The Distinctive Voice of Zora Neale Hurston
"It's thrilling to think- to know that for any act of mine, I shall get twice as much praise or twice as much blame"(Hurston 2). Zora Neale Hurston has a remarkably positive but realistic outlook on the duality of the African American female. She understands and therefore is aware that the African American female is greatly magnified in the blurred eyes of the white male world that distorts all of her achievements and shortcomings. Hurston was caught between the emphasis on the exotic aspects of the Harlem Renaissance and the angry voice of black literature during the 1940's and 1950's. During the Harlem Renaissance, Hurston decreased those injustices of race and sex. She challenged the traditional position of women and exceeded the traditional space they had been provided: She dared to see herself as a writer with talent equal to if not greater than her peers at representing the "folk" orally and in writing. Hurston rose above the challenge by becoming the most extraordinary writer of the group. Hurston's works deserve literary and scholarly attention because they acknowledge universal themes, view individuals at all levels of society, and represent the diversity and complexity of the African American female at the turn of the century. Hurston reveals themes in literature that are universal despite the fact that they often experienced divided fidelity to the culture that she lived. The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) has become a perennial classroom favorite because it does not focus on one class, but the entire community as a whole-representing its language, morals, and prejudices-as context. She went against the "nor...
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...rom the rural south who challenged racial, class, and sexual, assumptions in her writing, Hurston has become an
icon for many African American and women's studies scholars interested in authors promoting feminist and black national aesthetics. Her studies of literature and anthropology at Howard University and Barnard College provided her with a critical method for viewing individuals at all levels of society. It cannot be denied that Hurston's
works deserve literary and scholarly attention from all people because of the universal themes confronted, view of individuals at all levels of society, and the representation of diversity and complexity of the African American female at the turn of the century.
Works Cited
Story, Ralph. "Gender and Ambition: Zora Neale Hurston in the Harlem Renaissance"
1989 The Black Scholar. 28 May-July 1989
This excerpt from Zora Neale Hurston’s book, Their Eyes Were watching God, is an example of her amazing writing. She makes us feel as if we are actually in her book, through her use of the Southern Black vernacular and admirable description. Her characters are realistic and she places special, well thought out sentences to keep us interested. Zora Neale Hurston’s art enables her to write this engaging story about a Southern black woman’s life.
Zora Neale Hurston and Maya Angelou are arguably the most influential writers of the mid 20th century . Their work has inspired young African Americans to have more confidence in their own abilities. Their work has also been studied and taught countless times in many schools across the U.S. But the main reason why their work is considered classics in American literature; is because their work stands as testament to the treatment, and struggles of African Americans in the mid 20th century America.
Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. Harper Perennial Modern Classics: Reissue Edition 2013
Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York: Harper & Row Publishers, Inc., 1990.
This is reflected in the literature of the African-American as a special bond of love and loyalty to the mother figure. Just as the role of motherhood in African-American culture is magnified and elevated, so is the role of the wife. The literature reflects this by showing the African-American man struggling to make a living for himself and his family with his wife either being emotionally or physically submissive. Understanding the role of women in the African-American community starts by examining the roles of women in African-American literature. Because literature is a reflection of the community from which it comes, the portrayal of women in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) and James Baldwin's Go Tell it on the Mountain (1952) is consistent with the roles mentioned above.
Zora Neale Hurston an early twentieth century Afro-American feminist author, was raised in a predominately black community which gave her an unique perspective on race relations, evident in her novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God. Hurston drew on her on experiences as a feminist Afro-American female to create a story about the magical transformation of Janie, from a young unconfident girl to a thriving woman. Janie experiences many things that make her a compelling character who takes readers along as her companion, on her voyage to discover the mysteries and rewards life has to offer.
Bloom Harold. Modern Critical Views: Zora Neale Hurston. by Harold Bloom; Modern Critical Interpretations: Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes were Watching God. Black American Literature Forum, Vol. 23, No. 4 (winter, 1989), pp. 799-807 St. Louis: St. Louis University, 1989. Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2904103
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural, social, and artistic eruption that took place in Harlem between the end of World War I and the middle of the 1930s. Throughout this period, Harlem was a cultural center, drawing black writers, poets, artists, musicians, scholars, and photographers. The Harlem Renaissance was a movement across every form of art, from literature to jazz to painting to drama. Regardless of the fact that Hurston wrote in a particular and geographical area, Hurston held political views that were utterly different from other Harlem Renaissance writers. Their Eyes Were Watching God focuses its plot both on Janie's series of romantic relationships as well as on Janie's individual journey for spiritual nourishment. In the novel, Janie's marriages force her to become aware of what it is that she wants for herself as an individual. This is an important part involving Zora´s writing because she as a person represents the Harlem Renaissance by the story she takes us
Racine, Maria J. "African American Review." Voice and Interiority in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God 28.2 (1994): 283-92. Jstor. Black's Women Culture Issue, Summer 1994. Web. Dec. 2013.
Despite the mindset that most of her peers keep about the inequality of race, she maintains an open mind and declares to the reader that she finds everyone equal. Thus proving herself as a person ahead of her own time. What I feel is truly remarkable about this author is that despite all the scrutiny and anguish that she faces like most of her race at the time she does not take a negative attitude towards white people and she actually chooses to ignore the general racial segregation. Her charming wit and sense of humor despite all the hardship is what attracts the reader. Hurston does not let her social disadvantages stop her from trying to achieve her aspirations and dreams.
Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God depicts the process of a woman's coming to consciousness, finding her voice and developing the power to tell her story. This fresh and much-needed perspective was met with incomprehension by the male literary establishment. In his review in New Masses, Richard Wright said the novel lacked "a basic idea or theme that lends itself to significant interpretation." Hurston's dialogue, he said, "manages to catch the psychological movements of the Negro folk mind in their pure simplicity, but that's as far as it goes. . . . . The sensory sweep of her novel carries no theme, no message, no thought." Many male reviewers and critics have reacted with similar hostility and incomprehension to The Color Purple. But to be blind to the definitions these and other women writers give to women's experience is to deny the validity of that experience.
Zora Neale Hurston’s “Sweat” is a distressing tale of human struggle as it relates to women. The story commences with a hardworking black washwoman named Delia contently and peacefully folds laundry in her quiet home. Her placidity doesn’t last long when her abusive husband, Sykes, emerges just in time to put her back in her ill-treated place. Delia has been taken by this abuse for some fifteen years. She has lived with relentless beatings, adultery, even six-foot long venomous snakes put in places she requires to get to. Her husband’s vindictive acts of torment and the way he has selfishly utilized her can only be defined as malignant. In the end of this leaves the hardworking woman no choice but to make the most arduous decision of her life. That is, to either stand up for herself and let her husband expire or to continue to serve as a victim. "Sweat,” reflects the plight of women during the 1920s through 30s, as the African American culture was undergoing a shift in domestic dynamics. In times of slavery, women generally led African American families and assumed the role as the adherent of the family, taking up domestic responsibilities. On the other hand, the males, slaves at the time, were emasculated by their obligations and treatment by white masters. Emancipation and Reconstruction brought change to these dynamics as African American men commenced working at paying jobs and women were abandoned at home. African American women were assimilated only on the most superficial of calibers into a subcategory of human existence defined by gender-predicated discrimination. (Chambliss) In accordance to this story, Delia was the bread victor fortifying herself and Sykes. Zora Neale Hurston’s 1926 “Sweat” demonstrates the vigor as wel...
Hurston does not concern herself with the actions of whites. Instead, she concerns herself with the self-perceptions and actions of blacks. Whites become almost irrelevant, certainly negative, but in no way absolute influences on her
...izes that there are still great differences between them and she sees them in a positive way. She feels while he only hears. Hurston handles the topic of race relations with no shame for herself or the African American community. She is proud of the differences. She feels life more fully.
Alice Walker and Zora Neale Hurston are similar to having the same concept about black women to have a voice. Both are political, controversial, and talented experiencing negative and positive reviews in their own communities. These two influential African-American female authors describe the southern hospitality roots. Hurston was an influential writer in the Harlem Renaissance, who died from mysterious death in the sixties. Walker who is an activist and author in the early seventies confronts sexually progression in the south through the Great Depression period (Howard 200). Their theories point out feminism of encountering survival through fiction stories. As a result, Walker embraced the values of Hurston’s work that allowed a larger