THE GILDED SIX-BITS

CITAS:
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“Ah seen de pitchers of Henry Ford”

These references to old traditions are combined with modern elements of the happy
1920s. For example, the reference to Henry Ford, Grant or Rockefeller as symbols of
modernity and economic boom of the 1920s.

"Ah seen de pitchers of Henry Ford and he's a spare-built man and Rockefeller
look lak he ain't got but one gut…”

“Ah seen de pitchers of Henry Ford”

- “Yo ’water is on de fire and yo’ clean things is cross de bed”

- “Ah’m hongry”

- “Where would a po’ man lak me git gold money from?”

- “Nope”

- “No mo”

The story is not written in standard English. Hurston wanted to vindicate the oral
dimension of African-Americans’ language. She uses the vernacular speech of African-
American, their real language. This language has also a poetic dimension even if used in
a literary text. That was not so common at that time.

We saw Eugene O’Neil using the register of working class but the use of the register of
rural African-Americans was something novelty at that time.
These sentences were difficult to understand for people at that time because they were
not familiar with that language.

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“It was a Negro yard around a Negro house in a Negro settlement that looked to the
payroll of the G. and G. Fertilizer works for its support.

But there was something happy about the place”.

We can see the integration of polarities, a feature of Modernism. Black people work for
a company and they are condemned to unhappiness because the economic oppression.
However, Hurston emphasizes that, in spite of this, they are happy. The place where
they live is supposed to be happy.

Many members of the Harlem Renaissance criticized Hurston because in her stories we
do not have an open criticism against racism. However, in many cases, she denounces
racism but without being very explicit. Her denounce of racism is implicit in her novels.

From the formal point of view of the novel, we have talked about the integration of
polarities.

We can see these polarities when we read:

“It was a Negro yard around a Negro house in a Negro settlement that looked
to the payroll of the G. and G. Fertilizer works for its support.

But there was something happy about the place. The front yard was parted in
the middle by a sidewalk from gate to doorstep, a sidewalk edged on either side
by quart bottles driven neck down into the ground on a slant. A mess of homey
flowers planted without a plan but blooming cheerily from their helter-skelter
places. The fence and house were whitewashed. The porch and steps scrubbed
white”.

We can also see the integration of polarities when we think about old traditions and
modern references. For example, we can find combinations of religious references and
references to modernity.
We can find many references to the Bible in proper names, for example, “Samson”,
“Jordan River”, “Lot's wife”, suggesting that religious traditions are fundamental part of
African-American heritage, particularly in the South.
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We can also find other elements of modernity: “Cadillac”

"Who would be losin' gold money round heah? We ain't even seen none dese white
folks wearin' no gold money on dey watch chain. You must be figgerin' Mister
Packard or Mister Cadillac goin' pass through heah."

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We can also find many metaphors related to weather:

The setting of the novel is located in Florida where the weather is hot.
We can read:

“It was Saturday night once more before Joe could parade his wife in
Slemmons's ice cream parlor again. He worked the night shift and Saturday
was his only night off. Every other evening around six o'clock he left home,
and dying dawn saw him hustling home around the lake, where the
challenging sun flung a flaming sword from east to west across the trembling
water”.

The reference to the sun flaming express that the weather is challenging, it burns, it is
hard. This is a reference to the situation of African-American people there.

Many scholars claim that the story is very simplistic but if we pay attention to the way
in which the author writes, we can find this kind of second implicit meaning related to
racism that are really remarkable.

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Another term used in the novel is “colored man”.

“Joe smiled pleasantly. "Yeah, he's up-to-date. He got de finest clothes Ah ever
seen on a colored man's back”.
- Finally, we pay attention to the different terms used by the writer to refer to African-
American people. All of them are not politically correct nowadays. All of them are
archaic and offensive.

Hurston uses at least four terms to refer to African-Americans in the novel:

- One of them is very offensive and we will use a euphemism: “N-word“(Nigger)

- Negro
- Colored man
- Darkies

The term “Negro” comes from the Spanish and Portuguese words to refer to African-
American people. In Europe, this term was very common until the civil rights
movement. Until the 1960s the term “Negro” was very common and it was also used by
African-American themselves. In the 19th century, the term “black” was pejorative and
the term “Negro” was more acceptable. Nowadays, the term “Negro” is archaic,
pejorative and offensive.

Another term used in the novel is “colored man”.

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The term “colored” was very similar to “Negro” and it was very common until the civil
rights movement. It was used instead of the term “black”. Nowadays is a pejorative term.

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 Joe got his candy and left the store. The clerk turned to the next customer. "Wisht
I could be like these darkies. Laughin' all the time. Nothin' worries 'em."

- The term “Negro” was very common until the civil rights movement. Until the 1960s
the term “Negro” was very common and it was also used by African-American
themselves. In the 19th century, the term “black” was pejorative and the term “Negro”
was more acceptable. Nowadays, the term “Negro” is archaic, pejorative and
offensive.

- Another term used in the novel is “colored man”.

“Joe smiled pleasantly. "Yeah, he's up-to-date. He got de finest clothes Ah ever
seen on a colored man's back”.

The term “colored” was very similar to “Negro” and it was very common until the civil
rights movement. It was used instead of the term “black”. Nowadays is a pejorative term.

- The “N-word” appear in different parts of the story used by Missie May. She is the one
using this word. The N-word was very common in the 19 th century, especially in the
South. For example, in the book by Mark Twain “The adventures of Tom Sawyer” this
term is used more than 100 times.
At the middle of the 20th century, this term became offensive when used by white people,
because it was thought that it was offensive and derogative for black people. It was
rejected and it became a taboo term.

This term is also used by African-American people to refer to other African-American

people. In this novel Missie May uses this term to refer to Otis, another black person,
that is why we could say that it is acceptable. It could have different connotations:
friendly, colloquial or even used to attract attention of other people.

- The term “darkies” is also used in the novel:

Joe got his candy and left the store. The clerk turned to the next customer. "Wisht
I could be like these darkies. Laughin' all the time. Nothin' worries 'em."

The clerk uses this term. The clerk is from Orlando so he is not part of the community.
He is not African-American. He is white. He refers to African-Americans as “darkies”.
The particular ending (suffix) of the adjective is significant. It denotes that he is mocking
them. The clerk uses this term in a paternalistic way, referring African-Americans as if
they were children, inferior.

We can also see the irony in his words (Laughin' all the time. Nothin' worries 'em) trying
to express that African-American people have not reasons for complaining.

These formal issues about the language, the style, the images, the terms used in the novel
are relevant because they show a different side of the happy 1920s with the parties, the

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 feel of “carpe diem”. In this novel we are told about other social, ethnic groups of people
at that time.

https://www.kibin.com/essay-examples/english/zora-
neale-hurston-6608/the-gilded-six-bits-4291
Zora Neale Hurston was not considered a canonical writer until the last two decades of
the 20th century. The Gilded Six-Bits is short story written by Zora Neale Hurston in
1933. Hurston was a leading prose writer of there Harlem Renaissance. This story is
about love, forgiveness, and betrayal. Hurston enjoys writing about the celebration of
being black in America. One of the most interesting features of the contribution of the
Harlem Renaissance to American literature is that its representation of the "black man"
was no longer that of a victim of slavery who rebels and seeks the compassion of his
readers.

The Gilded Six-Bits is an example of this Harlem Renaissance style and it is clearly
portrayed in this passage through the themes in the play, the descriptions of the
characters he gives and his use of literary devices.

This passage belongs to the end of the third scene

Major themes in this fragment include

Furthermore, different literary devices are also used within the passage as Harlem
Renaissance techniques to emphasize characters’ feelings and attitudes. For example,

In conclusion, in this passage we can appreciate how several literary devices are used to
help readers to understand not only the development of the plot but also the characters’
personality and the different themes that the author approaches in the story. With the
dramatic use of expressionism along with the use of literary terms, symbols, and
appropriate language O'Neill manage to portray the main theme in the passage, the
differences between social classes and the need of belonging to a group.