Their Eyes Were Watching God

BY ZORA NEALE HURSTON

 Historical Context

Their Eyes Were Watching God ( TEWWG)

Published in 1937.

Harlem Renaissance is
the most significant
historical reference.
 Harlem Renaissance
Generally, from the end of WW1 through the
middle of 1930s depression
Talented young African-American writers produced a
sizable body of literature in the four prominent genres
of poetry, fiction, drama, and essay
W. E. B. DuBois introduced the notion of two-
ness: a divided awareness of ones identity
One ever feels his two-ness an American, a Negro;
two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled stirrings;
two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged
strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.
 Harlem Renaissance
4

Lasted from 1919-1937.

Goals of the Harlem Renaissance:
To respond to the social conditions of African-
Americans;
To break with the 19th century minstrel stereotypes of
African-Americans;
To place greater emphasis on black folk culture;
To provide political and social uplift for African-
Americans through social programs such as the NAACP.
 Common themes of the Harlem
Renaissance writers
Alienation
Marginality
Use of folk material
Use of the blues tradition
More than just a literary
movement
Included racial consciousness
back to Africa movement, led by
Marcus Garvey
Racial integration
Explosion of music, particularly jazz,
spirituals, and blues
Painting
Dramatic revues
 Literary Period

Modernism:
- Focus on central character development
- Deviation from tradition and the norm
- Focus on dialogue/ dialect
- Inferential characterization
 Black Arts Movement
7

Their Eyes Were Watching God marked the end of

the Harlem Renaissance.
After this period (post 1937), the Black Arts
Movement began, in which African Americans
continued to seek a new black aesthetic that captured
the emotions, desires and unique talents of blacks in
America as they face prejudice.
 Hurston
Biography

Hurston was born in 1891 and grew up in Eatonville,

Florida ( the fist incorporated black township).

Hurston was the 5th of 8 children.

Mother Lucy Potts school teacher
Father John Hurston carpenter, Baptist preacher, mayor
 Hurston Biography

In 1904, Hurstons mother died. Her father remarried

and rejected her.

At 14, she left Eatonville and earned money as a maid.

In 1917, in order to finish public high school, she said

she was 10 yrs younger and born in 1901.
 Hurston Biography

In 1918, she enrolled at Howard University and

explored writing. She also studied at Barnard
College.

In 1925, Hurston moved to New York City and

became involved with the Harlem Renaissance.

She was awarded the Guggenheim fellowship in 1936

to study West Indies folklore. She studied
primitivism in folklore, and anthropology.
 Hurston Biography

Hurstons loves:
- Married Herbert Sheen (1927 1931)
She loved her work more than him.
- Married Albert Price III (1939 1943)
He was 15 years younger than her.
 Critical Analysis

Hurston wrote TEWWG in 7 weeks in 1937.

In 1975, Alice Walker wrote In

Search of Zora Neale Hurston
and praised Hurston for her
sense of black people as
complete, complex,
undiminished human beings.

Hurston was often criticized for heralding the

Black community too much unlike other Black
writers (Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, etc.).
Zora Neale Hurstons Influence on the
Harlem Renaissance

Their Eyes Were Watching

God is considered the last
text of the Harlem
Renaissance.
Her portrayal of an African-
American female able to
define herself outside of
social conventions and
stereotypes has provided a
model for modern African
Americans seeking their
identities in unconventional
roles. 13
 Hurston, Langston
Hughes, and Wallace
Thurman organized the
journal Fire!, considered
one of the defining
publications of the era
Hurston studied
anthropology at Barnard
College
Her writing was
influenced by her
anthropological research
on rural black folklore
 In late 60s, Alice Walker
rediscovered Hurstons
work
In 1973, Walker traveled
to Florida and marked
Hurstons grave with the
phrase A Genius of the
South
Walkers 1975 essay, In
Search of Zora Neale
Hurston, published in Ms
magazine, brought about
new interest in her work
Spike Lees film Shes
Gotta Have It is a modern
adaptation of the novel
 Critical Analysis

Hurston sheds light on the following literary

movements:
Black Empowerment (praise for the
independence of Black individual)
Feminism (female emerges as victor through
struggle)
Magical Realism (mythical elements blend with the
real narrative)
Setting

TEWWG takes place in

West Florida, early 1900s.

Janie moves from:

- Nannys plantation shack
- Logan Killicks farm
- Eatonville with Joe Starks
- Everglades with Tea Cake
- Return to Eatonville
 Hurstons Views of the South
18

Zora Neale Hurston believed that authentic black

culture can only be found in the south.
Hurston opposed the integrationist measures
implemented in the Brown vs. Board of Education
decision, seeing integration as a way for cultural
values to become tainted.
Hurston became a spokeswoman for the first
integrated all-black community, Eatonville,
Florida.
 Symbols and Motifs

Motifs Symbols
the community (its role; the horizon
as a character) mule(s)
storytelling (folklore; the pear tree
magical realism) Janies hair
heros journey (Joseph
the hurricane
Campbell)
 Theme topics to explore

Gender roles
within social constructs of marriage, social class, gender,
and race
Voice (language and storytelling)
development of character though language and
communication (speech/silences)
Hurstons form supports its content

the inevitability of judgment

power and conquest as a means of to personal fulfillment

True Love
define and discovery (types of love one experiences)
 Regional Dialect as Realism
21

Hurston employed regional black dialect in her

writing.
Hurston chose to do this because she wanted to
portray African-Americans as they appeared in some
southern areas of the United States.
Realism includes dialect, local color and familial
settings.
 Hurstons Narrative Structure

How does Hurstons narrative structure construct

Janies journey?
Flashbacks
Point of View: Poetic language and dialect?
 Feminist Issues in Their Eyes
23

Their Eyes Were Watching God is considered the first

modern feminist text by an African-American.
Their Eyes Are Watching God describes Janies search to
find her identity and voice apart from her three husbands.
Janie leaves her first husband in search of a more fulfilling
relationships.
Janie finds her voice through her femininity and through
her community.
Janie chooses to work outside the home to find purpose
outside of domestic life.
 Identity: Whats in a name?

Janie Mae Crawford Killicks Starks Woods

 Gender Inequality: What we see in Janies
community(ies)

Scenes/Quotes from TEWWG. How does the example

provide meaning to the novel as a whole?
Intertextuality Their Eyes Were Watching God

Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye

Gloria Naylor's The Women of Brewster Place
Alice Walker's The Color Purple
 Eyes was published in 1937, long after heydey of
the HR
1930s brought an end to the sense of cultural openness that
allowed the renaissance to flourish
Political tension increased and social realism dominated
cultural ideas
Art should be political and expose social injustice
Richard Wright (Native Son, Black Boy) wrote that
Hurstons novel was not serious fiction and that it carries
no theme, no message, no thought.
 Hurston refused to honor gender conventions
Her behavior sometimes seemed shocking

Fell into obscurity for a number of years

By late 1940s she was having trouble getting

published
By 1950s she was working as a maid
In the late 1950s she suffered a stroke and entered a rest
home in Florida
Died penniless in 1960 and was buried in an unmarked
grave