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Zora Neale Hurston

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Title: Zora Neale Hurston


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
  • Jonahs 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 worldI 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 3s,
  • 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 Hurstons Their Eyes Were Watching God.
    The Southern Literary Journal, 172 (54-66)
  • Jordan, Jennifer. Feminist Fantasies Zora Neale
    Hurstons Their Eyes Were Watching God. Tulsa
    Studies in Womenaposs Literature. 71 (105-17).
  • Saunders, James Robert. Womanism as the Key to
    Understanding Zora Neale Hurstons Their Eyes
    Were Watching God and Alice Walkers The Color
    Purple. The Hollins Critic. 254 (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. lthttp//www.galenet.comgt
  • Images
  • http//www.americanplacetheatre.org/stage/index.ph
    p?optioncom_contenttaskviewid47Itemid57
  • http//www.loc.gov/wiseguide/jan04/zora.html
  • http//www.nndb.com/people/237/000084982/
  • http//xroads.virginia.edu/MA01/Grand-Jean/Hursto
    n/Chapters/patron.html
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