The Color Purple Essay

Colin Forbes
2/24/11

Compare and contrast essay

“The Color Purple”, by Alice Walker, tells the story of a two African American sisters in the early 20th century. Celie deals with many problems throughout her life and writes to God about them. Also, it is about her sister Nettie, a missionary in Africa. “The Color Purple” is an epistolary novel, which means that the novel is written in letters. Though they start off being raised the same, Celie and Nettie go off very different ways. Celie gets married off to an abusive husband and Nettie goes to Africa with missionaries. They both encounter discrimination throughout their lives, and both try to overcome. Also, Celie deals with questioning religion and God, even though she has written to him most of her life.

Throughout the novel Celie and Nettie both deal with their religion and spirituality. Celie mostly goes with what people tell her. She accepts what is real and never educates herself about religion. Though she has faith and addresses God throughout the story, she begins to question the reality of God. All her past experiences and observations make Celie feel like she is not being treated equally. By men and women, she is recieving harsh insults for being stupid, ugly, or black. She writes to God, expecting help through her hard times, but fails to get any. She tells Nettie in a letter that she will not write to God anymore.

“She say, Celie! Like she shock. He gave you life, good health, and a good woman you love to death. Yeah, I say, and he give me a lynched daddy, a crazy mama, a lowdown dog of a step pa, and a sister I probably won’t ever see again.” (192)

Here, she begins to question how God benefits her. She reflects upon the bad things in life that she has to deal with and does not bother to think about the positive things. She also thinks that God may not be listening to her because she is colored.  “Let ‘im here me, I say. If he ever listened to poor colored women the world would be a different place, I can tell you.”  Here, she attempts to convince Shug Avery that God is not fair by saying that if he listened to poor colored women, the world would be equal for everyone, no matter the race or creed. Nettie, on the other hand, is educated about religion and decides to make it a career. She was taught by missionaries and knows more about religion than Celie. Nettie’s take on religion is slightly different from Celie’s.  She does not keep her knowledge to herself but instead teaches religion and equality to kids in Africa. Nettie’s firm belief in God helps her throughout the story by giving her the courage to stand up to gender inequality in Africa.

Sexism plays a big role in “The Color Purple”. Women are treated unfairly in both the American South and in Africa.  When Celie and Shug announce they are moving to Memphis, Celie breaks gender barriers between men and women. She speaks up and tells Mr_ how she feels.

“You a lowdown dog is what’s wrong, I say. It’s time to leave you and enter into the creation. And your dead body just the welcome mat I need. Say what? He ast. Shock. All round the table folkses mouths be dropping open. You took my sister Nettie away from me, I say. And she was the only person love me in the world.” (199)
She stands up to Mr_ and tells him all of her feelings that she has held in from the day they were married. She knows that Mr_ does not love her and she wants someone in the world to love her. Mr_ treats her with little respect throughout the book, and constantly fights Celie’s attempts at equality. Celie deals with sexism throughout her life. Her stepdad even removes her from school because he impregnated her.

“The first time I got big Pa took me out of school. He never care that I love it. Nettie stood there at the gate holding tight to my hand. I was all dress for the first day. You too dumb to keep going to school, Pa say. Nettie the clever one of the bunch.”

Her stepdad never cared about cared about how she loved school. He still took her out. He always thought Nettie was the smart one and completely gave up on Celie. He never tried to support her and he just gave her away. Nettie even tries to defend Celie, saying that she is smart, but her stepdad will not change his mind.

Nettie, however, does not achieve equality while she is living in Africa because of their culture. The village that Nettie lives in only educates the boys and treats the girls with little respect. The boys are given many privileges and rights and the women and girls of the tribe do not get much say in what happens. Nettie is not given the rights that the boys are given and the girls are not allowed the education that the boys are allowed. Nettie tries to fight for women’s rights in Africa but has little success.

“The world is changing, I said. It is no longer a world just for boys and men. Our women are respected here, said the father. We would never let them tramp the world as American women do. There is always someone to look after the Olinka woman. A father. An uncle. A brother or nephew.”

The father of Tashi does not think that women are equal in their village. He thinks that there will always be someone to look after them because they are not educated. He says that they respect their women by not letting them have the same freedoms as American women. He thinks that American women are tramps and they are not respected by their communities, yet they have equal rights as men in America.

            Though Celie and Nettie are similar in a few ways, their differences far outweigh their similarities. Celie has a far worse life than Nettie, but manages to overcome sexism. Nettie, on the other hand, is not able to overcome sexism, but is able to overcome racism.