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k
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, October 31, 2003 - 10:16 am: | 
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Can anyone think of a work by Alice Walker that has a single male character with redeeming qualities? |
Chris Hayden
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, October 31, 2003 - 10:19 am: |
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She has male characters with redeeming characters in all of them.
Even in the supposedly most notorious book, The Color Purple, the evil Mister comes to see the wrongness of his actions and is redeemed.
The movie, which I loathe, did not play that up. |
InPrint
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, October 31, 2003 - 01:08 pm: |
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I know this is petty, and small, and simplistic, but I wonder what her work would have been like if her brother hadn't shot her eye out with a bb gun when she was a little girl. |
Anita
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, October 31, 2003 - 01:29 pm: |
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InPrint, I feel ya!!!
I've felt this way since her interview with Diane Sawyer a number of years ago. There was still pain in Diva Walker's face at the mention of the incident. I had to turn the channel, though, when Diane asked Alice if her brothers enjoyed her work. To this question Alice answered: "Diane, I don't think they read." I flipped back during the moment Alice made her daughter, Rebecca, fess up about a racist comment her boyfriend's father made. The father wasn't too thrilled that his son was dating Rebecca and said, "Oh, you're f****** a n****." I sat there stunned, wondering what either thing had to do with the interview.
Years later and during lots of free time on airplanes, I found a common thread in Alice's "The Way Forward Is With A Broken Heart" and Rebecca's "Black, White, Jewish: Autobiography of A Shifting Self": Both women just want acceptance, love, a little understanding. Although "The Way Forward..." was not "autobiographical," Rebecca substantiated a lot of veiled info in "Black..." when she revealed how devastated her mom was when her dad, in the words of RuPaul, went back to his roots with a Jewish woman of whom his parents approved. Sigh. |
Carey
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, October 31, 2003 - 07:59 pm: |
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Excuse me, y'all are going to have to fill me in. What's up with the BB gun thing. Where does Rupaul fit in? What did the father do? In other words...who?.....what?....when?....where? Hey, what can I say
I'm in the dark, could you please explain.
Carey |
Anita
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, November 01, 2003 - 06:19 am: |
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Hi Carey:
1. Alice was born to Georgia sharecroppers and was partially blinded when a pellet fired by her brother's BB gun accidentally struck her in the right eye. The physical scar was eventually corrected by surgery, but Walker spent most of her childhood withdrawing from the world because of her disfigurement.
2. I simply quoted RuPaul because the song was in my head. You know, I'm going back, back, back to my roots. Alice's first husband was a Jewish attorney who fought for civil rights in the heart of Mississippi. His parents weren't thrilled that he chose Alice as his bride. When they separated he dated a Jewish woman again. His parents were happy again. So, he went back to his roots. :-)
3. Alice and her husband have a daughter named Rebecca, a Yale educated scribe whose writing ability is astounding. She dated a young white man whose father said, "Oh, you're f****** a n****." What I gathered from Alice and Rebecca's exchange during the interview was that perhaps they thought times had changed, that life would be easier for Rebecca across the color line.
Does this help? |
Carey
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 02, 2003 - 01:07 pm: |
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Thanks Anita, yep that helps. |
Thumper
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 02, 2003 - 06:05 pm: |
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Hello All,
k: I thought The Third Life of Grange Copeland had a male, Grange Copeland, with redeeming features. He didn't start off as a hero, but by the end of the book, he most certainly was. The Temple of My Familiar had a couple of male characters that were not totally evil. Actually, I can't think of one Walker book that didn't feature black male characters with positive attributes. If you can name one, I would certainly like to hear it. I think Walker gets a bad rep on the black male character issue. |
Madame X
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 02, 2003 - 06:31 pm: |
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What other female writers tend to demonize black men in their literature? |
InPrint
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Sunday, November 02, 2003 - 08:06 pm: |
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Thumper-
You may be right. I think with Ms. Walker a lot of her personal life, or the absence of black men within it, gets taken into account when her work is interpreted.
I have found, for my part, that her redeemable male characters tend to be older, father types, or less significant characters.
Again though, it goes to the bigger question of "Is her responsibility to create role models, or art?" I personally lean away from propaganda, even if she does get on my nerves. |
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