The Color Purple
by Alice Walker · first published 1976
33% recommend67% neutral
Why HN recommends it
An emotionally powerful novel that still moves on rereading, with strong emotional impact and literary weight.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
The Color Purple is a 1982 epistolary novel by American author Alice Walker which won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National Book Award for Fiction. The novel has been the frequent target of censors and appears on the American Library Association list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2000–2009 at number seventeenth because of the sometimes explicit content, particularly in terms of violence. In 2003, the book was listed on the BBC's The Big Read poll of the UK's "best-loved novels."
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…Eugenides, author, Pulitzer prize winner "Herzog," by Saul Bellow "Love in a Fallen City," by Eileen Chang "The Lay of the Land," by Richard Ford Oprah Winfrey's Favorite: White Oleander by Janet Fitch The Color Purple by Alice Walker A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith The Four Agreements by Don Miguel Ruiz To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck…
on “What books would you recommend reading? Why?” ↗The Color Purple - Even on re-reading I get emotional because the story is so powerful and impactful to me.
on “Ask HN: What book changed your life?” ↗83. The Color Purple – Alice Walker
It was surprising to me just how many of the banned books have immense literary value. The Color Purple, The Handmaid's Tale, The Kite Runner, etc. aren't random books that may be a little obscene, they're literary classics. In my opinion this is what makes it obvious that these bans were made in bad faith.
on “"None of These Books Are Obscene": Judge Strikes Down Much of FL's Book Ban Bill” ↗Man’s Search For Meaning (Frankl), The Color Purple (Walker), Orbital (Harvey) Not specifically for the HN community but these are the only books I read this year that I would recommend without qualification.
on “Ask HN: End of Year Book Recommendations” ↗…Hosseini Crank by Ellen Hopkins Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie An American Tragedy by Theodore Dreiser The Color Purple by Alice Walker Feed by M.T. Anderson Friday Night Lights by Buzz Bissinger Gossip Girl by Cecily von Ziegesar I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou I'm a bit surprised…
on “Iowa using AI to automatically scan and ban books” ↗…according to the article, is an autobiography with an emphasis on the author questioning gender identity during their adolescence. Over two decades ago my middle school library had three copies of The Color Purple, an autobiography featuring multiple pedophilic rapes, and no member of my cohort was harmed by that. Instead of idealising the children of today and attributing unrealistic levels of vulnerability to…
on “Calls to ban books hit highest level ever recorded in US” ↗…on this matter, because I know that 95% of them are looking at the world through the same lens of subconscious prejudice I was, because they've never seen anything different. Reading things like The Color Purple, Black Like Me, and The Autobiography of Malcolm X in my childhood didn't remove that blind spot; if anything, the contrast tempted me to think that racism was pretty much a solved problem in the US,…
on “Meta's memo to employees rolling back DEI programs” ↗…and is bad. You just think that it's an rhetorically effective term. When I walk into a public library and I see a display a books for "banned books week" that includes The Catcher in the Rye and The Color Purple, two of the most best selling books ever which are commonly assigned reading in schools, it's so obvious that the whole thing is a farce.
on “Banned Book Library in a Wi-Fi Smart Light Bulb” ↗…again, compare this to florida, iowa, and texas who have 1000s of banned books across the states. over 10,000 instances last year of book bans and i didn't find mein kampf in this list at all--while The Color Purple is one of the most banned. yeah, the novel The Color Purple... [0] https://pen.org/report/beyond-the-shelves/ [1] https://pen.org/book-bans/pen-america-index-of-school-book-b...
…harmful to minors. If passed, such a broadly written bill would violate the First Amendment by inevitably chilling bookstores from `displaying` books like (mentioned in the article) The Bluest Eye, The Color Purple, and Slaughterhouse Five (which are each banned from school libraries in at least one Texas district). [1] https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/89R/billtext/html/HB01375I... [2] https://pen.org/book-bans/pen-america-index-of-school-book-b...
on “Censorship concerns rise over Texas bill; Abilene bookstore pushes back” ↗…particular, the article's "look at these banned books" is an outright fraudulent claim. You should be careful when using the word "fraudulent", because the bookstore owner in TFA mentioned The Bluest Eye, The Color Purple, and Slaughterhouse Five, which are each banned from school libraries in at least one Texas district [2]. Broadly written and with a private right of action, the bill will inevitably result in frivolous…
on “Censorship concerns rise over Texas bill; Abilene bookstore pushes back” ↗…between restricting by age, making available to all and actually assigning material to children. Not all materials are appropriate for elementary school libraries. And I'm not even talking about The Color Purple specifically. Also, none of this stops a parent from buying a book for their children they feel is appropriate for their child.
It is not disingenuous, maybe a little loose on the 'meaning', but your definition is rather narrow. The Color Purple has been challenged many times in order to be removed from public library circulation and public school curriculums. Annie on my Mind was banned from the Kansas Public School system and subject to book…
on “Banned Book Library in a Wi-Fi Smart Light Bulb” ↗> It is not disingenuous, maybe a little loose on the 'meaning', but your definition is rather narrow The thing is that every other country does have what they're describing. > The Color Purple has been challenged many times in order to be removed from public library circulation and public school curriculums. And yet nobody challenged it to get it removed from US Amazon. Amazon _is_ forbidden…
on “Banned Book Library in a Wi-Fi Smart Light Bulb” ↗