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Eleanor Jane is the white daughter of the mayor and the mayor’s wife, whom Sofia works for as an indentured servant. Much of Sofia’s time as the mayor’s wife’s maid is spent raising Eleanor Jane. During this time period, it was common for wealthy white families to employ Black women as nannies who would handle the difficult and menial parts of child-rearing. From a young age, Eleanor Jane adores Sofia. She sees her as a mother figure and one of the few people in her life who cares for her. Her father is a typical patriarch who places more importance on his son than his daughter, and her mother, expected to fall in line with her powerful husband, follows suit. This exclusion leaves Eleanor Jane in a position where Sofia is the most active parental figure in her life. When she reaches adulthood, she’s still attached to Sofia and often comes to visit her. What Eleanor Jane doesn’t understand is that her familial love for Sofia is not fully reciprocated. Sofia is fond of Eleanor Jane to a degree, but she ultimately regards everything about her forced service to the mayor’s family as degrading and painful. While she understands that Eleanor Jane had no part in the circumstances that led to her indentured servitude, and she considered Eleanor Jane one of the only bright spots of her servitude, the fact remains that the time she spent raising Eleanor Jane was time she lost with her biological children.
Although Eleanor Jane’s circumstances are greatly different from Sofia’s and Celie's, she does share one thing in common with the Black women in The Color Purple: mistreatment at the hands of men. She exaggerates her son’s sweet and innocent qualities to convince herself that he’ll grow up to be a good man, but her insistence on her son’s sweetness is a coping mechanism. In reality, Eleanor Jane is terrified. Her son looks just like his grandfather, a man who is domineering and cold. Both she and Sofia know that her son will likely grow up to be a violent, racist, misogynistic man despite Eleanor Jane’s attempts to teach him otherwise. Additionally, the man she married is a workaholic and otherwise spends his time gambling, showing that Eleanor Jane does not have a loving or equal relationship with her husband. She clings to Sofia because she’s the only person who seems to have shown her genuine care. While Sofia distancing herself from Eleanor Jane is entirely justified, there is something tragic about Eleanor’s circumstances. Although she has a great amount of privilege in her race, her gender renders her powerless and unloved within her own family and community. And sadly, unlike the Black women in The Color Purple who are all connected through Mr. ______, Eleanor Jane does not have any deep female friendships to help support her through her troubles.
