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The Color Purple
Read the original inspiration for the new, boldly reimagined film from producers Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg, starring Taraji P. Henson, Danielle Brooks, and Fantasia Barrino.
Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award
A powerful cultural touchstone of modern American literature, The Color Purple depicts the lives of African American women in early twentieth-century rural Georgia. Separated as girls, sisters Celie and Nettie sustain their loyalty to and hope in each other across time, distance and silence. Through a series of letters spanning twenty years, first from Celie to God, then the sisters to each other despite the unknown, the novel draws readers into its rich and memorable portrayals of Celie, Nettie, Shug Avery and Sofia and their experience. The Color Purple broke the silence around domestic and sexual abuse, narrating the lives of women through their pain and struggle, companionship and growth, resilience and bravery. Deeply compassionate and beautifully imagined, Alice Walker’s epic carries readers on a spirit-affirming journey towards redemption and love.
“Reading The Color Purple was the first time I had seen Southern, Black women’s literature as world literature. In writing us into the world—bravely, unapologetically, and honestly—Alice Walker has given us a gift we will never be able to repay.” —Tayari Jones
“The Color Purple was what church should have been, what honest familial reckoning could have been, and it is still the only art object in the world by which all three generations of Black artists in my family judge American art.” —Kiese Laymon
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Genres FictionHistorical FictionFeminismClassicsLGBTHistoricalQueer
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304 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 1982
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About the author
Alice Walker
262 books 6,199 followers
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.
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295 reviews 4,701 followers
I give this book 5 stars to spite the myopic David Gilmours and the V.S. Naipauls of the world who think books written by women are irrelevant. I give this 5 stars to make up for the many 1/2/3 star ratings it may receive simply because of Alice Walker’s forthright, honest portrayal of unpleasant truths that are often conveniently shoved under the carpet so as not to disturb the carefully preserved but brittle structure of dogma and century-old misconceptions.
And I award this 5 stars, symbolically on Banned Books Week as an apology for all the cowardly sentiments of the ones who misuse their power by banning books, thereby shutting out many powerful voices which demand and need to be heard.
In my eyes, an author’s merit lies not only in their sense of aesthetic beauty, but also in the scope and reach of their worldviews which must reflect in their craft.
Alice Walker’s is the voice of one such African American writer that recounts a story which not only breaches the boundaries of an issue like emancipation of women but tries to detect a common pattern in problems plaguing civilizations across continents. She gives us one horrifying glimpse after another into the lives of women ravaged by unspeakable brutalities like rape and abuse, lives searching for meaning and connection and seeking out that elusive ray of hope amidst the darkness of despair.
And by the end of the narrative, she brings to light with great sensitivity, that misogyny, sexism and blind patriarchal prejudices are as rampantly in vogue in the urban, upscale sphere of American cities as they are in the intractable, untameable African landscapes.
Celie and Nettie. Shug Avery, Sofia and Mary Agnes. Tashi and Olivia.
All these are but different names and many facets of the same disturbing reality.
If the lives of Celie and Nettie are torn apart by sexual abuse and humiliation from childhood, then Tashi and other unnamed young African girls of the Olinka tribe are victims of genital mutilation and other forms of psychological and physical torture.
If the men of African American families dehumanize the female members to the point of treating them as mere care-givers and sex slaves, then the objectification of African women by the men of their families is no less appalling. And contrary to accepted beliefs, white families in America are just as easily susceptible to misogyny as the African American families are.
But Alice Walker doesn’t only stop at opening our eyes to the uncivilized aspects of our so-called civilized world, but also shows us how knowledge of the world and people at large, self-awareness and education can help exorcize such social evils, how it is never too late to gain a fresh perspective, start anew and how empowerment of women eventually empowers society.
Dear David Gilmour, if I were a professor of English literature I’d have taught Alice Walker to my students without a shred of hesitation, because here’s an author who may not possess the trademark sophistication of Virginia Woolf’s lyrical prose but who, nonetheless, fearlessly broaches subjects many masters and mistresses of the craft may balk at dealing with.
Alice Walker: 5 | David Gilmour: 0
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501 reviews 2,537 followers
I read The Colour Purple in my early teens, was traumatized by the graphic abuse portrayed, and vowed to never read it again. I was curious about why so many of my GR friends rated it so highly and was eventually convinced to give it another go.
Years after my first read, I still (of course) have the same visceral reaction to the abuse but that no longer blinds me from seeing the magnificence of Alice Walker’s storytelling, and how she brings her characters to life.
Celie is the protagonist of the tale. Her story is told through a series of letters written firstly to God, and then to her sister Nettie. As an abused, uneducated woman (abused by her father, husband, and step-children) who was only ever shown love by Nettie, the letters are very telling, and are the only means Celie has of expressing her feelings.
I adored Celie. It really amazed me how a woman who was abused so much (sexually, physically, verbally) could still have so much love in her heart, and not be bitter. Imagine hearing things like this regularly: (Husband to Celie) – “Who you think you is? You can’t curse nobody. Look at you. You black, you pore, you ugly, you a woman. Goddam, he say, you nothing at all.”
But Celie is something, and one of my favourite parts of this book is the sisterhood portrayed, especially by the enigmatic Shug, who helped Celie on her journey to self-realization. The book has strong female characters, which is another plus.
I’m so glad I gave this book a second chance. Celie is a wonderful character and proof of the resilience of the human spirit.
“I think us here to wonder, myself. To wonder. To ask. And that in wondering bout the big things and asking bout the big things, you learn about the little ones, almost by accident. But you never know nothing more about the big things than you start out with. The more I wonder, the more I love.”
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Wow. I mean. Really. Wow.
You know how there are some books and their words wrap around you like a comforting blanket? Well.
This. Is. Not. One.
The Color Purple rips the clothes right off of your skin, leaving you bare and vulnerable. From the first freakin’ moment opening the page. You are just THERE and you can’t be anywhere else but THERE. Even when you’re not.
Have you seen the movie? I had. I thought I was prepared. Because the movie was devastating. I remember vividly being in the house that me and a couple of college friends rented, sitting there in the dark, all of us sitting on our furniture, chain smoking, drinking wine and crying. The movie didn’t prepare me.
Walker’s words are music. Sometimes a sweet melody, but mostly a cacophony of pain and sorrow. Oh and how the characters change and grow with time, how they eventually find peace. And the dichotomy of the South and Africa? It makes me yearn to find pieces of literature that can show me the mysteries of that continent.
I am incoherent and refuse to speak of the summary. It’s The Color Purple! It doesn’t need a summary.
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1,005 reviews 3,319 followers
“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.”
And yet, she is one of the strongest characters I have ever met in literature. Long before women began speaking up about their different experiences in the #metoo movement, Alice Walker’s Celie and her sisters resist the violence and power of the men around them and go on living through the pain and frustration, only to find life worth fighting for in the end. Rarely these days do I finish a book within one sitting, but this novel was impossible to put down.
In a voice genuinely her own, Celie begins to tell her story of rape, loss, and forced marriage. Her loneliness is so painful that she can’t even think of a recipient for her letters – except for God, which she imagines to be an older, white man, the very symbol of patriarchal power.
Wherever her life takes her, she is surrounded by men who are taught from the cradle to mistreat and look down on women in order to establish their own fragile egos. While they claim to be the stronger sex, they leave it to their mothers, sisters, daughters and wives to make a living, to work for food and shelter and education.
Celie’s world – based on submission – changes when she encounters two women who refuse to bow their heads, who fight for their right to individual pride and happiness. In Shug, her lover, and Sofia, her neighbour, she sees the true colour of female power: the purple of queens! A mix of the passionately hot blood-red colour of happiness and the deeply painful and dark blue, purple is the essence of nature, the expression of the divine principle of life beyond the Christian God of the bible who is mainly catering to the white male authority that makes women suffer.
The day Celie discovers that her long lost sister is still alive, she can finally drop the patriarchal god figure as a recipient of her letters (written to reflect on the painful experience of her life) and share her thoughts with somebody she loves truly and unconditionally. “Dear Nettie” – a moment of triumph caught in writing!
Life is not only red happiness or blue sadness, it is purple!
Therefore Celie’s lover Shug is convinced that “God is pissed” whenever someone ignores the beauty of the colour purple in nature whereas he is completely absent from church.
Finding spiritual support within the loving human heart is at the centre of this powerful hymn to women across the world, and while telling the story of Nettie and Celie, of Sofia and Shug, it approaches the difficult political topics of misogyny, repressed sexuality, colonialism, missionary endeavours, racism, domestic violence and poverty.
Rarely have I felt a colour expressing itself so strongly in emotions!
Despite the terrible circumstances of life in the Deep South in the 1930s and 1940s, it is a book about the joy of living. Confronted with the hatred of the man she is about to leave to embark on her first attempt at independent life, Celie answers:
“I am pore, I’m black, I may be ugly and can’t cook, a voice say to everything listening. But I’m here.”
And the message Alice Walker sends out to people across the world is a positive one: men and women can define their own roles, they can develop and learn and change for the better. Gender roles are not static, and there are moments of peace and friendship for anyone who dares to move out of the pattern of dominance that destroys the freedom of choice for both men and women.
Recommended to the world, over and over!
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1,901 reviews 56.1k followers
Gotta tell you, I don’t really know what to say.
They say there’s a first time for everything but I, as a member of the never shuts up community, doubted this day would ever come.
So I will keep this quick!
Lately I’ve had a hard time feeling books – as in actually have them impact me emotionally – so I’ve read increasingly crazy lit fic to attempt to undo it.
This just shattered all of that and fixed it no problem. I teared up.
I’m not ashamed, even if this wrecks my badass image. This book is emotive and touching and I care about the characters so, so much.
But enough yearning on main.
Bottom line: A book so good it broke me!
going to stare at the wall for the next couple of hours
review to come / 4.5 stars
can i still call myself a bookworm if it took me this long to read this?
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The Color Purple is an absolute masterpiece about love and redemption. Shug, Celie, Sofia, and Nellie are some of the strongest women characters in American fiction. I am literally writing this with tears streaming down my cheeks.
There is so much to unpack here as Alice Walker deals holistically with the fate of African Americans from the perspective of Africa and the tribes who sold their kinsman to white slavers, the devastation of Africa by European colonizers particularly after WWI leading to WWII, the violence of in the South particularly aimed towards women, female sexuality. There is an infinite depth in this book that can reveal itself more and more with each successive read.
The first half of the story is told through letters to God by Celia who is married, against her will, to Mr. ____. We learn that his first name is Albert, but we never learn his last name. Perhaps, this anonymity is symbolic of the widespread rape and spousal abuse in impoverished communities – and yet we also see that in the white mayor’s family, through her sister-in-law Sofia’s eyes is no more sane and no less violent.
Celia was raped by her stepfather and bore two children that subsequently disappeared. Her sister refuses Mr. ____ in marriage and leaves and thus Celia is given to him. Sex for her is a burden and a torture without end: You know the worst part? she say. The worst part is I don’t think he notice. He git up there and enjoy himself just the same. No matter what I’m thinking. No matter what I feel. It just him. Heartfeeling don’t seem to enter into it. She snort. The fact he can do it like that make me want to kill him. (p. 65).
In fact, Albert loves the singer Shug who, ailing, comes to their house (and incidentally name drops legendary blues singer Bessie Smith as a friend – thus dating the story to the 30s). As Celie nurses Shug back to health,the two women develop a deep, lasting love for each other that is both physical and spiritual and the first love that Celia has ever felt from another person: She say my name again. She say this song I’m bout to sing is call Miss Celie’s song. Cause she scratched it out of my head when I was sick. First time somebody made something and name it after me. (p. 73) This is one of the first moments where having a box of Kleenex handy is not a luxury. Through Shug, Celie learns about her body and that she can have pleasure via her breasts and her sex (p. 78).
The book has many characters that transform completely during the book. Mr. ____ for example, will be cursed by Celie when she leaves (finally), but he will change completely into a tender-hearted and remorseful man who accepts his wife’s sexuality such as it is and she in turn is able to forgive him. In fact, at the end of the book, there is a beautiful reunion which is somewhat prefigured back on p. 57: “First time I think about the world. What the world got to do with anything, I think. Then I see myself sitting there quilting tween Shug Avery and Mr. ____. Us three together gainst Tobias and his fly speck box of chocolate. For the first time in my life, I feel just right. She and Shug have a spiritual transformation as well, evolving from the white-borrowed religion of a white God which has born no good for Celie: Yeah, I say, and he give me a lynched daddy, a crazy mama, a lowdown dog of a step pa and a sister I probably won’t ever see again. Anyhow, I say, the God I been praying and writing to is a man. And act just like all the other mens I know. Trifling, forgitful, and lowdown. (p. 192). Shug expresses her beliefs this: The thing I believe. God is inside you and inside everybody else. You come into the world with God. But only them that search for it inside find it. And sometimes it just manifest itself even if you not looking, or don’t know what you looking for. Trouble do it for most folks, I think. Sorrow, lord. Feeling like shit.
It? I ast.
Yeah, It. God ain’t a he or a she, but a It. (p. 195). The next two pages are a beautiful eloge to this form or Emersonian deism, a powerful arugment for a more personal and less judgmental religion. Yes, Celie, she say. Everything want to be loved. Us sing and dance, make faces and give flower bouquets, trying to be loved. You ever notice that trees to everything to git attention that we do, except walk?” (p. 196) I was touched by this ecological message that reminded me of the comments on this that I made in my reviews of The Overstory and The Lord of the Rings. From this point on, she addresses her letters directly to Nellie.
The letters written back to Celie from her sister Nettie are hidden for years by a pre-repentant Mr.____. In this letters, we learn of Nettie’s voyage to Africa as a missionary. Nellie also has a spiritual transformation as she sees European Christianity’s utter disregard for villagers and their traditions with the complete destruction and near elimination of the Olinka culture that she traveled to Africa to help.
There is just so much depth in this masterpiece, that I will stop my review here and just urge you, beg you to read this book if you have never done so. It is a rare, raw look at humanity and suffering but with a powerful, compelling message of redemption and hope.
Celie’s process of finding a voice and self-fulfillment In Alice Walker’s ‘The Color Purple’
For just over two hundred years, the concern to depict the quest of the black speaking subject to find his or her voice has been a repeated topos of the black tradition, and perhaps has been its most central trope. As theme, as revised trope, as a double-voiced narrative strategy, the representation of characters and texts finding a voice has functioned as a sign both of the formal unity of the Afro-American literary tradition and of the integrity of the black subjects depicted in this literature (Gates 29-30).
In his article “Color me Zora: Alice Walker’s (Re)Writing of the Speakerly Text”, Henry Louis Gates Jr. talks about The Color Purple in connection with other novels by black authors (especially Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston) whose characters are all looking for a voice throughout the story. The theme of finding a voice seems to be very characteristic of African-American writing. Tamar Katz points out that “The Color Purple remains, above all, [. ] a novel about the instruction of Celie and her coming into consciousness (69). And, speaking of The Color Purple, Diane Gabrielsen Scholl also clarifies that
[t]he novel is [. ] the story of Celie’s changing fortunes [. ] as Celie gradually overcomes the oppressive conditions of her despised situation, achieving in the end the prosperity and family security she has longed for (109).
Walker emphasizes throughout the novel that the ability to express one’s thoughts and feelings is crucial to developing a sense of self. According to Carla Kaplan, Celie “in some way hinges on her ability to narrate her life story and to find an audience fit to hear and understand it (181). She argues that Celie does not exactly need to find a voice but rather learn how to use it:
Walker, in fact, does not really represent Celie as “finding” a voice. Even in her most oppressed state she is able to express herself by writing. It is the process of developing that voice, orienting it toward her different audiences, that is really at stake. Above all, Celie needs to learn to use her voice to resist oppression. She must be convinced that resistance and contestation are not incompatible with fulfillment and satisfaction. Making this convincing, [. ], proves a very difficult task (Kaplan 185).
In the course of this paper I would like to show how Celie gradually overcomes her situation as an oppressed and finds and uses the voice that brings her freedom and happiness.
Initially, Celie is completely unable to resist those who abuse her. As a young girl, she is constantly subjected to abuse and told that she is ugly. Celie does little to fight back against her stepfather, Alphonso. Later in life, when her husband, Mr. , abuses her, she reacts in a similarly passive manner. Remembering Alphonso’s warning that she “better not never tell nobody but God” (Walker 11) about his abuse of her, Celie feels that the only way to persevere is to remain silent and invisible. She decides that this is the best way ensure her survival. Celie is essentially an object, an entirely passive party who has no power to assert herself through action or words. Her letters to God, in which she begins to pour out her story, become her only outlet and means of self-expression. However, God is a distant figure, who she doubts cares about her concerns. Celie writes in her first letter to God:
I am fourteen years old.I amI have always been a good girl.
Henry Louis Gates Jr. recounts for the fact that Celie places her present self (“I am”) under erasure by saying that it is a “device that reminds us that she is writing, and searching for her voice by selecting, then rejecting, word choice or word order [. ]” (39). Because Celie is so unaccustomed to articulating her experience, her narrative is initially muddled despite her best efforts at transparency.
Female Relationships and Gender Roles
Numerous times, other women tell Celie that she must learn to fight back and therefore encourage her to use her voice. “You got to fight. You got to fight”, Nettie tells Celie when she sees how Mr._’s children ride roughshod over her. “You’ve got to fight”, Nettie writes. “I don’t know how to fight. All I know how to do is how to stay alive”, Celie replies. Mr.’s sister Kate also tells Celie to fight: “I can’t do it for you. You got to fight them for yourself.” But Celie sees no sense in fighting: “I think about Nettie, dead. She fight, she run away. What good it do? I don’t fight. I stay where I’m told. But I’m alive.”
Celie eventually latches on to Shug Avery, a beautiful and seemingly empowered woman, as a role model who gradually helps her to speak up and assists her in the process of developing a sense of self. Despite Shug’s unpredictable nature and shifting roles (she moves through a whirlwind of different cities, trysts, and late-night blues clubs), she remains Celie’s most constant friend and companion until the end of the novel.
Shug Avery is a sultry blues singer who first appears as Mr. ’s mistress. The first impression of Shug is a negative one. She has a reputation as a woman of dubious morals who dresses scantily, has some sort of “nasty woman disease,” and is even spurned by her own parents. However, Celie immediately sees something more in Shug. When Celie looks at Shug’s photograph, not only does Shug’s glamorous appearance amaze her, but Shug also reminds Celie of her “mama.” Celie compares Shug to her mother throughout the novel. Unlike Celie’s natural mother, who was oppressed by traditional gender roles, Shug refuses to allow herself to be dominated by anyone. Shug has fashioned her identity from her many experiences, instead of subjecting her will to others and allowing them to impose an identity upon her.
The Color Purple concerns a universe in which many characters break the boundaries of traditional male or female gender roles. Traditionally masculine traits such as assertiveness, sexual gratification, and physical strength are present in female as well as male characters. Sofia’s strength and sass, Shug’s sexual assertiveness, and Harpo’s insecurity are major examples of such disparity between a character’s gender and the traits he or she displays. Sofia’s assertiveness and strength are virtually unsurpassed by any of the male characters, whereas the nurturing and care that Harpo displays toward Mr. could be considered feminine. This blurring of gender traits and roles sometimes involves sexual ambiguity, as in the sexual relationship that later develops between Celie and Shug.
Disruption of gender roles also sometimes causes problems. Harpo’s insecurity about his masculinity leads to marital problems and his attempts to beat Sofia. Likewise, Shug’s confident sexuality and resistance to male domination cause her to be labeled a tramp. Throughout the novel, Walker wishes to emphasize that gender and sexuality are not as simple as we may believe. Her novel subverts and defies the traditional ways in which we understand women to be women and men to be men.
However, though Shug’s sexy style, sharp tongue, and many worldly experiences make her appear jaded, Shug is actually warm and compassionate at heart. When Shug falls ill, she not only appreciates, but also reciprocates the care and attention Celie lavishes upon her. After Shug moves into Celie and Mr. ’s home, Celie has the opportunity to befriend the woman whom she loves and to learn, at last, how to fight back. Shug not only becomes Celie’s friend but also eventually her lover, all the while remaining a gentle mentor who helps Celie evolve into an independent and assertive woman. As Shug’s relationship with Celie develops, Shug fills the roles of mother, confidant, lover, sister, teacher, and friend, among others. Shug’s maternal prodding helps spur Celie’s development. Shug does not at first appear to be the mothering kind, yet she nurtures Celie physically, spiritually, and emotionally.
In Shug and Sofia, Celie finds sympathetic ears and learns lessons that enable her to find her voice. Gradually, Celie recovers her own history, sexuality, and spirituality. In her article “Romance, Marginality, Matrilineage: The Color Purple” Molly Hite explains the importance of strong female relationships which overthrow traditional gender roles:
In the development of the story, Celie […] acquires a voice and becomes a producer of meanings, while Shug and Sofia, articulate all along, increase their authority until it is evident that female voices have the power to dismantle hierarchical oppositions that ultimately oppress everyone and to create a new order in which timeworn theories about male and female “natures” vanish because they are useless for describing the qualities of people (98).
However, although Walker clearly wishes to emphasize the power that narrative and speech have in asserting selfhood and resisting oppression, the novel also acknowledges that such resistance can be risky. Sofia’s forceful outburst in response to Miss Millie’s invitation to be her maid, for instance, costs her twelve years of her life. Sofia regains her freedom eventually, so she is not totally defeated, but she pays a high price for her words.
Throughout The Color Purple, Walker portrays female friendships as a means for women to summon the courage to tell stories. In turn, these stories allow women to resist oppression and dominance. Relationships among women form a refuge, providing reciprocal love in a world filled with male violence. Female ties take many forms: some are motherly or sisterly, some are in the form of mentor and pupil, some are sexual, and some are simply friendships. Sofia claims that her ability to fight comes from her strong relationships with her sisters. Nettie’s relationship with Celie anchors her through years of living in the unfamiliar culture of Africa. Samuel notes that the strong relationships among Olinka women are the only thing that makes polygamy bearable for them. Most important, Celie’s ties to Shug bring about Celie’s gradual redemption and her attainment of a sense of self.
Q&A with the Costume Designer for The Color Purple
April 13, 2023 / in Theatre Company, General / by Emma Hunt
At first glance, the costumes in The Color Purple look pretty ordinary. Everyone is wearing historically accurate clothing, pieces that look like they belonged to your grandparents or great-grandparents. What if that is exactly what the costume designer, Trevor Bowen, had in mind? For some productions, it takes hard work to make costumes look like real clothes. Below, Bowen talks through his design process and bringing the vision for The Color Purple to life.
DCPA: How do you begin work on a project? What is the research process?
I begin each project by reading the script several times. This enables me to start to understand the language and rhythms of a given piece.
The research process is often tied with script analysis, so as I break down the piece, I begin to research what resonates with me , and start to solve the visual puzzle of the story.
Research can range from an image from a book in my library, a trip to the public library, a trip to a museum or department store, a google search, to people watching.
DCPA: Where do you draw inspiration?
What a great question. Anything can be inspiring from learning who is cast in a role, a piece of music, the color of the sky, finding a bit of treasure on a neighborhood walk.
DCPA: You’ve mentioned wanting the costumes for The Color Purple to look like clothes – not like costumes. What steps do you take to achieve that vision?
It first began by looking at extant garments from the periods the story traverses. Then it was looking at Southern and black communities in rural Georgia to see how clothing was worn, how fabrics draped on the body, how fit and proportion gave me a backstory to the origin of a garment, and who the wearer was.
This translated to dyeing, painting, aging, distressing fabrics. I also was curious to explore texture by not ironing some garments, while others were pressed, steamed, and starched.
DCPA: Do you have a specific color palette for each character, or a color palette for the production?
Most of the colors in the production complement each other . This was to support Timothy’s vision of the production being very communal and supportive.
DCPA: How did you source the costumes? Were they vintage, modern, handmade, or a combination?
A combination. I will let you figure out what is what in the musical.
DCPA: When is the design process finished?
The design is finished by opening night. This is when a production is “frozen,” and changes can no longer be made.
Updates and refinements are made throughout the rehearsal process, as the costume shop learns about bits of choreography and blocking to seeing a composition on stage in tech rehearsals and previews and making adjustments for clarity or cohesion.
Tags: DCPA Theatre Company, Costume Design, The Color Purple
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