Alice Walker's acclaimed novel, The Color Purple, has been on my to-read list for years. A classic of the epistolary format - one of my favorite reading formats - it should have cycled to the top long before now; in any event, I've finally read it and found it as absolutely brilliant and jaw-droppingly beautiful as expected.
The novel follows two sisters with very different lives: Celie, who grows up poor before becoming a downtrodden child bride, and Nettie, who moves to Africa with missionaries and spends most of her adult life there. Celie's husband, a widower, had originally wanted to marry Nettie, but their father insisted he take Celie instead, so she begins her married life as an unwanted consolation prize, destined to be a household drudge and free childcare for her new husband's children from his first marriage. Celie finds some comfort in writing letters to God, in the sympathy of her new sisters-in-law, and in her dreams of meeting famous local singer Shug Avery. Celie's sister-in-law, Kate, takes her shopping for a new dress - the first time anyone has shown Celie any love or care since her marriage.
He look at me. It like he looking at the earth. It need somethin? his eyes say.
She go with me in the store. I think what color Shug Avery would wear. She like a queen to me so I say to Kate, Somethin purple, maybe little red in it too. But us look an look and no purple. Plenty red but she say, Naw, he won't want to pay for red. Too happy lookin. We got choice of brown, maroon or navy blue. I say blue.
I can't remember being the first one in my own dress. Now I have one made just for me. I try to tell Kate what it mean. I get hot in the face and stutter.
She say, It's all right, Celie. You deserve more than this.
Maybe so, I think.
While Celie tries to navigate her new marriage and household responsibilities, Nettie falls into the company of a missionary family preparing to travel to Africa. (I won't tell you how Nettie meets the missionaries or what her connection is to them, since that would reveal an important plot point.) As Nettie's world expands beyond the tiny circle of her poor hometown, she makes sense of her new experiences by writing long, newsy and thoughtful letters to Celie - unaware that Celie's husband is preventing Celie from receiving any of them. (Vindictively, he had told Nettie that she would never speak or write to Celie again - but Nettie still holds out hope that her letters might get through.) In her missives to Celie, Nettie reflects on the culture shock she experiences in Africa, and especially on her horror at discovering practices like facial mutilation and female circumcision among the people she is trying to convert to Christianity (and, by extension, to a Western worldview).
The world is changing, I said. It is no longer a world just for boys and men.
Our women are respected here, said the father. We would never let them tramp the world as American women do. There is always someone to look after the Olinka woman. A father. An uncle. A brother or nephew. Do not be offended, Sister Nettie, but our people pity women such as you who are cast out, we know not from where, into a world unknown to you, where you must struggle all alone, for yourself.
So I am an object of pity and contempt, I thought, to men and women alike.
Meanwhile, back home, Celie has realized her dream of meeting the singer Shug Avery - who, it turns out, is an old flame of her husband's. Shug turns up on their doorstep one day, sick and mean, and Celie patiently nurses her back to health - falling in love with her in the process. Shug, for her part, falls in love with Celie too - as much as she can, at least. Shug isn't meant for one man or one woman, but Celie becomes the love of her life. Together, they explore each other's bodies and minds, talking through their doubts and fears and joys and beliefs.
I is a sinner, say Shug. Cause I was born. I don't deny it. But once you find out what's out there waiting for us, what else can you be?
Sinners have more good times, I say.
You know why? she ast.
Cause you ain't all the time worrying bout God, I say.
Naw, that ain't it, she say. Us worry bout God a lot. But once us feel loved by God, us do the best we can to please him with what us like.
You telling me God love you, and you ain't never done nothing for him? I mean, not go to church, sing in the choir, feed the preacher and all like that?
But if God love me, Celie, I don't have to do all that. Unless I want to. There's a lot of other things I can do that I speck God likes.
Like what? I ast.
Oh, she say. I can lay back and just admire stuff. Be happy. Have a good time.
Well, this sound like blasphemy sure nuff.
Alice Walker famously said that The Color Purple is a book about religion. There's certainly plenty of material to chew on, between Nettie's experiences with the missionaries and Celie's homespun reflections. But the story that captivated me was a story of community, more so than religion. Nettie, surrounded by community - both her small community with the missionary family and her experience of a larger, and very different, community in the African village where they live - is, for all intents and purposes, alone. As a Western woman come to spread Christianity, she cannot be truly a part of the community in the village. But neither does she belong to the missionaries; indeed, she starts to fall apart from them when the missionary wife becomes jealous and suspicious of Nettie's relationship to her husband. Nettie's only solace is the community she creates for herself in the letters to Celie - letters she knows are almost certainly not even being delivered.
Celie, meanwhile, starts out the book virtually alone - married off at a young age to a man who does not love her and has only taken her on to be his drudge. Called ugly, forced to watch children who do not respect her, Celie could easily fall into loneliness and despair. But she seems to attract community - it grows up around her almost organically. First, there are her husband's sisters, who seem to recognize that Celie is downtrodden but deserving of far more than her husband believes. Then Celie's stepson grows up and marries a fiery woman, Sofia, who brings her own community to their home. And there's Mary Agnes - called Mouse - who starts as an intruder to the family but becomes an important part of the community, and - above all others - there's Shug. Celie, poor and at first unloved by any but Nettie, builds herself a life in which she is surrounded by community, and especially by female community. It's a compelling story of the power of female friendship, support, and love.
It has taken me weeks to find the words to write this review, because this book was just so wonderful it left me astonished. I do need to give a trigger warning if you're planning to read it, as part of the plot hinges on an act of abuse and incest. (This is crucial to the story and not gratuitous, is treated sensitively, and is over quickly - but it's important to note.) And there really are no words to express how very special this book is, and all of these characters. I just adored them all - even the characters who began their story arcs as unpleasant people have their redemptions. I can see myself returning to The Color Purple again and again and taking some new treasure with me each time.
Have you read The Color Purple? What did you take from it?
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