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Shug Avery Quotes From The Color Purple

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Alice Walker’s novel The Color Purple begins with a young girl experiencing hardships of rape and incest, and continues to narrate the life of this girl as she becomes a woman capable of love and overcoming her long lived need of dependence. The person that catalyzes her transformation is Shug Avery, a provocative singer. Throughout the novel are little splashes of color that give a deeper meaning and further illustrate exactly what effects Shug Avery has on Celie. Shug Avery facilitated Celie’s change from submissive to independent as evidenced by the color symbolism throughout the novel.
Before Shug Avery makes her appearance in the novel, one of the first colors written in the book reflects Shug's lifestyle and the effects it has on Celie. Celie and Kate, Mr.’s sister, go shopping for cloth in order to make Celie a new dress, and as Celie decides what color she wants, she thinks to herself “what color Shug Avery would wear...somethin purple, maybe a little red in it” (Walker 28). Typically, purple indicates “power, nobility, luxury, and ambition,” which is appropriate for someone like Shug, a woman who “has the reputation of a high-living, adventurous, independent blues singer” (Parker; Henderson 26). The little hint of red, a color that is associated with “strength, …show more content…

Purple and red, as Celie noted, become Shug Avery's color

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