Quote 10
Everybody say how good I is to Mr._________ children. I be good to them. But I don’t feel nothing for them. Patting Harpo back not even like patting a dog. It more like patting another piece of wood. Not a living tree, but a table, a chifferobe. Anyhow, they don’t love me neither, no matter how good I is. (17.10)
Unlike Nettie, who loves Celie, Mr.__’s children are not Celie’s family and she doesn’t treat them like family, even though she’s kind to them. Family is more about love than marriage or sharing the same blood.
Quote 11
My heart broke.
Shug love somebody else. (83.1-2)
As much as Shug loves Celie, she is not capable of fidelity or monogamy.
Some womens can’t be beat, I say. Sofia one of them. Besides, Sofia love you. She probably be happy to do most of what you say if you ast her right. She not mean, she not spiteful. She don’t hold a grudge.
He sit there hanging his head, looking retard.
Harpo, I say, giving him a shake, Sofia love you. You love Sofia.
He look up at me best he can out his fat little eyes. Yes ma’am? He say.
Mr._______ marry me to take care of his children. I marry him cause my daddy made me. I don’t love Mr.________ and he don’t love me.
But you his wife, he say, just like Sofia mine. The wife spose to mind.
Do Shug Avery mind Mr.__________? I ast. She the woman he wanted to marry. (29.15-21)
Celie tries to get Harpo to see that love in a marriage means a lot more than a loveless marriage where the wife obeys her husband blindly.