CHANGE AS A THEME

Taniya Treesa George - 1313251

Class : 2 BA PSEnglish

                 Transformation – rapid and continuous change- is a usual thread in the tapestry of late twentieth and twenty-first century life. This is demonstrated flamboyantly in the novel, ‘The Color Purple’- a genuine combination of transfiguration of people, cultures and worlds.

                  Religion is frequently seen us contributing a pathway to eventual transformation. But the essence of this transformation is often contradictory or paradoxical. In the novel color purple, Celie’s world is a microcosm of this contradiction. Her enormous suffering and misery are the consequences of a separation between her inner and outer life. However, when her inner and outer pathway becomes one, her misery is transformed into liberation.

                 In the novel, many of the characters undergo change. Until she finds out that Mr._____ has been hiding all her letters, she however, perceives her potential for change. Celie undergo a fundamental change within the space of one letter. “Where I’m at it peaceful”, she says “no Albert there. No Shug. Nothing.” Truly we are able to see a whole new Celie being born, who is brave, even cruel “crazy for Mr._____ blood.”

                When she realizes that Alphonso is not her real father, we again see the change in her when she and Shug “dress up” in “Big floppy Easter hats” while the all the flowers are in bloom. These allusions indicate a new life and propose a resurrection of Celie’s memories as well as a new life with Shug and a delightful understanding that now she’s detached from Alphonso. Further we understand that the American south is not only where change happens. The missionaries Samuel, Cornie and Nettie imagined that there job is to urge Christianity on the local residents only to realize “how powerless we and our God are”. Walker tries to bring in so many instances or examples of people who have a strong desire to bring forth change to injustices in the country but are not capable of finding a right away to bring about the changes that could transform the lives of, mostly, the natives. Doris Baines is an example for this. She was a white missionary with unusual forward thinking of her time. Doris had contributed enormously to communities in Africa and also used to help individuals to get education by sending them to England. She travelled with an African boy whom she adopted as her grandson called Harold. She saw past the norms and notions of that time and was a major contributor of change. Aunt Theodosia is another character in the story who tried to bring about change. The author itself offers us the correct manner to transform the system and that is exactly what she has done by writing. In the eighteenth letter, she says that, “no sooner had a young woman got through seminary than she began to put her hand to whatever work she could do for her people” though “they thought nothing of packing up for India.”

                   As we go through the novel, we often ask ourselves what walker is trying to change through her novel. We could assume that it is people’s perception of race and sex that she is trying to change through her book. Both these issues are however, dealt with by the end of the novel. By the end, Mr.____ stops regarding the sexist values he had for many years.

Walker is not choosing out sex and racism as a single problem, but the different culture and people’s resistance against change. However the two characters, Alphonso and Tashi’s father oppose to any kind of change and perish. This symbolizes how wretched unwilling to change is.

                   In other words, Walker acknowledges varied personal and religious qualities but she hopes that she can somehow try to change the mindset of people.

REFERENCES;

1. Walker, Alice. The Color Purple: A Novel. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1982. Print.

2.”Tell Nobody but God": The Theme of Transformation in The Color Purple." "Tell Nobody      but God": The Theme of Transformation in The Color Purple. Web. 29 Aug. 2014. 

3. "Themes." Themes. Web. 29 Aug. 2014.