Comparing The Color Purple And The World's Wife By Alice Walker

‘Celie gives in to her environment with a kind of passivity that comes near to provoking screams in readers’

Compare how Alice Walker and Carol Ann Duffy present female passivity and its consequences in The Colour Purple, and The World’s Wife

In The Colour Purple and The World’s Wife, Alice Walker and Carol Ann Duffy both present characters who have endured the difficulties of the patriarchal system through the problems of abuse and difficulties with expression. Both writers present female passivity through women who are silenced by their issues and oppression, and are therefore unable to defend themselves. Furthermore, passive females are traditionally characterised as meek, and those who depend on men in marriage for stability. In addition,

This is evidenced in her advice to Harpo regarding his masculinity and insecurities with Sofia, ‘beat her’. Walker develops how the system of oppression is uncomfortable and shocking as it has led to learnt helplessness where Celie is unable to escape from her abusive environment and only further supports the cycle. This is further demonstrated by Albert’s actions as he tells Harpo to beat his wife in order to show who had the ‘upper hand’. The idiom again conveys another form of control and dominance which is continued throughout the whole text. Celie’s female passivity has conequently meant, that Harpo has been socialised to see women as passive creatures, which is why he is unable to understand Sofia’s stronger personality and character. The resulting female passivity is arguably due to the society’s socialisation of individuals where people learn from their family, and their role models, one that is understandable. Celie’s female passivity has therefore allowed for both the cycle of abuse as well as the image of passive women which would continue to be unchanged in society if one does not resist the system. In addition to understanding Celie’s abusive environment, Edwin Mhandu describes how men in The Colour Purple use ‘violence to dominate women’ which support the differences in power and control in the society where Celie grows up in, compared to the society in The World’s Wife where the dominance of men in media and institutions are the main focus. For example, Celie describes how Albert ‘beat me like he beat the children’, therefore demonstrating that violence is spread throughout the novel, with both domestic abuse towards partners and the children. The verb ‘beat’ is blunt, and depict the extent to which violence has become a norm in society. The plosives further