Alice Walker's The Color Purple

The Color Purple, written by Alice Walker, pinpoints the hardships that the main character--Celie--has to deal with due to her rough childhood. Not only does her past affect her present actions negatively at first, but she also finds the courage to leave her past and live a new life at the end. During her young age, she had two children by being raped by her stepfather, that were only given away. After her mother died, her stepfather was in full control and sent off Celie at the age of twenty to a man--Mr. _______--who was looking for someone to marry after his wife as killed. Mr. _______ however was abusive also, as he often beat up Celie. Her past event of being raped, led her to have a weak relationship with any man and instead fear them saying “I don’t even look at mens. That’s the truth. I look at women, tho, cause I’m not scared of them” (Walker 6). She viewed them to be evil as a whole

_______’s house as being his on and off lover. Due to Celie’s encounter with being raped, she fears men and feels no sense of emotion when her husband--Mr. ______--tries to make love to her. However, Walker displays a connection between her and another woman, not because of a different sexuality, but rather loving someone as an individual who is not a man. She describes sleeping with Shug as, “It feel like heaven is what it feel like, not like sleeping with Mr. _______ at all” (Walker 119). Celie also often feels jealous when Shug gets too close to Mr. ______, not because that’s she’s flirting with her husband, but rather because she wants all of Shug’s attention to be focused on her. This attitude of Celie’s allows her to distant herself from her own husband and instead almost worship Shug starting from the very beginning as she takes care of her while she’s ill. “I wash her body, it feel like I’m praying. My hands tremble and my breath short” (Walker