Celie In Alice Walker's The Color Purple

In Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, the reader follows Celie, a young African American girl, as she reveals the hardships of her life through her written testimonies to god. Celie’s ability to move beyond the abuse of Pa and Mr.______, into a life created by her relationships and ambitions highlights how it takes courage to change one’s identity because of the past.

Celie, a 14 year old girl, is demeaned by her father, Pa, from the beginning of the novel; either by rape, or stripping her of her two children she bared for nine months. Throughout the majority of Celie’s first letters to God, she mentions the abuse of Pa. Stating, “he beat me for dressing trampy but he do it to me anyway,” and “(Pa) say I’m evil and always up to no good.” The
Shug is a young, beautiful blues singer, with an unapologetic personality. Shug and Celie’s relationship shifts from a one sided relationship, where Celie is infatuated with Shug, into a two sided relationship with Shug and Celie becoming close friends and intimate partners. Through this transition, Shug’s interest in Celie allowed for Celie to find beauty within herself. Because nobody ever took the time to truly admire or love Celie, Celie could never truly figure out how to love herself. Through Shug’s appreciation and affection towards Celie, Celie truly began to understand her worth and her potential; Celie also began to become proud of her body and learned how to enjoy sex, rather than it being something forced upon her. Shug forever influenced Celie’s perception of herself, directly correlating into her changed identity. Without Shug, Celie would not have had the courage to further her desires beyond the societal norms of a woman during this time period. Consequently, Celie began to leave behind her dresses in exchange for pants, as the dresses symbolized her oppression as a woman. Because pants were considered only a man’s clothing, Celie’s ability to leave behind dresses and begin wearing pants highlights her enlightened courage to defy the very men that oppressed her for the entirety of her life. Not only does Celie begin wearing pants, but she starts a successful business making pants for both genders. The pants serve both as a liberation from her past, and from gender stereotypes of her time period. By leaving behind her dresses, she is consciously leaving behind her past, the past that inhibited her from achieving her dreams. Through Celie’s relationship with Shug, she was able to find qualities within herself that she could not have discovered alone, therefore discovering different parts of her identity throughout the process as