Dear God

I am not even kidding, this is a coloring book. Alice Walker’s The Color Purple is a read that will add color to your life. Even though it starts off excruciatingly painful and depressing after you are done reading and set the book aside, it will be like, “Damn, everything looks so beautiful now. So purple."

Walker has always been an author that put her own sex ahead of her own race and her critics have always nagged at her pallid portrayal of black males. The Color Purple is definitely one of her works that those critics cite because it deals with women seeking and finding friendship and liberation (you know what I’m talkin' about) in other women because their male counterparts cannot help and frequently exacerbate things. But not to worry, Walker manages to make The Color Purple not sound like a feminist’s wet dream largely due to the writing style Walker implements.

The Color Purple is an epistolary novel with the main narrator, Celie, being an uneducated black woman (meaning she gets a double-dose of oppression) that writes in African-American colloquialism. This is not to mean, “Sup yo, my name be C-to-the-E-to-the-L-I-E; so what the deal G," but it does take a while to get used to if you get annoyed everytime someone says, "I write good." At the beginning of the novel, Celie is a fourteen year old growing up in the 1930s South (not good, I hear, if you’re black). Her mother dies. Celie's father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her; her two children (whom we are first led to believe are the product of incest) are taken away and her only confidant, a younger sister named Nettie, must run away to avoid Alphonso’s abuse. Later on, Celie is married off but the abuse does not end. Her literally nameless husband (referred to as Mr. ___ in Celie’s letters) feels that it’s a necessity of manliness to beat your wife. Yeah, with all Celie's drama, not even Mary J. Blige got sh*t on her. Celie grows up in this unbearably stark world that she allows us to enter through her letters that begin, “Dear God."

The reason Celie can still speak to someone that has been, to this point in her life, either nonexistent or extremely cruel is because she has no one else. In fact, it can be argued that writing to God is like writing to no one and there is something very poignant about a character so unfortunate that she continues to write knowing she won’t get a response. Walker makes the letters themselves moving because Celie does not write with the expected emotion of someone that is continually abused; her letters are upsettingly removed. This is because Celie does not know what a better life is and thus fully accepts her current torturous one and lives it out like a rock would. If someone beats a rock, who cares? Certainly not the rock.

But while living with Mr. ___, Celie meets two women that will introduce her to life - not the beauty of life because it makes sense to say that Celie hasn’t even been living if she has no emotions. Mr. ___’s son, Harpo, picks the wrong woman to fall for, Sofia, who is a tough, buff, no-B.S. Jamaican woman (I’m unjustly assuming she’s Jamaican) that refuses to let Harpo beat her like his dad beats Celie. Sofia eventually becomes friends with Celie. But Celie eventually becomes more than just friends with another woman, a singer named Shug Avery. Like it or not, Celie’s first experience with love comes from another woman while the men are simply no good. This is where I would normally make a smarta*s comment but because this book was so moving, I won’t.

One revelation about life that The Color Purple gave me is that love comes with pain (somehow, Ja Rule could not manage this). As painful as it is for us to read about Celie’s early experiences with her father and her husband, we should remember that, in her rock-like existence, she felt no pain herself. She certainly didn’t feel happiness. But with continued exposure to Sofia’s independence and Shug’s caring touch, Celie began to feel joy, love, and hope; and with those came pain, hate, and despair. Despite all the abuse Celie has endured from Mr. ___, she does not hate him until she finds out that he’s been hiding Nettie’s (whom Celie thought was dead) letters. The epiphany and turning point for our protagonist is summarized by her writing, “I curse you," referring to Mr. ___. It is then that Celie is finally done being initiated into life.

While it is obvious that Walker does some male-bashing (is there a word for this like there’s “misogyny" for female-bashing?), I am okay with this; she’s probably listened to hip-hop and wanted some revenge. What I had to knock a star off for in this otherwise exemplary tale is Nettie’s character. Celie’s narratives are interrupted by Nettie’s letters and through those we find that Nettie and Celie’s two children are in Africa with two missionaries, a married couple, Samuel and Corrine. While Celie is portrayed as a woman neither blessed with intelligence nor good looks, Nettie is supposed to be someone who understands the importance of education and has educated things to say. This means Nettie is boring. In disguise, we are reading Nettie’s lost letters to Celie, but what we’re really reading is Alice Walker’s political letters to her readers. Sadly, Walker could not contain herself from too-obviously injecting her own voice into her story making Nettie a stoic, one-dimensional character amongst the rich, dynamic ones back in America. This is not to say there isn’t a little bit of drama unfolding in Nettie’s life, but compared Celie’s past, it’s not even worth mentioning. Besides, genuine feelings and political this-and-thats mix about as well as beer and wine.

Fortunately, the novel picks up again when Celie commences writing again but this time “Dear Nettie" has replaced “Dear God." Celie makes the observation about God, “you must be sleep." Which is interesting because it is only when she sees a little bit of sunshine that she can denounce God. At this point in the novel we see the bitterness in Celie that she deserves to feel but has repressed for so long. However, Walker couldn’t end the story with Celie still mad at God and all men. Over time Celie finds a little satisfaction away from Mr. ___ making her own living (sewing clothes) and she eventually forgives Mr. ___, who sees his wrongs and transforms into a peaceful man that even sews with Celie. However, Celie cannot find true solace because a part of her is still missing and this is not resolved until the very end.

Nettie and Celie’s children do get reunited with Celie and The Color Purple ends in a celebration. Celie’s final letter is addressed to the stars, the trees, the peoples, everything, and God - a universal God (represented by the color purple) rather than a white, patriarchal one that I, too, have trouble accepting. The Color Purple thus goes full circle from a satisfied existence back to a satisfied existence, although the circumstances for both are very different. The novel is an emotionally draining read and the ultimate message is one of hope and forgiveness. It is amazing how the bad English of one homosexual, black woman can convey these messages universally. The Color Purple has many things to teach; it taught me that you cannot experience love without pain and vice versa; and if you’re religious, it'll teach that “Not being tied to what God looks like, frees us;" and if you’re a feminist, it'll remind you that, Men? We’re no good. And if you're a man that's mad at Alice Walker, at least admit that she makes "female intellect" sound not quite so oxymoron.