American Author Blog Post #8

Nick Porter
4/17/08
Block C.
Justin Wells
American Literature

Writing Assignment #8- American Author Thesis Proposal

There are three books that I’ve read so far for the American Author Project. These books are all by the author Alice Walker. They are entitled, “The Color Purple”, “By The Light of My Father’s Smile”, and, “Possessing The Secret of Joy.” What might we think can unite all of these books you might ask yourself. I’ve asked myself the same question. So I’ve come up with this as my possible thesis statement for my final paper. How do the relationships between the characters in all three books compare and contrast to those of the relationships of the characters in the other two books or how do they differ?
We may think to ourselves about how might the relationship between Nettie and the man simply known as Mr. either being the same in some ways or different to the characters in the other novels like Tashi from Possessing The Secret of Joy, or the characters from the novel, By the Light of My Father’s Smile. Some examples of difference from Nettie and Mr. to the character Tashi could be the following. For example Tashi is on a journey and is trying to accomplish something by finding her tribal warriors in different parts of the jungle, where as Nettie is given the advice by Kate, Mr.’s sister to rebel against him and stay away. Some ways on how they could compare is that they are both out to accomplish a specific goal or that’s how it seems to be at least. For example Tashi is out in the jungle to find people and in turn gets a right of passage and goes through a transformation, where as Nettie is given the advice by Kate, Mr.’s to stay away from him and not accept his marriage proposal.
As we can see here the relationships between the characters given as examples before from the two novels, “The Color Purple”, and, “Possessing The Secret of Joy”, they have similarities that compare and contrast to each other. Not only do these characters have similarities, but in addition to this they have differences as well.

I need to do a little more thinking to prove my thesis out right so no one contests that it is indeed not a good thesis so there is more work to be done on this of course.

American Author Blog Post #7

Some possible thesis statements are as follows.

How do the relationships between the characters in all three books compare and contrast to those of the relationships of the characters in the other two books or how do they differ?

For The Color Purple-

How does the relationship between Shug and Celie change?

I've almost finished by third book by now which is entitled, "Possessing the Secret of Joy."
I'm on page 203, and hope to finish it very soon.
So far Tashi has left her civilization. She is now tracking tribes warriors into some parts of the jungle, in doing this she undergoes what we might call a right of passage. She goes through a transoformation and dies, and is then reborn no longer and child and is now able and capable of marriage. This is false though as because Tashi is reborn but she is not yet "empowered".

American Author Blog Post #6

So far I've read a lot of very meaningful things in these two books by Alice Walker. I've now finished The Color Purple and have read just over 100 pages so far in the novel entitled By The Light of My Father's Smile. So far this book has let me known that in Alice Walker's opinion women in our society are suppressed in the form of how they can express there sexuality. This goes for our culture as well because I've read some plot overviews to support my information that I've taken from this book so far in my reading and this is just another thing to go along with our society not only supressing womens sexuality but our culture as well.

American Author Blog Post #5

Some thematic and or stylistic threads that I've noticed in reading my second book are the following. Actually I've not really noticed much of anything that has to do with this writing prompt question but I have noticed some other things. She has chosen to write this book with several narrarators which goes with the way she wrote The Color Purple where she is daring to be different as opposed to most American literature that we might read. For example, she dares to different in The Color Purple by writing the book in a style that people may talk from where she is from or how they indeed did speak in that manner explained in one of my previous blog entries, and this goes the same for for this book in the fact that she is in fact daring to be different and writes her story with many different narrarators which is something we don't normally see. I've read up to maybe page 50 or so so far in the novel By the Light of My Father's Smile if I can remember correctly because I am writing this as late work and am going off of memory because that's all I have to go off of.

American Author Blog Post #4

Some symbols have been employed so far in The Color Purple but I haven't noticed anything like symbols and such in By the Light of My Father's Smile. The first symbol I've noticed in this is the symbolism of sewing and how it represents the power of women. It shows us through this symbolism that through there productivity as women they can chennel there energy.

American Author Blog Post #3

I'm doing this off of memory so I can't remember exactly where I was but I'll do the best I can to describe how far I was in the plot of the first book so far. So far Celie and her sister Nettie have learned that a man known just as, "Mr." wants to marry Nettie, Celie's younger sister. Mr.'s sister's name is Kate and feels sorry for her and says she should rebel against this marriage proposal and not get married to Mr. Theme seems to be controversy so far between Nettie and her sister Celie and this man that wants to marry Nettie known just as Mr., and then in the background we have Kate telling Nettie what to do and giving her suggestions.

American Author Blog Post #2

Passage from The Color Purple- "That's right, Say Harpo. But not Sofia. She do what she want, don't pay me no mind at all. I try to beat her, she black my eye's. Oh boo-hoo, he cry. Boo-hoo-hoo."(Pg. 63)
Response-
Alice Walker has a very distinctive writing style. Instead of writing things like most writers would, for example like saying, "don't pay me no mind" is what she writes when most writers would write, "does not pay me any mind." This is very interesting because it's different and sort of goes against the grain of normal literature, its very creative.

I've read to pae 63 in The Color Purple so far and have also just barely started the book titled By the Light of My Father's Smile.