A good book may go with you until your bedtime but a best book will be with you for a lifetime. For instance, there are some timeless treasures of American Literature beginning with 'THE COLOR PURPLE' by Alice Walker. Why am I citing this specific example? It is because I am going to base this article on its theme, storyline, plot, and characters.
The color purple explores the fall and rise of a young African-American woman called Celie Johnson. There is a hue of fear, exploitation, horrid teenage years, and abuse by one's stepfather. Alice has carefully kept out the vivid images of life through celie's perspective and why not as whole of the book is celie's journey from hell to heaven and from downfall to rise.
When this novel came out, it received mixed reactions from the black Americans as the abuse came from the community itself. Walker's work on the other hand was a pioneer in the sense of history. This book actually created a lot many controversies in the American fiction. It represents the idea of slavery in the Negro community that destroys the basic unit and infrastructure of the society that is family. Money on the other hand was another major horror that this people faced. Young children and especially teenage girls were sold or married to oldies to have money and farming animals. It was as if making slaves and the masters that resided in the families sold them off without having a second thought.
We always take an example and recite all the time that our families are there to protect us but here family led the young girls to slavery, exploitation, bullying and mental abuse. If there were no families, there would be no slavery, no community, no unity, and no society. This sounds like hell but this is true. No effective protests were seen, and as we read the book, we actually can picture the girl who is forced to become a woman and how she finds love in the same-sex relationship. (Celie and Shug Avery). The writer does not follow the usual track of black and white mechanism of slavery but black on black exploitation effect. Here, the lower class is not only affected by the whites but also by their own people.
Alice is African-American woman writing about and for the African-American people. The evil comes from the same community. Walker by this brave attempt explores the grey areas pervading in her own community. This was not an easy task. She got death-threats and killer letters from people because all of them were hoping to see this as a 'white-perspective' novel. It is easier to throw off the blame on other's shoulders because we cannot acknowledge our own faults. (Is it not?). In this context, the roles are literally changed. Immense contradiction is reflected and terrible backlash is seen.
I do not judge the author, the book, or the community because when a writer writes she promises to portray real-life accuracy. It is a dismayed representation of a young black life and the villain is not the archetypal white but the black people themselves.
When you get threatened, frightened or bullied by your own family, community and society your life turns into a living hell. But if you believe in God and trust your destiny no one will dare to stop you from having the best part of your life.
No comments :
Post a Comment