The Color Purple - The exposition

You better not tell nobody but God. It’d kill your mammy.

Dear God,

     I am fourteen years old. I am I have always been a good girl.

These are the first three lines of the book The Color Purple by Alice Walker. They really caught my interest because the young girl seems to have been threatened by someone else. Maybe because of something she did herself, something bad that would hurt her mother’s feelings. Or it could be something the other person did to her. There is an untold secret and it makes you want to keep on reading to find out more about it. However I believe the book will unveil more about the girl’s life.

In the beginning we are introduced to the main character, a young black girl named Cecile. Since a young age she has been raped by her own father and bore two of his children, which he had killed or sold. Her mother unknowing of this died of sickness and Cecile tried to protect her younger siblings from their father. Later on she married a man and took care of his children even though he did not love her, beat her to make her obedient or just to release his anger. Her husband was in love with the glamorous singer Shug Avery, a beautiful woman who all men seemed to be mesmerized by, and envied by women. Cecile secretly admired her a lot and eventually Albert made her live with them. In the novel we also meet Cecile’s husband Albert’s son Harpo. He married the woman he loved, Sophia, but their marriage became troublesome. They seemed to have reverse roles, when you look at the cultures custom. Sophia was strongly built, and she went out and repaired the house and did fieldwork, while Harpo stayed at home and made food in the kitchen. Being used to see the ways his father treated his wife, I believe that he tried to do the same but failed. When they got into fights he became more injured. He tried to comfort himself by eating a lot, hoping to grow bigger. Afterward, Sophia took the children with her and left.

The book is so far about black people like Cecile, living in poverty and segregation, in country where white people are dominating. Lives are not treated as valuable, and there seems to be very little love in between people, even in a family. For instance a woman can have very many children, too many for her to care about each and every one, if she did. Furthermore, daughters seem to be something a father can sell for a prize and children are not encouraged to have an education. Cecile seems to be a nice and kind girl. She does not fight back when she is treated badly and accepts everything without trying to grasp her destiny in her own hands. Being called ugly and compared to other people all the time, she is probably dissatisfied, living in a society where money talks, but also where people build too much of their self-image on the confirmation by others based on their looks and then build their values on it. But already in the beginning we can see little glimpses of how Cecile feels belonging and that someone does something for her, due to Shug Avery. Shug Avery on the other hand, seems to be the opposite of Cecile. A woman who is praised for her beauty and she has confidence and freedom. Similarly, none of them seem to be happy and I believe that the two of them will change each other’s lives.

The book’s title is The Color Purple. I believe it is because in the ancient times, purple was a royal colour, worn by rich people, and that it might symbolically represent the value of a treasure Cecile will find, or it represents her admiration toward Shug Avery who is always dressed at her best. But from another perspective the colour purple is also seen in bruises, and that could represent all the violence Cecile has to put up with through her life. It could be a mix of both. The colour could also mean something in their culture. I have yet not found any evidence in the exposition, but I believe that the author will relieve it later into the story.