48 Facts About Alice Walker

Alice Malsenior Tallulah-Kate Walker was born on February 9,1944 and is an American novelist, short story writer, poet, and social activist.

Alice Walker, born in rural Georgia, overcame challenges such as childhood injury and segregation to become a valedictorian and eventually graduate from Sarah Lawrence College.

Alice Walker began her writing career with her first book of poetry, Once, and later wrote novels, including her best-known work, The Color Purple.

Alice Walker has faced multiple accusations of antisemitism due to her praise for British conspiracy theorist David Icke and his works, which contain antisemitic conspiracy theories, along with criticisms of her own writings.

Alice Malsenior Walker was born in Eatonton, Georgia, a rural farming town, to Willie Lee Walker and Minnie Tallulah Grant.

The scar tissue was removed when Alice Walker was 14, but a mark still remains.

Alice Walker found two of her professors, Howard Zinn and Staughton Lynd, to be great mentors during her time at Spelman, but both were transferred two years later.

Alice Walker was offered another scholarship, this time from Sarah Lawrence College in Yonkers, New York, and after the firing of her Spelman professor, Howard Zinn, Alice Walker accepted the offer.

Alice Walker became pregnant at the start of her senior year and had an abortion; this experience, as well as the bout of suicidal thoughts that followed, inspired much of the poetry found in Once, Alice Walker's first collection of poetry.

Alice Walker wrote the poems that would culminate in her first book of poetry, entitled Once, while she was a student in East Africa and during her senior year at Sarah Lawrence College.

Alice Walker would slip her poetry under the office door of her professor and mentor, Muriel Rukeyser, when she was a student at Sarah Lawrence.

Alice Walker took a job working for the Legal Defense Fund of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in Jackson, Mississippi.

Alice Walker worked as a consultant in black history to the Friends of the Children of Mississippi Head Start program.

Alice Walker later returned to writing as writer-in-residence at Jackson State University and Tougaloo College.

Alice Walker has written several other novels, including The Temple of My Familiar and Possessing the Secret of Joy.

Alice Walker has published a number of collections of short stories, poetry, and other writings.

In 2000, Alice Walker released a collection of short fiction, based on her own life, called The Way Forward Is With a Broken Heart, exploring love and race relations.

Rebecca Walker, Alice Walker's only child, is an American novelist, editor, artist, and activist.

Alice Walker's godmother is Alice Walker's mentor and co-founder of Ms.

In 2007, Alice Walker donated her papers, consisting of 122 boxes of manuscripts and archive material, to Emory University's Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library.

The collection contains a scrapbook of poetry compiled when Alice Walker was 15, entitled "Poems of a Childhood Poetess".

In 2013, Alice Walker published two new books, one of them entitled The Cushion in the Road: Meditation and Wandering as the Whole World Awakens to Being in Harm's Way.

Alice Walker took part in the 1963 March on Washington with hundreds of thousands of people.

On March 8,2003, International Women's Day, on the eve of the Iraq War, Alice Walker was arrested with 26 others, including fellow authors Maxine Hong Kingston and Terry Tempest Williams, at a protest outside the White House, for crossing a police line during an anti-war rally.

Alice Walker wrote about the experience in her essay "We Are the Ones We Have Been Waiting For".

In 1983, Alice Walker coined the term womanist in her collection In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens, to mean "a black feminist or feminist of color".

Alice Walker is a judge member of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine, and she supports the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign against Israel.

In January 2009, Alice Walker was one of over fifty signatories of a letter protesting against the Toronto International Film Festival's "City to City" spotlight on Israeli filmmakers, and condemning Israel as an "apartheid regime".

Alice Walker planned to visit Gaza again in December 2009 to participate in the Gaza Freedom March.

In May 2013, Alice Walker posted an open letter to singer Alicia Keys, asking her to cancel a planned concert in Tel Aviv.

Alice Walker has refused to allow The Color Purple to be translated and published in Hebrew, saying that she finds that "Israel is guilty of apartheid and persecution of the Palestinian people, both inside Israel and in the Occupied Territories" and noting that she had refused to allow Steven Spielberg's film adaptation of her novel to be shown in South Africa until the system of apartheid was dismantled.

Alice Walker has expressed that animal advocacy is one of her central concerns.

Alice Walker has been a longtime sponsor of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.

In 2023 Alice Walker publicly defended JK Rowling from criticisms of her views regarding trans people and shared that her own views matched Rowling's.

Alice Walker was criticized on social media for taking this position with many referring to her as a TERF.

Since 2012, Alice Walker has expressed appreciation for the works of the British conspiracy theorist David Icke.

On her blog in 2017, Alice Walker published a poem which she titled "It Is Our Duty to Study The Talmud", recommending that the reader should start with YouTube to learn about the allegedly shocking aspects of the Talmud, describing it as "poison".

Alice Walker defended her admiration for Icke and his book, saying: "I do not believe he is anti-Semitic or anti-Jewish".

Alice Walker argued that any "attempt to smear David Icke, and by association, me, is really an effort to dampen the effect of our speaking out in support of the people of Palestine".

In 2022, Alice Walker was disinvited from the Bay Area Book Festival due to what the organizers referred to as her "endorsement of anti-Semitic conspiracy theorist David Icke".

An invitation for Alice Walker to speak at San Diego Community College District was upheld despite opposition from community groups with the organizers citing their belief in free speech.

In 1965, Alice Walker met Melvyn Rosenman Leventhal, a Jewish civil rights lawyer.

Alice Walker legally added "Tallulah Kate" to her name in 1994 to honor her mother, Minnie Tallulah Grant, and paternal grandmother, Tallulah.

Alice Walker's spirituality has influenced some of her best-known novels, including The Color Purple.

Alice Walker has written of her interest in Transcendental Meditation.

Alice Walker has never denied that there are some autobiographical dimensions to her stories.

John O' Brien's 1973 interview with Alice Walker offers further details.

Beauty in Truth is a documentary film about Alice Walker directed by Pratibha Parmar.