Zora Neale Hurston
From Harlem Renaissance
A famous writer during the Harlem Renaissance (see Main Page), Zora Neale Hurston wrote a book called,Their Eyes Were Watching God."
Contents |
Books
Zora Neale Hurston lived from 1920 to 1950. In that lifetime, she was able to write many books. In her books, she wrote a lot about independence and how blacks are just as good as whites, and that she is happy to be one. This idea is strongly suggested in her book: "I Love Myself When I Am Laughing... and Then Again When I Am Looking Mean and Impressive." This book is a compelling autobiography, fiction, folklore, and journalism story of how Zora feels about herself as a person. Others disapproved her because of her arrogance, bravery, fearlessness, and her constant fight for her rights in independence. Probably one of Zora's most Famous books is "Their eyes were watching god." This book talks about a young girl named Janie. Janie mother, having been raped by a white man, has handed Janie over to her Grandmother. Her Grandmother, lived in the time of slavery, and all she wanted for Janie was for her to have the things that her Grandmother never had a chance to have. So, with out any second opinion from Janie, she arranges a marriage for Janie with a man named Logan Killicks. Janie, is unsatisfied with this marriage. And longs for the kind of love that she had dreamed of. Logan, pushes Janie to work extremely hard and cares very minimally about her opinions on anything.
Then, Janie meets a man named Joe Starks. He's a hard workingman, with big hopes and dreams. With this in mind, Janie thinks that she might have a chance at real love after all. She and Joe escape together and get married and move to a Town called Eatonville. Eventually, Joe is allowed to speak his voice as mayor. Yet, Janie soon comes to realize that having a big voice can be taken too far. Joe begin's to speak out when Janie talks, and states his opinions over Janie's. Janie, frustrated with not being able to speak her mind, realizes that Joe's love is not what she had hoped for. ""It was the time for sitting on porches beside the road. It was the time to hear things and talk" is a quote from the book.
Zora also collected and recorded African American folklore. Much of that work was owned by her mentor, Charlotte Mason. A lot of it has only been published recently, long after Zora's death. In the story "Herbs and Herb Doctors" Zora's ear for a good story and understanding of culture and character can be seen. "People came to him with all sorts of diseases and 'spells' and they said he helped them all. At first he set no particular fee, his motto apparently being, 'Give what the spirit moves you to give'; yet as time passed and his services grew in demand this motto changed to 'The laborer is worthy of his hire.'"
Childhood
Zora Neale Hurton grew up in Eatonville, Florida, She was the fifth of eight children. Her father John Hurston often threatened her mother, sibling and her with physical violence, in her autobiography, Dust Tracks on a Road she told how she did not find that her father's abuse towards women and children that alarming. Lucy Ann Potts, Zora's mother died when she was still a child on September 18,1904. She was sent to a school in Jacksonville, Florida at nine. John Hurston remarried and his new wife split up the family, her father told the school they could have her if they wanted and he withdrew his tuition payments from the school. She worked for the school so she could finish the year. She tried to go home but was no longer welcome there. Zora finished high school in 1918 at Morgan Academy in Baltimore, Maryland, she went on to attend Howard Prep School in D.C the same year one year later she started and finished the Howard University in D.C. and was given the associate degree in 1920.
Career
Early Career
Although people say that Zora Neale Hurston lived between 1891-1901, no one can be quite sure because Zora lied about her age for many years. In the summer of 1918 she worked as a waitress at a nightclub and she worked as a manicurist at a Black owned barbershop that only served white customers. 1919-1924 she attended Howard University and received an associate degree in 1920.
In 1921 her first storey, "John Redding Goes to Sea" was published in the Howard University literary magazine, "The Stylus”. In December 1924 she published a short story, "Drenched in Light," in "Opportunity". Opportunity was a literary magazine focused on black culture founded in 1923 by the National Urban League. One year later she submitted a short story "Spunk" and a play "Color Struck" to "Opportunity's” literary contest. They both won second place and two other pieces she wrote received honorable mentions. At the magazine's awards dinner with 1,316 of the most important African American writers and literary critics there, Zora Neale Hurston won the most awards.
That evening she met two women important to her future, Fannie Hurst, a best selling novelist and Annie Nathan Mayer, a founder of Barnard College. The first hired Hurston as a chauffer and secretary and the second arranged for her to attend Barnard on a scholarship. Hurston had arrived in New York a few months’ earlier with a single bag and $1.50 in her purse. She lived for a time at 267 W136th St. It was a rooming house with free rooms for artists and writers that Hurston famously christened "Niggerati Manor". A literary landmark, it also housed Langston Huges, Richard Bruce Nugent and Wallace Thurman. At Barnard she studied under FranZ Boas, an Anthropologist. In 1926 she began doing fieldwork in Harlem, for Boas. Expressing how anthropology allowed her to see her own culture she said,” From the earliest rocking of my cradle, I had known about the capers Brer Rabbit is apt to cut and what the Squinch Owl says from the housetop. But it was fitting me like a tight chemise. I couldn't see it for wearing it. It was only when I was off in college, away from my native surroundings, that I could see myself like somebody else and stand off and look at my garment. Then I had to have the spy-glass of Anthropology to look through at that."
In 1926 she published several short stories in literary magazines. In 1927 she published a play, "The First One" in the magazine, "Ebony and Topaz" In February she traveled to Florida to collect folklore In May 1927 she married Herbert Sheen. In September of 1927 she visited Charlotte Mason, who became her patron. The two women formed a psychic bond that seemed to them mystical. Hurston wrote to her as "her true conceptual mother" and said "I have taken form from the breath of your mouth. From the vapor of your soul am I made to be." In October 1927 she published an account of the black settlement at St Augustine, Florida, in the Journal of Negro History. In December 1927 Mason funded Hurston return to the South and drew up a legal contract that paid Hurston $200 a month, gave her a car and a movie camera in exchange for collecting black folklore. The results of Hurston's collection, including fiction, became Mason's property and Huston was not allowed to publish it.
Mid-Career
Hurston headed south in a car she called 'Sassy Susie' and spent two years exhilarated by unearthing stories that were part of African American heritage. She wrote to Langston Hughes, "I am getting inside the Negro art and lore," and "I am beginning to "see" really." One year later in January she ended her relation ship with Sheen. In the summer of 1927 Hurston ran into Langston Huges in Mobile, Alabama. They decided to drive north together in Huston's car. They visited landmarks, met famous African Americans and collected wonderful stories. On the trip they decided to collaborate on an African American Opera. The Opera became a more realizable play. From April - May in 1930 Hurston and Huges, supported by Charlotte Mason, worked on a play titled Mule Bone. In May Hurston left for the South, Charlotte Mason scolded Hughes for the lack of productivity. The Hurston-Hughes partnership broke up and Hurston copyrighted "Mule Bone" under only her name. She and Hughes met only once again. "Mule Bone" was first produced in 1991 at Lincoln Center, long after both authors were dead. Mason continued to support Hurston until 1932. The period after Hurston left her patron was her most productive. She wrote 5 books, one a Book-of-the Month-Club selection. She also produced plays, short stories, and published a book of 70 folk tales. She established a school of dramatic arts at Bethune-Cookman College and began to study for a PhD. in Anthropology at Columbia University. She received two Guggenheim fellowships. In 1937, while in Haiti, she wrote her most famous book, Their Eyes Were Watching God. Hurston continued to write articles, plays, short stories, and biographical profiles. She worked as a story consultant for Paramount Pictures and was awarded book prizes and distinguished alumni awards.
Late Career
She only published two books in the last twenty years of her life. Just after her last book was published she was accused of sexual abuse of a ten year-old boy. The accusations in a Baltimore black tabloid used quotes from her novel to link her to the improper association. Though there was never any proof, Hurston became profoundly depressed, writing " My race has seen fit to destroy me without reason, and with the vilest tools conceived of by man so far." In the last ten years of her life she worked as a maid, an Air force Librarian and a substitute teacher. She occasionally published magazine articles. She suffered a stroke in 1959 and died in January 1960, three months after-entering the St. Lucie County Welfare Home. She was buried in an unmarked grave in the segregated Garden of the Heavenly Rest cemetery. Thirteen years after her death the contemporary African American writer, Alice Walker made a pilgrimage to Florida, located and marked Hurston's grave with a stone that reads, "Zora Neale Hurston; 'A Genius of the South". In March of 1975 Alice Walker published an article titled In Search of Zora Neale Hurston in "Ms" magazine. The article sparked a Hurston revival.
Education
Hurston attended Howard University while working as a manicurist. In 1925, she went to New York City and began writing fiction stories. Annie Nathan Meyer, the founder of Barnard College, was able to find a scholarship for Zora Neale Hurston at that University. Hurston Began to study anthropology at Barnard under Franz Boaz, and also studying with Gladys Reichard and Ruth Benedict. With their help, Hurston was able to win a six-month grant in which she used to collect interesting African American folklore. While Hurston was studying hard at the college, she was also working as a secretary for Fannie Hurst, a novelist.
References
http://www.zoranealehurston.com/
http://www.lkwdpl.org/wihohio/hurs-zor.htm
http://www.bookrags.com/notes/tewg/SUM.html
http://www.webster.edu/~woolflm/hurston.html
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/hurstonzoraneale/p/hurston_bio.htm
http://www.powells.com/cgi-bin/biblio?isbn=0912670665&atch=r
Potter, Michelle. “Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Life.” Literary Traveler 1998-2007 4/4/2008 <http://www.literarytraveler.com/authors/zora_neale_hurston.aspx>
FISCHER, S. A. (2007). 'A Glance from God': Zadie Smith's On Beauty and Zora Neale Hurston. Changing English. 14, 285-297.
HURSTON, Zora Neale (1981).'The Sanctified Church' Herbs and Herb Doctors, Turtle Island Foundation, Marlow & Company p.16.
