Sofia Character Analysis in The Color Purple

A strong-minded and physically strong woman, and first wife of Harpo. She does not brook any discrimination from white people or physical or other efforts to control her by men, Sofia is sent to prison for fighting the (white) mayor and his wife. She later serves as maid in the mayor's house for almost twelve years, helping to raise his children. Sofia then returns to Celie's home, where her own children with Harpo no longer recognize her.

Sofia Quotes in The Color Purple

The The Color Purple quotes below are all either spoken by Sofia or refer to Sofia. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Sofia look half her size. But she still a big strong girl. Arms got muscle. Legs, too. . . . She got a little pot on her now and give you the feeling she all there. Solid. Like if she sit down on something, it be mash.

Related Characters: Celie (speaker), Sofia

Page Number and Citation: 36

Explanation and Analysis:

They fight. He try to slap her. What he do that for? She reach down and grab a piece of stove wood and whack him cross the eyes . . . She throw him over her back. He fall bam up gainst the stove.

Related Characters: Celie (speaker), Harpo, Sofia

Page Number and Citation: 39

Explanation and Analysis:

I don't know, say Sofia. Maybe I won't go. Deep down I still love Harpo, but—he just makes me real tired. She yawn. Laugh. I need a vacation, she say.

Related Characters: Celie (speaker), Sofia, Harpo

Page Number and Citation: 70

Explanation and Analysis:

What Sofia gon say bout what you doing to her house? I ast. Spose she and the children come back. Where they gon sleep.

They ain't coming back, say Harpo, nailing together planks for a counter.

Related Characters: Harpo (speaker), Celie (speaker), Sofia

Page Number and Citation: 74

Explanation and Analysis:

Sofia say to me today, I just can't understand it.
What that? I ast.
Why we ain't already kill them off.
…
Too many to kill off, I say. Us outnumbered from the start.

Related Characters: Sofia (speaker), Celie (speaker)

Page Number and Citation: 105

Explanation and Analysis:

And I see they [the children] think that me and Nettie and Shug and Albert and Samuel and Harpo and Sofia and Jack and Odessa real old . . . But I don't think us feel old at all. And us so happy. Matter of fact, I think this the youngest us ever felt.

Related Characters: Celie (speaker), Adam, Olivia, Tashi, Nettie, Shug Avery, Mr. _____ (Albert), Samuel, Harpo, Sofia, Jack and Odessa

Related Symbols: God

Page Number and Citation: 295

Explanation and Analysis:

Sofia Character Timeline in The Color Purple

The timeline below shows where the character Sofia appears in The Color Purple. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

Harpo says he is in love with Sofia Butler, his girlfriend (the same girl whose father does not wish for them to marry).... (full context)

Sofia, seven months pregnant, comes to the house with Harpo to meet Mr. ____. Mr. ____... (full context)

Mr. ____ says he will not let Sofia and Harpo marry, even though Sofia is pregnant. Sofia says she doesn't need to be... (full context)

Despite this, Harpo and Sofia soon marry. Harpo begins receiving a wage from his father (his father believes this will... (full context)

Harpo's and Sofia's wedding is small but relatively happy. Celie makes curtains for their new home. Harpo has... (full context)

Harpo tells his father that he cannot get Sofia to "mind" him, or obey him. Mr. ____ asks if Harpo beats her; Harpo says... (full context)

...is revealed that three years have passed since Harpo's wedding. Harpo seems happy with his Sofia, but still wants her to "mind" him. Harpo asks Celie what to do; Celie says... (full context)

One day, Celie is walking by Sofia and Harpo's shack, near the edge of Mr. _____'s property, when she sees the two... (full context)

...trouble sleeping and is not sure why, at first. Then she realizes she has wronged Sofia, by telling Harpo that he ought to beat her. One day Sofia comes to Celie... (full context)

Celie admits that she was jealous of Sofia's ability to stand up to Harpo; Celie is unable to do this with Mr. ____.... (full context)

Sofia admits that she feels sorry for Celie, who has no power over Mr. ____, but... (full context)

Sofia and Celie end up laughing about Mr. ____, whom Sofia says Celie should crack on... (full context)

...he returns to his home, he has brought Shug with him. He calls to Harpo, Sofia, and Celie to prepare the house for their sick guest. (full context)

Sofia and Celie have begun working on a large quilt that Celie wants either to give... (full context)

Some unspecified time later, Sofia asks Celie why men eat as much as they do. Apparently Harpo has been eating... (full context)

...one evening in her house, crying to himself. Harpo is upset that he cannot get Sofia to obey him—this seems to be the source of some of his recent anxieties. Celie... (full context)

...married Mr. ____ to look after his children; the two do not love each other. Sofia and Harpo, on the other hand, really do love one another, and Celie tells Harpo... (full context)

Celie talks to Sofia, who is fixing the roof of her and Harpo's shack. Sofia tells Celie that she... (full context)

...cares only about his own pleasure, and Celie dreams about Shug when they're having sex. Sofia complains, to Celie, that Harpo too thinks only of himself when the two of them... (full context)

Sofia decides to take a few of her older children (these children are not named) to... (full context)

...of one of the children, who has wet herself. He then hands the child to Sofia (this is the last child Sofia will take with her), as she quickly says goodbye... (full context)

Sofia is gone for six months. In the meantime, Harpo does some "traveling" of his own,... (full context)

...be hidden enough by the fields and the woods behind them. Celie asks Harpo what Sofia will think of the jukejoint, but Harpo replies that Sofia is never coming back to... (full context)

One night at Harpo's bar, Sofia arrives with a new boyfriend, a boxer named Buster Broadnax. Mr. ____ asks Sofia where... (full context)

Celie realizes that Sofia has started a new life with Buster. Celie feels that her own "new" life began... (full context)

Harpo asks Buster if he can dance with Sofia, and Buster agrees. Harpo and Sofia dance across the floor at the center of the... (full context)

Sofia, however, as Celie describes, does not deal in slaps, but rather punches Squeak in the... (full context)

...amount of time later, Squeak asks Celie why Harpo is moping, and Celie replies that Sofia has been thrown in jail, and Harpo is upset. Before she begins to tell the... (full context)

The story goes as follows: Sofia, Buster, and Sofia's children were walking around downtown, when they ran into the (white) mayor... (full context)

Sofia said "hell no" to this offer; when the mayor asked her to repeat herself, and... (full context)

When Celie and Mr. ____ visit Sofia in jail some time later, they find that Sofia has been placed on laundry duty... (full context)

...Celie, Shug, Odessa, Buster, and the rest of the family think of how to get Sofia out of prison sooner, since they worry she will die from her backbreaking labor before... (full context)

...to her face to lighten her skin. They tell her to tell the warden that Sofia doesn't really mind her punishment, and that the only thing Sofia would hate would be... (full context)

Some months later, Celie visits with Sofia while Sofia is watching the mayor's children on the mayor's property (which is near the... (full context)

One of the mayor's children, a boy named Billy, tries to kick Sofia playfully, near where Sofia and Celie sit, but ends up kicking a rusty nail and... (full context)

Sofia continues in her conversation with Celie by wondering how white people manage to do anything—Sofia... (full context)

Sofia demonstrated for Miss Millie how to drive, then Millie practiced on her own until she... (full context)

Sofia agreed eagerly to riding with Miss Millie to see her family. But Miss Millie first... (full context)

Millie drove Sofia to Celie's and Mr. ____'s home. Sofia's children had not seen her in so long,... (full context)

Sofia said that Odessa's husband, Jack, could drive Millie into town to get a mechanic, but... (full context)

...maid looked, working for her white bosses. (Nettie does not know that this woman was Sofia.) (full context)

Sofia has been let off her twelve-year sentence, as maid to the mayor and his wife's... (full context)

Celie tells Harpo, too, that he is partially responsible for Sofia's service to the mayor's family, since Sofia never would have run away from him in... (full context)

...them to Memphis, in order to try to sing professionally. Eleanor Jane, the white girl Sofia cared for, comes over at this point and interrupts the meal. Eleanor Jane asks to... (full context)

After returning from talking to Eleanor Jane, Sofia says she will look after Suzie Q, Squeak's youngest child, and the other children while... (full context)

Celie goes back to Georgia, from Memphis, to visit Harpo and Sofia, who are having arguments, just like old times, although they appear to have settled into... (full context)

Celie reports to Harpo and Sofia that, in Memphis, Grady and Squeak have been smoking large amounts of marijuana together, which... (full context)

Celie sees Mr. ____ at Sofia's mother's funeral. Mr. ____ has "found religion," and appears to want to mend his previous... (full context)

Sofia tells Celie, later, about Mr. ____: how, after Celie left for Memphis, Mr. _____ seemed... (full context)

Sofia tells Celie and Albert stories about Eleanor Jane, who is now married to a man... (full context)

This speech hurts Eleanor, but Sofia is glad to have spoken her mind, finally, to the family that once employed her.... (full context)

Celie has hired Sofia to work in her shop, as a clerk, and Sofia has made amends with Eleanor.... (full context)

...Celie and others, yet he also sees how much love surrounds him—Shug's, Celie's now, and Sofia's, and the children's. Albert believes it is his religious duty, while on earth, to wonder... (full context)

The Color Purple

Sofia Character Analysis

Sofia Quotes in The Color Purple

Letter 18 Quotes

Letter 20 Quotes

Letter 30 Quotes

Letter 32 Quotes

Letter 43 Quotes

Letter 90 Quotes

Sofia Character Timeline in The Color Purple