The exposition-The color purple 1

The first three lines:

You better not never 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. Maybe you can give me a sign letting me know what is happening to me.

These are the first lines of the novel and they immediately catch my attention, mostly because they signify both danger and mystery and I instantly want to continue reading to find out more abut these two characters. I also notice that the character from whose perspective the sentences are written from is currently in a situation she has a hard time understanding and is therefore looking for guidance from God, which makes me believe that she is going through something difficult without having anyone to lean on. She has also replaced I am with I have always been, which tells me that a specific occurrence has now lead to her not considering herself as a good girl anymore, she now talks about herself being good in past tense.  However it is hard to draw a conclusion based on these sentences of what will happen in the novel but I believe that the terrified girl will experience a lot of hardship during her life. 

In the beginning of the book we are introduced to Celie, the protagonist of the novel who is a young Afro-American girl that is constantly being sexually abused by her father and as a result Celie ends up in a state where she has a hard time standing up for herself in front of this man, she is just to scared and weak. Her father treats her very badly and humiliates her multiply times by saying that she is a lousy cook, impure, old and so on. With an abusive father and a dead mother Celie has a hard time experiencing real love and kindness in her surroundings, however we are also introduced to one character that gives her the love that she really deserves and that is her beloved sister Nettie. She stands up for her and tries to help her build up her confidence after their father has crushed it over and over again.

Furthermore we will also meet another character with a name that is unknown until later on in the book, however this man will marry Celie and she will have to leave her family to live with him and the children that he has from his first marriage.  The sad part is that he did not want Celie in the beginning but her little sister Nettie and when the father refused to let her go he gave away Celie because for him she was “worthless”. This shows that the bases of this marriage was not love, instead it was the comfort of this man so that he can have a woman that is able to take care of the children and the household, in other words an object that is there to fulfill all of his desires and needs.  In combination with the move Celie finally gets away from her abusive father only to move to a place where the mistreatment will continue, but this time by another man.

Celie:

She is the main character we will follow throughout the novel and also a woman who has been mistreated most of her life, despite that she still has so much love and compassion within herself and for me that is absolutely incredible. Throughout her life she has lived and is currently living in a male-dominated home, where the woman’s role is to listen and do as she is told and that is exactly what Celie does.  She is introduced as a vulnerable character but very caring, a person who does not want to harm anyone. Nevertheless I believe that she will develop as a person and become stronger and more independent, but ill have to continue reading to find out.

The title of the novel:

The color purple is the title of the novel but the author has so far not revealed why the novel has this specific title, we will just have to wait and see because it will probably be revealed later on in the book.