The Color Purple - Plot Summary

Plot Summary

Celie, the protagonist and narrator, is a poor, uneducated, fourteen-year-old black girl living in the South. She starts writing letters to God because her father, Alphonso, beats and rapes her. Alphonso has already impregnated Celie once. Celie gave birth to a girl, whom her father presumably killed in the woods. Celie has a second child, a boy, whom her father also abducts. Celie’s mother becomes ill and dies. Alphonso brings home a new wife, and continues to abuse Celie.

Celie and her bright, pretty younger sister, Nettie, learn that a man known only as Mr. Johnson wants to marry Nettie. Mr. Johnson has a mistress named Shug Avery, a sultry lounge singer whose photograph fascinates Celie. Alphonso refuses to let Nettie marry, and instead offers Mr. Johnson Celie, "an ugly woman," as his bride. Mr. Johnson eventually accepts the offer, forcing Celie into a difficult and joyless married life. Nettie runs away from Alphonso and takes refuge at Celie’s house. Mr. Johnson still desires Nettie, and when he advances on her, she flees. Never hearing from Nettie again, Celie assumes her dead.

Mr. Johnson's sister Kate feels sorry for Celie, and tells her to fight back against Mr. Johnson rather than submit to his abuses. Harpo, Mr. Johnson's son, falls in love with a large, spunky girl named Sofia. Shug Avery comes to town to sing at a local bar, but Celie is not allowed to go see her. Sofia gets pregnant and marries Harpo. Celie is amazed by Sofia’s defiance in the face of Harpo’s and Mr. Johnson’s attempts to treat Sofia as an inferior. Harpo, kinder and gentler than his father, still assumes this means he is doing something wrong and under the advice of Mr. Johnson and a momentarily jealous Celie, attempts to beat Sofia into submission. However, he consistently fails, as Sofia is at least as strong and a more experienced brawler.

Shug falls ill and Mr. Johnson takes her into his house. Shug is initially rude to Celie, but the two women become friends as Celie takes charge of nursing Shug. Celie finds herself infatuated with Shug and attracted to her sexually.

Frustrated by Harpo’s consistent attempts to subordinate her, Sofia moves out, taking her children with her. Several months later, Harpo opens a juke joint where Shug sings nightly. Celie grows confused over her feelings toward Shug.

Shug decides to stay when she learns that Mr. Johnson beats Celie when Shug is away. Shug and Celie’s relationship grows intimate, and Shug begins to ask Celie questions about sex. Sofia returns for a visit and promptly gets in a fight with Harpo’s new girlfriend, Squeak. In town one day, the mayor’s wife, Miss Millie, asks Sofia to work as her maid. Sofia replies with a sassy "Hell no!" When the mayor slaps Sofia for her "insubordination", Sofia returns the blow, knocking the mayor down, for which she is sent to jail. Squeak’s attempts to get Sofia released are futile. Sofia is sentenced to work for 12 years as the mayor’s maid, though she is eventually released from jail six months early.

Despite her new marriage, Shug instigates a sexual relationship with Celie, and the two frequently share the same bed. One night Shug asks Celie about her sister and Celie tells her she assumes Nettie is dead because she'd promised to write Celie but never did. Shug helps Celie recover letters from Nettie that Mr. Johnson has been hiding from her for decades. Overcome with emotion, Celie reads the letters in order, wondering how to keep herself from killing Mr. Johnson.

The letters indicate that Nettie befriended a missionary couple, Samuel and Corrine, and accompanied them to Africa to do ministry work. Samuel and Corrine have two adopted children, Olivia and Adam. Nettie and Corrine have become close friends, but Corrine, noticing that her adopted children resemble Nettie, wonders if Nettie and Samuel have a secret past. Increasingly suspicious, Corrine tries to limit Nettie’s role within her family.

Nettie becomes disillusioned with her missionary experience, as she finds the Africans self-centered and obstinate. Corrine becomes ill with a fever. Nettie asks Samuel to tell her how he adopted Olivia and Adam. Based on Samuel’s story, Nettie realizes that the two children are actually Celie’s biological children (whom Alphonso, her stepfather, abducted), alive after all. Nettie also learns that Alphonso is actually only Nettie and Celie’s stepfather, not their biological father, who was a store owner whom white men lynched because they resented his success. Alphonso told Celie and Nettie he was their real father because he wanted to inherit the house and property that was once their mother’s.

Nettie confesses to Samuel and Corrine that she is in fact their children’s biological aunt. The gravely ill Corrine refuses to believe Nettie. Later, Corrine dies, finally having accepted Nettie’s story and reconciled thereto just before her death. Meanwhile, Celie visits Alphonso, who confirms Nettie’s story, admitting that he is only the sisters' stepfather. Celie begins to lose some of her faith in God, but Shug tries to get her to reimagine God in her own way, rather than in the traditional image of the old, bearded white man.

Celie moves to Tennessee and designs and sews tailored pants, turning her hobby into a business. She returns to her home to learn that Mr. Johnson has changed dramatically, becoming much more considerate and even helping her sew some of the clothing for her business. He proposes that they marry "in the spirit as well as in the flesh," but she declines. She also finds out that Alphonso, her stepfather, has died. Celie inherits the land and moves back into the house. Around this time, Shug has fallen in love with Germaine, a 19-year-old flautist that is part of her blues band, and the news of this crushes Celie. Shug travels across the country and to Panama with Germaine, all the while writing postcards to Celie. Nevertheless, Celie pledges to love Shug even if Shug does not love her back.

Meanwhile, Nettie and Samuel marry and prepare to return to America. Before they leave, Adam marries Tashi, an African girl. Following African tradition, Tashi undergoes the painful rituals of female circumcision and facial scarring. In solidarity, Adam undergoes the same facial scarring ritual.

The end of the novel has Nettie, Samuel, Olivia, Adam, and Tashi arriving at Celie's house. Nettie and Celie embrace, having not seen each other for over 30 years. They introduce one another to their respective families as the novel ends.