The Color Purple / The Temple of My Familiar

by Alice Walker

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, The Color Purple is the moving story of a young woman’s endurance of shame and suffering to become whole and to know God. The novel became an instant classic and has been adapted into a film and musical. Paired here with The Temple of My Familiar , which the author describes as “a romance of the last 500,000 years,” this edition brings together two works that established Walker as a major voice in modern fiction.

Genres: Classics, Fiction, Novels, Historical Fiction, Adult Fiction

761 pages, Hardcover

First published May 18, 2011

About the author

Noted American writer Alice Walker won a Pulitzer Prize for her stance against racism and sexism in such novels as The Color Purple (1982).

People awarded this preeminent author of stories, essays, and poetry of the United States. In 1983, this first African woman for fiction also received the national book award. Her other books include The Third Life of Grange Copeland , Meridian , The Temple of My Familiar , and Possessing the Secret of Joy . In public life, Walker worked to address problems of injustice, inequality, and poverty as an activist, teacher, and public intellectual.

Reviews

[Karelle · Rating 4 out of 5]

(J'ai juste lu "The Color Purple".)

[Nancy DeValve · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Color Purple is one of those books I've heard a lot about, so when I saw it free on Kindle I decided now was my chance to read it. So, I'm going to go against the flow here and say that I don't understand all the accolades this book gets. On the one hand, Alice Walker is a good writer and she definitely tells a story that needs to be told, a story of abuse and of anger. However, there was so much about the book I was uncomfortable with: too many sex scenes, approval of homosexuality (though you could see how Celie would be uncomfortable in relationships with men), and sleeping around. Those things I could actually understand as a real picture and a story that needs to be told. But the whole pantheistic view of God .... enjoying the color purple in nature is god, etc. I think many reviews I've read point out how Celie found God; but I think you'd have to say she found a god. So, if you read this, be touched by the story, but please don't let it inform your theology! I also tried to read The Temple of My Familiar, but I COULD NOT get into it at all. I almost never don't finish a book, but three chapters in and I was done. I just gave up on it.

[Elizabeth Lagerstrom · Rating 3 out of 5]

Absolutely head-over-heels for “The Color Purple”; not so much for “The Temple of My Familiar.”

[Tracie Sneed · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fine piece of American Literature--in epic format.

[Reem · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book, a work of fiction, explores topics that range from slavery, to reincarnation, sexuality, self expression, relationships, racism, sexism, healing, magic, music, writing, art, feminism...

It is filled with a rich variety of characters, all with their unique complexity, and weaves them to show how interconnected we all are, to everything around us, other human beings, animals, the earth, to life itself.

One of the reasons why Alice Walker is my favourite author is because her writing is very evoking. There's something about the way that she communicates an experience that's not just describing it to you, but it's bringing that experience to life fully. There's no fear in the writing about really delving into a moment of pain and exposing the raw sore for all that it's worth. And in doing so, in evoking the reader in that way, it becomes impossible not to see how one person's pain, is everyone's pain. How the rape of a woman is a rape of humanity in it's entirety.

I think that to be a force of change in this world, to be part of a cause or movement taking a stand against injustice, you need to have felt pain, either through an experience of your own or someone else's. That's why her writing is brilliant. It evokes. It moves. All of a sudden, I can say I have insight into what it feels like to be enslaved, or to lose a child, or to be betrayed. And through all of this her writing depicts the multi-faceted beauty of life, of reality as it is.

My heart becomes that much bigger with sensitivity and compassion. My stand becomes that much stronger. My level of tolerance and capacity to forgive grow as well.

This book is a journey to be savoured.

[Kristin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this when I was 10 years old. My neighbor "lent" it to me. I don't think I really understood it until I saw the movie shortly afterwards, but I always remember how I felt this perpetual pit in my stomach as I traveled along side Celie, and all she endures, right up until the end. To this day, I cannot watch the end of the movie without balling my eyes out. This in my mind is a "Classic".

[Melissa McDonald]

Part love story, part fable, part feminist manifesto, part political statement, Walker's new novel follows a cast of interrelated characters, most of them black, and each representing a different ethnic strain--ranging from diverse African tribes to the mixed bloods of Latin America--that contribute to the black experience in America.

[Beth · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved The Temple of My Familiar. Alice Walker, what's not to love?

[Laurie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Loved the color purple. Told in letters, a poor black girl grows older and discovers herself.
The second one was so terrible I couldn't read past chapter two.

[Sadie Rose Knight · Rating 5 out of 5]

wow ... just wow.... everyone should read this book! for me this book is perfection.