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The Color Purple

Alice Walker

Start date: November 1, 2022

Finish date: November 26, 2022

Discussion: Monthly Bonus Reads

Why we're reading this: November Bonus Read - International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women

The Color Purple
[close] November Bonus Read - International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women

The Color Purple

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What Members Thought

Jul 31, 2018 Raymond rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: 20booksbyblackwomen, five-stars

Second review (2024): I re-read this alongside my Nerdy Circle partner Honorée Fanonne Jeffers after I watched the new musical adaptation. I enjoyed reading this book a second time and I appreciate and love it even more, especially its legacy not just in the film and theatre adaptations but also what it has to say about feminism and the patriarchy, what it has to say about how people can change and evolve. Honorée Jeffers said something in our conversations about the book that has stuck with me ...more

65 likes · Like · see review

Feb 13, 2017 Suzy rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, found-family, found-community, listened-to, re-reads, movie-fave, american-south, audio-faves

What a delight to reread The Color Purple after 30+ years, and to have Alice Walker read it to me. I'm always wary of an author reading their own work, but felt while listening that no one else could have read this with such depth of feeling and meaning as Walker. When I read TCP when it first came out, it felt revolutionary. A portrayal of violence against women and black people, but a story of redemption and Life with a capital L. In Walker's 1990 introduction, she talks about how she struggle ...more

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Aug 02, 2017 Jeanne rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: read-2017, feminism, read-women, african-african-american

I first read and enjoyed The Color Purple when it came out, 35 years ago. Some books don't have staying power, but The Color Purple does. I suspect that I read it then with different eyes than the ones I read with now, but it worked in both ways.

(Think of your rereads: Which didn't make as much sense the first time as now? Which fell flat with your second read?)

The Color Purple is Alice Walker's story of two sisters – neglected and abused, raped, children stolen, and married into "slavery." The I first read and enjoyed The Color Purple when it came out, 35 years ago. Some books don't have staying power, but The Color Purple does. I suspect that I read it then with different eyes than the ones I read with now, but it worked in both ways.

(Think of your rereads: Which didn't make as much sense the first time as now? Which fell flat with your second read?)

The Color Purple is Alice Walker's story of two sisters – neglected and abused, raped, children stolen, and married into "slavery." The two were separated in their teens and, although they did not receive letters from each other for decades, continued to write. This book appears to be a sampling of their letters across time. Imagine: Who would you continue writing for more than 30 years without a word? Who would you write after you believed that he or she had died?

It's easy to see this as a book about friendship, love, self-discovery, wisdom, and growth, but Walker sees it as a book about God: "Everything that happens during [Celie's] life, spanning decades, is in relation to her growth in understanding this force." Walker sees us as growing through "the intensity of our suffering, and what we are able to make of it" (Introduction).

Of course, it's not this simple. Suffering alone does not lead us to God/Goddess – and sometimes causes us to turn out backs on Him/Her, as Celie does at one point: "Anyhow, I say, the God I been praying and writing to is a man. And act just like all the other mens I know. Trifling, forgitful and lowdown.... If he ever listened to poor colored women the world would be a different place, I can tell you" (p. 192).

Suffering can, however, lead us to develop a richer view of the meaning and meaningfulness of life. Nettie, for example, observed, "God is different to us now, after all these years in Africa. More spirit than ever before, and more internal. Most people think he has to look like something or someone— a roofleaf or Christ— but we don’t. And not being tied to what God looks like, frees us" (p. 257).

Frees Nettie and her family to really see God/Goddess and all of Creation. From Celie: "I been so busy thinking bout him I never truly notice nothing God make. Not a blade of corn (how it do that?) not the color purple (where it come from?). Not the little wildflowers. Nothing." (p. 197).

What do you see? What are you forgetting to see because you are focused on your suffering or material things? See and surround yourself with the color purple.
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Feb 26, 2017 Alana rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: books-to-film, historical-fiction, classics, pulitzer-prize-fiction, boxall-s-1001-books

There's so much to digest about this book that I'm still not sure I'm really ready to collect my thoughts about this into a concise review, but I wanted to put them down before I forget my initial impressions.

This book is brilliant. It's tragic, yes, but oh, so full of hope, overcoming, and growth. There are some extremely graphic, adult issues, not only of rape and incest but of disease, racism, colonialism, misunderstandings.

I think what I appreciated most about Walker's writing was how she d There's so much to digest about this book that I'm still not sure I'm really ready to collect my thoughts about this into a concise review, but I wanted to put them down before I forget my initial impressions.

This book is brilliant. It's tragic, yes, but oh, so full of hope, overcoming, and growth. There are some extremely graphic, adult issues, not only of rape and incest but of disease, racism, colonialism, misunderstandings.

I think what I appreciated most about Walker's writing was how she developed ALL of her characters, not just the female, and not even just the primary characters. She takes just under 300 pages and puts together full lives of several people who are interconnected, but so very different in personality, perspective, upbringing, and ultimate growth. While many of the male characters are chauvinist, they are portrayed most of the time as being victims themselves of their own society and its norms, thinking "manliness" means a certain set of behaviors. Many of them, over time and experience, see the error of those behaviors, and while not completely leaving them behind, showing such growth and understanding that one imagines hope for the next generation to improve upon what has been learned, and the next, and the next, and onward. None of them are perfect--far from!--but they are not complete pigs and have a depth of character not often seen in a novel of this kind that faces so many "women's" issues.

The females as well show a vast array of personalities and their own levels of standing up for themselves and making improvements in their own tiny corners of the world. There are friendships formed and broken and reformed. There are some relationships (whether of men or women or both) that seem a little too tidily mended after a great deal of heartbreak, although that can be better overlooked by the period of time elapsed in the novel (it begins when the main character is in her early teens and ends when she has children grown into adulthood). Some of the relationships I wasn't as excited about as others for various reasons, but the themes explore in each relationship were interesting to ponder.

The blending of colors (i.e. red or pink with blue) and the unity implied by this by the color purple (along with several other implications of purple throughout the novel, including of royalty, expense, etc) binds it all together in a theme. It's a beautifully written story that I wish I had picked up long ago, and only put off for so long because it sounded like such a heart-wrenching, depressing book. Yes, it has some very difficult moments, but the heart of it is beautiful and strong and encouraging. I'm sure this is one I will read again in the future.
4.5/5
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