A powerful cultural touchstone of modern American literature, The Color Purple depicts the lives of African American women in early twentieth-century rural Georgia. Separated as girls, sisters Celie and Nettie sustain their loyalty to and hope in each other across time, distance and silence. Through a series of letters spanning twenty years, first from Celie to God, then the sisters to each other despite the unknown, the novel draws readers into its rich and memorable portrayals of Celie, Nettie, Shug Avery and Sofia and their experience. The Color Purple broke the silence around domestic and sexual abuse, narrating the lives of women through their pain and struggle, companionship and growth, resilience and bravery. Deeply compassionate and beautifully imagined, Alice Walker's epic carries readers on a spirit-affirming journey towards redemption and love.
I'd picked up The Color Purple from the thrift store. I'd of course heard of it before as it's a classic, but it was (unsurprisingly) the queer relationship plot line that piqued my interest. Also, purple is my favorite color. As is usual when reading when reading Black/African American stories from before the 1980s, I steeled myself for a super sad story, and was right to do so. Celie goes through so much abuse from her father and husband, as well as the systemic racism and misogynoir of her time. Major, major trigger warnings for rape and abuse (the full list is of course at the end of this post). I felt for her and was so glad that she got to be in a loving relationship and eventually became a respected member of her married-into family. Even her relationship with her husband Albert developed from abuser/abusee to friends, which was nice to read, although I would have been fine with reading that he died in a fire or something. The scene where Celie stands up for herself and calls Albert well-deserved names made me cheer! Almost all of the men suck in this book, unsurprisingly, but it is clearly due to the sexist, misogynistic culture they live in and the way they are brought up. Even the one character (Sofia, Celie's step-daughter in law) who seemingly is unaffected by and does not buy into misogynoir and racism is severely punished for it. There are so many heartbreaking family estrangements in this book: Celie and Nettie, Celie and her children, Sofia and her family, etc. Nettie has her own story that is fascinating to read. I did find it interesting how the family included mistresses and everyone helped raise everyone else's babies.
It's Shug Avery who first gives Celie the ability to dream. Celie finds her photograph (Shug is a famous singer and "bad girl") and falls in love with her immediately. They meet because Shug and Albert were in love and have an on-again, off-again thing, and he brings her home because she is very sick, making Celie take care of her. Celie and Shug become friends and then more, and Celie is inspired by Shug's openness about sexuality and spirituality. I think it's pretty clear that Celie is a lesbian and Shug is bisexual, although of course those terms aren't used. Surprisingly little to no homophobia; heteronormativity is of course there but everyone just accepts Celie and Shug's relationship. That they are able to make a home together in Celie's abusive 'father's' house after he dies is beautifully symbolic. I'm so glad Celie got to have the love she deserved.
This book was so sad and hard to read but so necessary, and Celie gets her happy ending. This is a very important book that I think most people should read, but if you cannot read about rape or abuse or incest, do not read this.
Score: 4 out of 5 stars
Read in: February 9
From: thrift store
Status: giving away
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