation of life.

The narrative form Alice Walker chooses gives this novel its special flavor, brings together the disparate plot elements, and augments the main themes. Unlike most epistolary novels, which have the effect of distancing the reader from the events mediated by the letter-writer, The Color Purple uses the letter form to bring the reader into absolute intimacy with the main character—poor, ugly, uneducated Celie, who, for more than two decades, reveals the horrors, drudgeries, and ecstasies of her life in rural Georgia. There is no authorial voice to intrude between Celie and the reader, and Celie’s voice itself in her letters—in its lyrical, rhythmic Black folk idiom—speaks in a continuous present. Speakers of Black English often omit endings for past tense, third person singular present, and possessives; the same verb form is used for all tenses and persons. Celie’s distinctive language draws the reader into the experience, allowing no distance between narrator and reader. This sense of intimacy is further enhanced by the fact that Celie writes all the letters of the first part of the novel to God, the only one she dares tell the horrors of her adolescent years: being repeatedly raped by the man she believes to be her father; of the two children, born to her before she is sixteen, given away by the same man; of being married off to a widower (who beats her unmercifully) with four unruly children; of her beloved sister, whom she helps escape from the lecherous eyes of this same husband, now believed dead or lost.

It is years after Nettie’s disappearance when Celie receives a letter from her, and she then discovers that her husband, Mr.——, has been hiding Nettie’s faithful and regular missives. The voice in the book has been Celie’s so long that the reader is caught up short with a new narrator who speaks standard English (Celie’s letters constitute more than half of the book). It is only after this point that Celie begins writing her letters to Nettie; this change corresponds with her growing disillusionment with God. The concluding letter again begins “Dear God.” Now, reunited with her sister and children, reconciled with her husband and with her lover, Shug, clear about her past and hopeful about her future, her faith restored in a God who is no longer a white man with blue eyes and white flowing hair but instead is a powerful, wonder-creating concept, she writes her final letter. It is more of a thankful prayer than a confession or supplication: “Dear God. Dear stars, dear sky, dear peoples. Dear Everything. Dear God.”

The letters from Nettie provide important thematic parallels between the traditional Olinka society in West Africa (where Nettie and a Black couple are Christian missionaries) and traditional Black society in America. Three parallels are evident: the treatment of women (women in Olinka society are valued only in relation to men, as wives or mothers; Nettie, as a single woman, has no value); the ultimate helplessness of a traditional society in the face of colonial capitalist expansion (the Olinka land is literally destroyed to build a British rubber plantation); and the failure of Christianity to meet the real needs of the people (the missionaries are powerless to stop the destruction of the society as the land is denuded of the essential roof-leaf tree). Nettie’s letters also provide essential plot information—Celie discovers that her real father had been lynched and thus that her children were not the result of incest—and they help in Celie’s growth toward self-assertion and redemption. Still, the African letters are the weakest part of the book because the tone, not mitigated by the rhythmic cadences of Celie’s voice, becomes preachy. The reader never identifies with the African characters in the way that they do in other fictional works portraying the breakup of traditional African society with the coming of the white man, such as Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart (1958). More important, the African subplot is not satisfactorily resolved in the novel. When the missionaries leave Africa to return to America, taking with them the wife of Celie’s son, Adam, the Olinka problems are simply dropped. The rounded fulfillment of Celie’s life in the novel does not include the rest of the world. Facial scarification and clitoridectomy continue among the Olinka in a vain attempt to maintain a dying culture while the economic base of the society has been completely destroyed. Perhaps Walker leaves this thread untied to suggest the magnitude of the problems of developing nations, but in terms of the masterful plotting and structure of the novel, the omission is a defect.

The twin themes of the novel are those of redemptive love as a means of survival as well as an end in itself, and the beauty and necessity of female bonding. Celie’s survival strengths are her forgiving spirit and her ability to tell herself not to feel—when she has to. Other women in the book are more assertive but are also punished more for it. Sofia, for example, is nearly killed for sassing a white woman. It is Celie, survivor, who is the binder of wounds, the healer, the necessary ingredient in redemption. It is Celie who goes to the battered Sofia in jail, Celie who nurses Shug Avery back to health, Celie who helps Nettie get away, Celie who tames Mr.——’s children. Nevertheless, Celie learns from Shug and Sofia’s fighting spirit; she finally tells Mr.—— to get out and has to be restrained from killing him when she discovers he has kept Nettie’s letters from her. “You a lowdown dog is what’s wrong, I say. It’s time to leave you and enter into the Creation. And your dead body just the welcome mat I need.” The reader wants to cheer—and Celie’s family are all so surprised they “ain’t chewed for ten minutes.” Helped to a first sexual awakening by Shug Avery (her husband’s mistress), Celie begins to become her own person, asserting her individuality through her love of color (purple) and her sewing ability. Always sewing for others—curtains, dresses, quilts—she begins to branch out creatively and ultimately opens her own business, Folkpants Unlimited, when she goes off to Memphis with Shug. Celie’s pants, each pair carefully fitted and designed for the individual customer, are comfortable, beautiful, unrestraining. For male or female, her pants become the symbol of the redemptive love of the book. Celie dreams while sewing pants for Jack, Odessa’s helpful and loving husband:

They have to be camel. And soft and strong. And they have to have big pockets so he can keep a lot of children’s things. Marbles and string and pennies and rocks. And they have to be washable and they have to fit closer round the leg than Shug’s so he can run if he need to snatch a child out of the way of something. And they have to be something he can lay back in when he hold Odessa in front of the fire.

All the strong characters in the book are women, and it is the women who are the catalysts for positive growth and change. Shug Avery’s love for Celie persuades Mr.—— to stop beating Celie; Celie’s assertiveness and anger mellow Mr.—— (by the end the two sit on the porch, companionably smoking pipes and sewing together, talking about their good times with Shug). Squeak, Sofia’s husband’s mistress, saves Sofia from prison death by intervening with the white prison warden, who rapes her—and then asserts her own individuality, becoming “Mary Agnes” and beginning to sing for a living. Even the white mayor’s family is partially redeemed as Miss Eleanor Jane cooks special food for Sofia’s sickly daughter. This female bonding is essential in the book; it is the source of strength across class, age, and sometimes even racial lines. The women in The Color Purple are “sisters” even if they both love the same man. There is evidence throughout the novel that degrading treatment of women is not limited to a particular group or race; in one telling incident, Black and white men join in mocking the nature of women. It is the women who plan Sofia’s release, using the strategy and tactics of Br’er Rabbit, saying that the worst punishment for Sofia would be making her work for a white woman, that her life in prison was too soft; the men had suggested only useless violence—blowing up the jail. Neither living in traditional African society nor living in dominant white society makes the woman’s situation any better, suggests The Color Purple. Women helping women is what is necessary for survival.

Both Black and white critics have faulted Walker’s portrayal of males, but this charge is open to dispute. The main male characters are full, rounded people and not totally unsympathetic (except for Mr.——, whose conversion seems unrealistic). Odessa’s husband, Jack; missionary Samuel; and Celie’s stepson, Harpo, are all interesting, redeemable characters.

The color purple itself becomes, along with Celie’s sewing, the central symbol in the book. Suggestive of royalty, creativity, surprise, it becomes for Celie symbolic of the wonder of the creativity of God. The first new dress she owns (not a hand-me-down), she wants to be purple. Purple not available, she opts for blue. When, at the end, she finally has her own house, she sleeps in a room painted purple. The pants she sews for Sofia have one red leg, the other purple. Purple is also the symbolic color of lesbianism; Celie’s passionate love for Shug Avery is one of the poignant centers of the plot. When Shug leaves her for a young man, Celie is so crushed she can only communicate to Shug by writing notes: “I pray to die, just so I don’t never have to speak.”

It is Celie’s voice—her language, her style, her imagery—that is the strength of the book. Celie gradually begins to use more standard English, through her contact with Shug and through her correspondence with Nettie. By the end she says, “My hair is short and kinky”; earlier, she would have said, “My hair be short and kinky.” By the end she is using more possessive endings: “any woman’s body”; earlier, she omitted them: “her sister doctor over Macon.” Celie does not lose all of her unique language, however, even when sewing assistant Darlene tries to change her speech patterns, because “peoples think you dumb” when you say “US.” Celie responds: “Every time I say something the way I say it, she correct me until I say it some other way. Pretty soon it feel like I can’t think. My mind run up a thought, get confuse, run back and sort of lay down.” Walker is clearly opting for the importance of retaining what she calls “black folk English”—rather than the pejorative and racist term “dialect.” In an interview with Gloria Steinem, Walker asserts that writing in this, her first language, came easily: “I remember feeling real rage that black people or other people of color who have different patterns of speech can’t just routinely write in this natural, flowing way” (“Do You Know This Woman? She Knows You: A Profile of Alice Walker,” Ms., June, 1982).

Celie may be uneducated and naïve, but she is wonderfully perceptive, and her ability to “peg” a character in a phrase gives the reader some marvelous pictures. On Sofia: “Solid. Like if she sit down on something it be mash.” On Shug Avery: “She look so stylish it like the trees all round the house draw themself up tall for a better look.” Her idiosyncratic language is graphic and often poetic: “Both the girls bigged and gone”; “black plum nipples”; and “dress like a moving star.” She can tell a story economically or draw it out for effect; parts of the book are uproariously funny. Anecdotes are told in a traditional storytelling setting, with a community of people participating, their reactions also recorded. In fact, the oral tradition is very strong in this book: the community of listeners—the extended family—is always very much in evidence, as in the long narrative told by Sofia about teaching her white mistress how to drive. That that community of listeners is always Black and mostly female does not detract from the universality of the themes of redemptive love, strength in adversity, independence, and self-assertion through the values of community. Alice Walker’s triumph here is in creating a unique set of people who speak to the human condition. The Color Purple won both the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award for fiction in 1983, honors richly deserved.

The Color Purple is a series of seventy short letters; the first fifty-one are from Celie to God. Celie’s stepfather, Alphonso, rapes her repeatedly when she is so young that she does not even realize what is happening to her. She does not know that she is pregnant until her first baby is born. Alphonso steals it, as well as a second baby, and threatens her not to tell anybody but God what he has been doing to her; he says that if she tells, it will kill her mother. Celie pours out her confusion and pain in her letters to God. Her mother dies anyway, and Alphonso immediately marries again. Celie, who dropped out of school when she became pregnant, is virtually alone and has neither the strength nor the will to fight for herself.

Alphonso “gives” Celie to Albert, who had asked to marry Celie’s younger sister, Nettie. Albert, whom Celie refers to as “Mr.—” through most of the book, abuses Celie even though she has sex with him, cares for his three children, cleans his house, and works in the field. Celie invites Nettie to live with them to save her from Alphonso’s sexual advances. When Nettie refuses sex to Albert, however, he sends her away and hides all of her letters to Celie. Meanwhile, Albert continues his longtime relationship with blues singer Shug Avery. Everyone in the community knows of their relationship, which Albert does nothing to hide.

When Shug is suffering from “that nasty woman’s disease,” Albert brings her home for Celie to nurse back to health. Celie, who has always been fascinated by Shug’s photograph and her scandalous reputation, bathes her, feeds her, combs her hair, and learns to love her. At first, Shug is hateful to Celie, ridiculing her weakness and her inability to stand up to Albert. She then begins to feel close to Celie, learns to respect her, sings to her, composes a song for her, helps her find the letters from Nettie that Albert has hidden, and teaches her to respect herself and to assert her own independence. When Celie realizes that Albert has kept Nettie’s letters from her, she wants to kill him. Shug instead encourages Celie to become more independent, using her artistic talent as a seamstress to make and sell pants.

Harpo, Albert’s oldest son, and his strong and determined wife, Sofia, also encourage Celie and in various ways help her to learn to assert herself. She is also greatly empowered by finding Nettie’s letters and learning that both Nettie and Celie’s own children are alive and well in Africa. She also learns that Alphonso is not her real father; her children are not the products of incest, as she had believed.

By the fifty-sixth letter, Celie is writing to Nettie instead of to God, since she is not sure if she believes in God anymore. Shug has taught her to know and to appreciate her own body and to enjoy sexual pleasure. Shug has listened to Celie recount the story of the brutal abuse that she suffered as a child, while Celie has also listened to the story of Shug’s past, including the circumstances of her relationship with Albert. Much to Albert’s surprise, Shug starts sleeping with Celie instead of him. By the sixtieth letter, Celie is living with Shug in Memphis, has become a successful businesswoman, and for the first time has enough self-respect and dignity to sign her own name to her letters.

When Alphonso dies, Celie inherits the farm, to her surprise and pleasure, and is able to provide a home for herself and Shug and to prepare a place for Nettie and her children when they return from Africa. In the last letter—which Celie begins “Dear God. Dear stars, dear trees, dear sky, dear peoples. Dear Everything. Dear God”—she describes the happy reunion, after thirty years, with her beloved sister, Nettie, and the children who were stolen from her.

Twenty-two of the letters in The Color Purple are from Nettie to Celie, telling of her life with the missionaries Samuel and Corrine, who have taken in Celie’s children as their own. She finds both of them to be very kind, loving, and well educated. In her letters to Celie, Nettie shares her trips and her adventures in New York City, London, and Africa. In Africa, among the Olinkan people, Nettie finds the same reluctance to educate women, to accept new ideas, and to change traditional behavior that she had experienced in Georgia. Nettie’s spiritual growth and increase in self-respect and self-confidence are in many ways parallel to Celie’s. After Corrine’s death, Nettie and Samuel discover that they love each other and marry so that they can work together more effectively to serve the needs of the African people. Samuel stops preaching the American religion and begins to minister to the sick and care for the children.

Olivia and Adam, Celie’s children, have matured into beautiful, thoughtful adults; both of them love Tashi, a young Olinkan woman who returns to Georgia as Adam’s wife after having undergone the female initiation ceremonies of her own people. Adam demonstrates his love and support of Tashi by having the traditional scarring done to his face just before the wedding.

Harpo and Sofia are part of the family celebration at the end of the story. Sofia left Harpo because he tried to dominate her; she was then thrown in jail for refusing to work for the mayor’s wife. While Sofia served her sentence, Harpo and his new woman, Mary Agnes (or “Squeak”), take care of Sofia’s children. Later Sofia and Harpo, both more mature, are happily reunited.

The powerful Pulitzer Prize–winning novel is in the tradition of Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), by Zora Neale Hurston, and deals with many issues dealt with in the novels of Toni Morrison and other outstanding African American women writers.

In the opening pages of the novel, Alice Walker invokes “the Spirit” to assist her in the writing of the book; at the end, she refers to herself as A. W., “author and medium.” In speaking of writing the novel, she frequently refers to the fact that she is simply telling Celie’s story for her in Celie’s own words. This approach to character explains the harsh language and the vividly graphic words Celie uses to describe the brutal treatment that she received and her attitudes toward it; it is important for Celie as well as for other young women to tell their own stories as they recall their experiences. As Celie’s world expands and she begins to heal, her language becomes more “pleasant” and is easier to read. Women need to learn to love and accept themselves and their histories and to have the courage to write their lives in their own words.

Another important message to women in The Color Purple is the importance of women’s supporting one another and encouraging one another in the expression of their unique talents. Sofia and Celie make a quilt together, and even Shug allows Celie to teach her to quilt; quilting symbolizes their solidarity and strong mutual support. Mary Agnes supports and helps Sofia even though Sofia literally knocked Mary Agnes’s teeth out when she first saw her with Harpo. Sofia finally accepts Eleanor Jane’s assistance even though she is white and a member of the family that has treated her so terribly. Corrine finally forgives Nettie for “looking like” Adam and Olivia and for loving them and Samuel so much when she realizes the truth about Nettie not being their mother. Olivia and Tashi are bound by the same love and mutual devotion that Shug and Celie share, and they show the sisterly loyalty that Celie and Nettie feel. Women love and support other women in this novel.

Black-White Relations in the Rural South

Following the abolition of slavery, the social and economic conditions for African Americans remained largely unchanged. While no longer enslaved, many Black individuals continued working the land as sharecroppers, with the land still owned by their former slave masters. After 1915, the promise of economic opportunities in Northern industrial cities prompted many Black people to migrate North. Those who stayed behind continued to live in isolation from white society. Segregation was pervasive in schools, churches, and housing. Opportunities for Black people outside of sharecropping were scarce. During the period depicted in the novel, segregation was legally enforced to the extent that Black people had to sit in separate sections of movie theaters, drink from separate water fountains, and were barred from eating at white lunch counters. These segregation laws were known as Jim Crow laws, named after a pre–Civil War minstrel character. In The Color Purple, Sofia suffers under this social policy. When she defies the white mayor’s wife, who insults her, she is arrested and given a harsh jail sentence. The strained relationships between Black men and women had roots in a white male-dominated society. In white society, men were expected to control the family and held higher status than women. This attitude also permeated Black culture, but unlike white men, Black men faced daily humiliation due to their skin color. In their frustration, many Black men directed their anger toward women, leading to the double oppression of Black women that Alice Walker explores in the novel.

Lynching, or mob murder, was widespread in the South from the 1880s to the 1930s. Celie’s real father was lynched in the early 1900s because he had established a business that competed with white businesses. White Southern businessmen felt economically threatened when a Black business attracted Black customers away from them. This retaliation through lynching went largely unchallenged until the United States Congress attempted to pass an anti-lynching law in 1937. Southern senators blocked the bill by preventing it from coming to a vote in the Senate.

African American Religion

In their letters, Celie and Nettie discuss their views on God. Celie admits that she envisions God as white, but Nettie responds that her time in Africa has altered her perception. Her African experience has led her to see God in a spiritual sense, rather than the physical form depicted in Western Christianity. During the first half of the twentieth century, most African Americans were either Baptist or Methodist. However, their religious expressions in church differed significantly from those of white congregations. Their services incorporated elements from their African heritage, including a unique musical style and a dynamic delivery of sermons. Congregation members would respond to the preacher at pivotal moments, and singing was often accompanied by expressive physical movements such as clapping and swaying. African Americans were particularly drawn to Baptist and Methodist churches because these denominations had opposed slavery early in American history. By the late eighteenth century, Black individuals were forming their own congregations within these Protestant sects. In 1816, Black religious leaders convened in Philadelphia to establish the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME), which continues to have significant congregations across the United States.

Barbara Christian notes that Alice Walker's writing style is "organically spare rather than elaborate, ascetic rather than lush." Indeed, the letters that make up the book, particularly Celie’s early letters to God, seldom occupy an entire page. This physical sparseness mirrors the painful constraints of Celie’s life and possibly her reluctance to express herself, a sign of her low self-esteem. While this is an imaginative technique, in such a short book, it provides a limited canvas for the author to develop. In The Color Purple, these physical constraints contribute to many characters being underdeveloped. Practically speaking, it is challenging for the reader to accept that thirty years pass within the roughly 250 partly blank pages of the book. Fictional time requires a suitably substantial text.

Nevertheless, Walker endeavors to convey the entire story through these letters—to God, to Nettie, and to Celie. The epistolary format is not new (Samuel Richardson used it in his 1740 novel Pamela), but it is quite rare in Black literature, leading to mixed reactions from critics regarding Walker’s approach. Peter S. Prescott in Newsweek found the Celie/Nettie correspondence "deeply moving," while Frank W. Shelton interprets Celie’s letters to God as a way for her to assert that "she is still alive." Conversely, Mel Watkins in the New York Times Book Review describes Nettie’s letters as "lackluster and intrusive." What is less debatable is that the transition from Celie writing to God to Celie and Nettie writing to each other effectively splits The Color Purple into two parts. Some readers find this technique brilliant; others find it disorienting.

The stark shift in language accentuates this split. The Color Purple has been highly praised for Walker's use of Black folk speech. Gloria Steinem is particularly impressed that "there are no self-conscious apostrophes and contractions to assure us that the writer, of course, really knows what the proper spelling and grammar should be." The rural, idiomatic language used by Celie contrasts sharply with the standard English used by Nettie, vividly illustrating how a change in environment can influence something as fundamental as language.

While many commentators praise Walker's skillful use of dialect, there is considerable debate regarding the novel's conclusion. The Color Purple presents Walker’s first “happy ending,” which, although it pleases Peter S. Prescott in Newsweek, is criticized by most other reviewers for being excessively contrived and sentimental. Nonetheless, Trudier Harris might be right in describing The Color Purple as a kind of fairy tale, complete with an ugly duckling and a cruel stepfather, which naturally calls for a happy ending to fit the fairy-tale mold.

On a more straightforward level, the ending can be justified as emotionally fulfilling: Celie and Nettie, who have endured significant hardship, deserve to be reunited. It would contradict everything Walker has depicted for over 200 pages if Nettie's ship had indeed been sunk by German mines off Gibraltar.

The concept of the regenerative power of love and the murderous effects of meanness is manifest in Alice Walker’s works. The author’s novels, short stories, poetry, and essays are all about a search for understanding and truth. Celie’s story is a transcription of her psychological and spiritual growth. Through the device of letter writing, Walker brings her audience into intimate communication with Celie, the principal storyteller in the novel.

As a poor, half-literate Black woman, Celie lacks the apparatus for success and happiness. Her transfiguration into a joyful soul proves that redemption is possible for all people open to human kindness and love.

Soulful poetry emerges from Celie’s speech, with its lyrical cadences. “Angels strike they cymbals, one of them blow his horn, God blow out a big breath of fire and suddenly Sofia free,” Celie writes of Sofia’s homecoming. The figurative and expressive qualities of Celie’s language make the novel more than simply a story. Inherent in the epistolary format of the book is the idea that language itself can be salvific. Celie’s letters for a time are her only sustaining lifeline, as they confirm her existence. Celie’s words are evidence of a life lived.

Celie’s relationships, described in Celie’s own disjointed style, are well-drawn and colorful. Her native Georgia community comes to life as a network of individual characters.

Sensitive to conflict in male-female relationships, Walker explores masculine and feminine psyches in The Color Purple. Female love is the strongest emotion in the book. Often called a feminist, Walker prefers the term “womanist,” to indicate the sexual and nonsexual affection among women.

Celie’s struggle to accept or reject abuse dominates her interaction with Albert. Celie is portrayed as basically good, whereas Albert is portrayed as villainous. Critical commentary on these polar characters varies. Some readers believe that the disparate character depictions are historically accurate, while others believe the book’s men are misrepresented as abject beings.

Imagery in the story is drawn from everyday, often domestic, scenery. The image of Celie as a tree suggests that she is a static force, planted in a confining role. Using garden imagery, Walker employs as a primary symbol the purple flowers in the fields. Shug tells Celie, “I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.” Knowing the spiritual value of the material world, Shug urges Celie to take pleasures that God gives freely. In this way, Shug gently prods Celie away from her emotional paralysis.

The multiple interpretations of the novel show the book’s depth. As with all good literature, The Color Purple can be examined from many contexts: moral, cultural, political, historical, aesthetic, and spiritual. That so much richness comes from the mouthpiece of a character as naïve as Celie is evidence of the power of honest storytelling.

In The Color Purple, Alice Walker explores the nature of God and religion. Celie shares a traditional Christian view of God with the rest of her community. The church is an essential part of this society, although there is a clear hierarchy within the congregation. The Bible is a guide for correct behavior, and the local preacher uses it to help shape the moral values of the community as a whole. The early letters demonstrate the key role that religion plays in determining Celie’s behavior, even to the point where she refuses to criticize her father for raping her because the Bible says she should honor her father. God, to whom Celie addresses her letters, is both a confidant and a source of protection. She pictures God as he appears in many Christian images, an Old Testament patriarch with long hair and flowing robes. However, after the revelation that Mr.—— withheld her letters for all those years, God suddenly seems a representative of the two groups that abused and betrayed her all her life, men and white people.

Shug Avery, a self-confessed sinner who is denounced by the churchgoing community, defends God. God is not “him” to her, but rather “it.” She espouses a pantheistic view of the world in which all nature is God, and God appears in all nature. God is a joyful and loving being. The novel’s title reflects this as Shug tells Celie that she thinks God may become angry when people walk past a field and fail to appreciate the color purple. In her view, God appears in church only when the people themselves bring him in. Her religion stresses love, compassion, and pleasure.

This contrast between the conventional Christianity of established churches and more nontraditional views is also reflected in Nettie’s letters from Africa. Although the Olinka worship nature and pay homage to the roof-leaf plant, the crop that sustains their lifestyle, they listen to stories about the white Christian God. However, the destruction of the roof-leaf and their village by the white colonialists causes the Olinka to question all religion because no God has been powerful enough to save them. Samuel and Nettie, too, find failures in conventional religion. They eventually wish to establish a new church in their community, one that honors the spirit of God rather than the image.

In following the life of a woman named Celie from the early 1900s to the mid-1940s, The Color Purple exposes the severe emotional, social, and economic challenges faced by Black people, particularly women, in the rural South during the early twentieth century. Equally important, it demonstrates how these challenges can be mitigated through hard work, faith (in oneself, if not in God), and education. While these themes might seem to border on the clichés that affected Walker’s earlier works, her sharp presentation of the material manages to keep the novel from becoming overly sentimental.

Especially notable is Walker’s unflinching portrayal of Black men in the beginning of the novel. Celie’s stepfather, Alphonso (often referred to simply as “he”), and her husband, Albert (“Mr.”), are depicted as cruel and immoral individuals who see their wives and daughters as mere servants and sexual objects. However, Walker illustrates that their abuse of women stems from Black men’s feelings of powerlessness in a society dominated by whites, coupled with ingrained social practices. Albert’s son, Harpo, attempts to beat his wife, Sofia, because he mirrors his father’s treatment of women. Furthermore, the letters from Celie’s sister, Nettie, who is a missionary in Africa, reveal that the systematic mistreatment of women is prevalent among the Olinka tribe, suggesting that this abuse is partly an African phenomenon independent of American white oppression. On the issue of violence, The Color Purple serves as a revealing document that explores this social issue from multiple perspectives.

Closely related to this is Walker’s exploration of sexual dynamics. The Color Purple begins with fourteen-year-old Celie being raped by her “Pa,” and Walker’s depiction of how this abuse appears to an uninformed young girl is unforgettable. Equally shocking is the coldness with which Pa takes Celie’s two babies away from her and then arranges her marriage to a much older neighbor, sweetening the deal with a cow because Celie “ain't fresh . . . She spoiled. Twice.” It takes 200 pages before Celie discovers that “Pa” is not her biological father, but the presumed incest that opens the novel sets a tone of sexual impropriety that runs throughout the story. Despite this, Celie’s lesbian relationship with her husband’s lover, Shug Avery, is portrayed as quite touching. Celie’s innocence regarding sexual matters (Shug often calls her a virgin) and her desperate need for the acceptance that Shug provides make their relationship one of the few genuine examples of love in the novel. The scarcity of love in society and the importance of accepting it in whatever form it appears are recurring themes that Walker continually revisits.

Similarly, Walker is profoundly concerned with the role of religion in contemporary American society. Nearly half of the novel is composed of Celie’s confessional letters to God, whom she imagines as “some stout white man work at the bank.” However, upon discovering the truth about her family—that her biological father was lynched, her mother suffered from mental illness, and that “Pa not pa”—she concludes that God is not omnipotent: “You must be sleep.” From that moment, her letters are directed to her sister, Nettie. They maintain their correspondence for thirty years, despite being uncertain if the other is still alive. The novel suggests that sisterly love, rather than organized religion, can serve as one’s “faith,” enabling individuals to endure and overcome the harshest circumstances. Yet, as Shug observes, even sisters are not essential for faith: “God is inside you and inside everybody else,” and to find God, one simply needs to “lay back and just admire stuff. Be happy. Have a good time.” Walker describes this perspective as “animism,” a heritage of the African past; students of transcendentalism might recognize it as the Emersonian “Oversoul.” Regardless of the label, Walker acknowledges the necessity of some form of faith in modern society.

Interestingly, one social issue that Walker does not explore in The Color Purple is the relationship between Black and white people. Aside from brief mentions of a white prison warden and a questionable lady missionary, white characters are absent from the novel. This omission highlights the insularity of rural Black life and may also contribute to the novel’s popularity among white readers, as Walker has deliberately made it non-offensive to them.

1930s: The roles of men and women are distinctly defined. Men are the primary earners and heads of households, while women remain at home to care for children and manage household chores.

Today: Both men and women share the financial responsibilities of the household. Many married women with children are employed, and young children are often looked after in daycare centers or by hired babysitters at home.

1930s: Racism is widely accepted across the nation, with Southern laws enforcing segregation. African Americans are excluded from numerous industries.

Today: Discrimination based on race, gender, ethnicity, or disability in the workplace is prohibited by law.

1930s: Violence against women is prevalent and largely overlooked by law enforcement.

Today: Violence against women is illegal, and offenders are actively prosecuted in both civilian and military settings.

1930s: The majority of religious African Americans are members of Baptist or Methodist churches.

Today: Many African Americans have converted from Christianity to Islam. The Black Muslim movement has developed strong leadership, making it a significant religious option for African Americans.

1930s: Colonial powers dominate the African continent, with European nations exploiting Africa's abundant resources.

Today: All African nations are self-governing, but the legacy of colonial mismanagement has resulted in unrest in several countries.

As previously mentioned, the epistolary format owes a significant debt to English novelist Samuel Richardson. Additionally, numerous critics have noted that letters and diaries have enabled modern historians to piece together the private lives of women before the late nineteenth century. This was a time when the literary market first became open to “female scribblers.” These highly personal literary genres are often considered a forte of women, particularly those like Celie, who lack other means to express their emotions and creativity.

Walker’s emphasis on rural Southern Black communities may reflect her admiration for William Faulkner’s works (e.g., Light in August, 1932; Go Down, Moses, 1942). However, she has stated that the fiction of Flannery O’Connor has had a more significant influence on her writing. It is important to note, though, that O’Connor shows little interest in racial issues and her strong Roman Catholic beliefs are quite opposed to Walker’s “animism.”

Walker’s primary literary interest lies in Black writers such as Jean Toomer (Cane, 1923) and Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1937). Hurston is recognized as an early documenter of rural Black speech, and it is likely that Walker was influenced by her work. There is also some evidence that Langston Hughes’s folk philosopher “Jesse B. Semple” can be seen in Celie’s passive contentment with life. In summary, despite Walker’s well-known admiration for Russian novelists, the Brontës, and Kate Chopin, the primary literary influences for The Color Purple seem to be rooted in Black literature.

Many of the social issues and themes found in The Color Purple are also evident in Walker's earlier novels, The Third Life of Grange Copeland (1970) and Meridian (1976). Although these three books are not connected in a series, they share common elements. The Third Life of Grange Copeland explores the history of the Copelands, a poor rural Black family, spanning from 1920 to the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Similar to The Color Purple, Walker presents the Copeland family's experiences, particularly those of the patriarch Grange, as representative of the Black experience in America during that forty-year period. Walker's second novel, Meridian, often regarded as the finest work to emerge from the Civil Rights Movement, is more ambitious, utilizing a non-linear structure and a poetic, almost impressionistic style. Despite their strengths, both books have faced criticism for excessive violence, inconsistent characterization, and overt, pretentious symbolism.

Characters introduced in The Color Purple reappear in Walker's subsequent novels. Tashi, Olivia, Adam, Celie, and Shug have minor roles in The Temple of My Familiar (1989), while Tashi, Olivia, and Adam are central figures in Possessing the Secret of Joy (1992). Walker has mentioned that she exercised her creative freedom to alter these characters slightly, but these novels should not be considered sequels. And indeed, they are not.

Warner Brothers acquired the movie rights to The Color Purple for $350,000. Filming commenced in June 1985, and the movie was released during the Christmas season. While it achieved significant box office success, it faced substantial criticism for its trivial and sentimental handling of some of the film's most impactful themes and scenes. David Ansen of Newsweek remarked that it was akin to “watching the first Disney movie about incest.” Some of the criticism was directed at the Dutch screenwriter, Menno Meyjes, but the majority of it was aimed at director Steven Spielberg. Critics accused Spielberg of creating a visually stunning yet superficial “white man’s version” of The Color Purple.

In 1985, Steven Spielberg both directed and produced The Color Purple. The film featured Whoopi Goldberg as Celie, Oprah Winfrey as Sofia, Danny Glover as Albert, Margaret Avery as Shug Avery, and Willard Pugh as Harpo.

Although the movie received nominations in every major category at the Academy Awards, it did not win any Oscars. However, it did earn accolades from the Directors Guild of America, the Golden Globes, and the National Board of Review.

The Color Purple also significantly contributed to the rise of Oprah Winfrey and Whoopi Goldberg's careers. The film is available on home video through Warner and Facets Multimedia.

Sources

Trudier Harris, “On The Color Purple, Stereotypes, and Silence,” in Black American Literature Forum, vol. 18, no. 4, 1984, pp. 155–61.

Gloria Steinem, “Do You Know This Woman? She Knows You: A Profile of Alice Walker,” in Ms., June, 1982, pp. 35, 37, 89–94.

J. Charles Washington, “Positive Black Male Images in Alice Walker’s Fiction,” in Obsidian, Spring, 1988, pp. 23–48.

Winchell, Donna Haisty, Alice Walker, New York: Twayne Publishers, 1992.

Walker, Alice, The Color Purple, New York: Simon & Schuster, Inc., 1982.

Richard Wesley, “The Color Purple Debate: Reading between the Lines,” in Ms., September, 1986, pp. 62, 90–2.

For Further Study

Richard Abcanan, Negro American Literature, Wadworth, California, 1970.
An early yet essential commentary on African American literature, its origins, and significance. It includes an in-depth discussion of Richard Wright’s novel.

Gordon W. Allport, The Nature of Prejudice, Cambridge, 1954.
A foundational source for understanding the issues of prejudice and racism, and for defining concepts like visibility and difference.

Barbara Christian, editor, Black Feminist Criticism, Pergamon Texto, University of California Press, 1985.
A collection of essays exploring Black literature from a feminist criticism perspective.

Arthur Davis and Michael W. Peplow, Anthology of Negro American Literature, Holt, New York, 1975.
A compilation of critical essays on early African American literature.

Leslie Fiedler, “Negro and Jew: Encounter in America,” in No’ In Thunder, Stein and Day, New York, 1972.
An intriguing article by a renowned critic examining the relationships between Jews and African Americans in the U.S.

Paula Giddings, When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Power in America, Bantam, 1985, p. 186.
Historian Giddings discusses the role of skin color and its impact on achievement. She provides evidence that African Americans of mixed race (with lighter skin) had better educational and economic opportunities than those with darker skin.

Nathan Glazer and Daniel P. Moynihan, editors. Ethnicity: Theory and Experience, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA, 1975.
A study of the relationships between “Self” and “Other,” based on significant observations from the 1960s.

Jacquelyn Grant, “Womanist Theology: Black Woman’s Experience as a Source for Doing Theology,” in Encyclopedia of African American Religions, Garland, 1993, p. 1.
Grant explains the concept of womanist as opposed to feminist, noting that Black women's struggles for expression differ from those of white women.

Bell Hooks, Ain’t I Woman: Black Women and Feminism, South End, 1981.
Hooks discusses the sexual violence Black women faced post-slavery and their passive roles after World War II.

Charles Frederick Marden and Gladys Meyer, Minorities in American Society, Van Nostrand, New York, 1973.
An early examination of ethnic relationships in the U.S., with a detailed section on the challenges faced by African Americans.

S. Dale McLemore, Racial and Ethnic Relations in America, Allyn and Bacon, Boston, 1980.
This comprehensive study delves into ethnic relations in the United States, with a significant focus on African Americans. It includes an in-depth analysis of cultural versus racial differences and their visibility.

Toni Morrison, Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination, Picador, 1992.
Nobel Prize winner Toni Morrison offers crucial and compelling insights into African American literature, exploring its origins, objectives, and future directions.

Carol Pearson and Katherine Pope, The Female Hero in American and British Literature, Bowker, New York, 1981.
This essential study of women in literature provides valuable understanding of Celie's role as a heroine in The Color Purple.

Annis Pratt, Archetypal Patterns in Women’s Fiction, Indiana University Press, Indiana, 1981.
This work examines the use of archetypes and myth in literature and can be applied to the analysis of The Color Purple.

Elaine Showalter, Towards a Feminist Poetics, Oxford, 1979.
A study of feminist poetic theory, offering intriguing ideas that are relevant to The Color Purple.

Claudia Tate, Black Women Writers at Work, Continuum, New York, 1983.
A collection of interviews with Black female authors, including Alice Walker. The interviews have a distinctly feminist perspective, making them particularly valuable for those studying The Color Purple.

Fannie Barrier Williams, in Paula Giddings’s book, When and Where I Enter: The Impact of Black Women on Race and Power in America, Bantam, 1985, p. 114.
Williams examines the historical perception of Black men towards Black women, highlighting an attitude that devalued Black women and questioned their virtue.