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Zora Neale Hurston: A Genius of the South

Explore the life and works of Zora Neale Hurston, an influential novelist, folklorist, and anthropologist. Discover her upbringing, education, career, and critical reception. Uncover her contributions to African American culture and the challenges she faced.

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Zora Neale Hurston: A Genius of the South

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  1. Zora Neale Picture for US Postal Stamp, 2003 Hurston

  2. Early Life • 1891 – 1960 • I “grew like a gourd and yelled bass like a gator.” • Notasulga, Alabama • Eatonville, Florida • Father: carpenter, preacher, mayor • Mother: died 1904 “jump at the sun.”

  3. Out in the World • At 13: taken out of school • At 16: traveling theater company

  4. Education and Career • Howard University (1920) • Harlem Renaissance • 1927: founded Fire! • Barnard College • Columbia University • Anthropology and Folklore • Teacher, librarian, and domestic

  5. Work for Benefactor • Mrs. R. Osgood Mason of Park Ave. New York • Monthly allowance for 5 years to collect folklore of the South • Criticized for flattering letters

  6. Other Works • Jonah’s Gourd Vine, 1934 [1991] • Mules and Men, 1935 • Their Eyes Were Watching God 1937 • Tell My Horse, 1938 • Moses, Man of the Mountain, 1939 • Dust Tracks on a Road, 1942 • Seraph on the Suwanee, 1948

  7. Early Critical Reception of Their Eyes Were Watching God • Sterling Brown: It does not “depict the harsher side of black life in the South” • Richard Wright: It “carries no theme, no message, no thought,” but is like a minstrel show. • Benjamin Brawley: “Her interest . . . Is not in solving problems, the chief concern being with individuals.” Richard Wright

  8. Affirmative View of African American Culture • But I am not tragically colored. There is no great sorrow damned up in my soul, nor lurking behind my eyes. I do not mind at all. I do not belong to the sobbing school of Negrohood who hold that nature somehow has given them a lowdown dirty deal and whose feelings are hurt about it. . . . No, I do not weep at the world—I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife. --“How It Feels to Be Colored Me” • Politically conservative in 1950s. • Opposed 1954 Supreme Court desegregation decision

  9. Last Years • Arrested in 1948 • Solitary retirement in Florida • Died in a welfare home • Buried in an unmarked grave • A Genius of the South: 1901 [sic]---1960. Novelist, Folklorist, Anthropologist

  10. Current Critical Issues • Alice Walker: “There is no book more important to me.” • Female bonding  self-definition • Questions about “voice” • Role of folklore: magic of 3’s, tale of courtly love, symbols that aid in retelling

  11. Bibliography Crabtree, Claire. “The Confluence of Folklore, Feminism and Black Self-Determination in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.” The Southern Literary Journal, 17:2 (54-66) Jordan, Jennifer. “Feminist Fantasies: Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.” Tulsa Studies in Women&apos’s Literature. 7:1 (105-17). Saunders, James Robert. “Womanism as the Key to Understanding Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and Alice Walker’s The Color Purple.” The Hollins Critic. 25:4 (1-11). Washington, Mary Helen. Foreword. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. New York: Perennial Classics, 1998. ----------. Introduction. I Love Myself When I Am Laughing. Alice Walker, Ed. New York: The Feminist Press, 1979. Zora Neale Hurston. Biography. Contemporary Literary Criticism. Literature Resource Center, January 2003. <http://www.galenet.com> Images: http://www.americanplacetheatre.org/stage/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=47&Itemid=57 http://www.loc.gov/wiseguide/jan04/zora.html http://www.nndb.com/people/237/000084982/ http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA01/Grand-Jean/Hurston/Chapters/patron.html

  12. facultystaff.richmond.edu/~rreilly/Women/Zora..

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