Contents
Alice Walker
Writing The Color Purple.
The Third Life of Grange Copeland · The Color Purple
- Born
- 9 February 1944
- Birthplace
- Eatonton, USA
More people
Alice Walker
Alice Walker is an American novelist, poet and essayist whose work centres Black women’s experiences, relationships and self-definition. The Color Purple brought her fiction to a broad international audience.
Early life
Rural Georgia
Grew up in a sharecropping family and attended segregated schools.
College years
Studied at Spelman College and completed her degree at Sarah Lawrence.
Career
- 1960s
Poetry and activism
Participated in civil-rights work and published her first poetry collection.
- 1970s
Novels and essays
Developed fiction while teaching and writing essays.
- 1982–1983
Major recognition
Published The Color Purple, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
- Later decades
Continued writing
Published further novels, poetry and reflections on politics and spirituality.
Selected work
The Third Life of Grange Copeland
A family story tracing violence and oppression across generations.
The Color Purple
Letters chart Celie’s movement towards independence and connection.
In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens
Essays on creativity, history and Black women’s lives.
Beyond work
Literary recovery
Helped renew attention to writer Zora Neale Hurston.
Womanism
Popularised the term womanist in her discussion of Black women’s experience and culture.
Sources & photo credit
Life and career ↗Institutional or specialist reference ↗Photo: Virginia DeBolt. CC BY-SA 2.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
