Key quotations Flashcards
Alphonso Letter 1
you better not tell nobody but God. It’d kill your mammy
Celie Letter 5
I don’t even look at men’s. That’s the truth. I look at women, tho, cause I’m not scared of them
Celie letter 8
I never tell her how flat it look to me
Celie letter 12
I don’t say nothing. I think bout Nettie, dead. She fight, she run away. what good it do? I dont fight, I stay where I’m told. But Im alive
Celie letter 13
I say to myself, celie, you a tree. Thats how come I know trees fear man
Celie letter 14
Shug Avery standing upside a piano, elbow crook, hand on her hip…. Her mouth open showing all her teef and don’t nothing seem troubling her mind… Lord, I wants to go so bad. Not to dance. Not to drink. Not to play card. Not even to hear Shug Avery sing. I just be thankful to lay eyes on her.
Albert letter 19
Wives is like children. Nothing can do better than a good sound beating
Celie letter 21
What you do when you get mad? she ast. I think. I can’t even remeber the last time I felt mad, I say.
Celie letter 22
Harpo ast his daddy why he beat me. Mr- say, cause shd my wife. Plus, she stubborn. All women are good for - he don’t finish
Celie letter 33
First time somebody made something and named it after me
Celie letter 36
By now he just about her size
Shug letter 49
cause she the only one you ever love
Celie letter 50
where I’m at it peaceful. It calm. No Albert there. No shug. nothing
Nettie letter 54
Like family might have been, I mean
Nettie letter 62
They’re like white people at home who don’t want colored people to learn
Celie letter 68
you must be sleep
Shug Letter 73
Listen, God love everything you love- and a mess of stuff you dont. But more than anything else God love admiration…. Not vain, just wanting to share a good thing. I think it pisses Gpd off if you walk by the colour purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.
Albert letter 75
who you think you is? he say. You can’t curse nobody. Look at you. You black, you pore, you ugly, you a woman. Goddam, he say, you nothing at all
Nettie letter 86
And not being tied to what God looks like, frees us
Albert letter 87
And I start to git mine real heavy long about the time I told Shug it was true that I beat you cause you was you and not her.
Celie letter 87
They not so backwards as mens here
Albert letter 89
I start to wonder why us need love. why us suffer. why us black. why us men and women… and that if you ast yourself why you black or a man or a woman or a busg it don’t mean nothing if you don’t ast why you here, period.
Celie letter 89
If she come I be happy. If she don’t, I be content. And then I figure this the lesson I suppose to learn-
Celie misses Shug but realizes she will feel fulfilled even if her friend and lover never return. She recognizes Shug’s friendship and love have empowered her to take sharge of her life by breaking the emotional bonds of physical abuse. She is strong because of the love she feels for herself and the love from her friends and family, and this fills her with satisfaction
Nettie talking about the Olinka Tribe letter 80
And as they struggled to put up the roofs of this cold, hard, glittery, ugly metal the women raised a deafening ululation of sorrow
