Zora Hurston's Sweat Essay

The character, Delia Jones, in Sweat and the narrator in The Yellow Wallpaper are personalities that are significantly persuaded by what their societies considered to be acceptable roles and behaviors for married women. However, throughout both works, both personalities opposed these norms to overcome the obstacles in their respective lives. Delia in Sweat was a washwoman, which made her the sole financial provider of her household. Her husband, Sykes, did not work at all and also challenged the era’s social standards by carelessly spending Delia’s hard earned money. Delia wanted to wash her clothes when she came back from church on Sunday. Although it was

From the very beginning, the reader notices the psychological and verbal abuse that Sykes puts on Delia. It was a Sunday and Delia decided to get ahead on her work for the week by separating piles of clothes by color. Fear then came

With rage and anger towards her husband, Delia states, “That ole snaggle-tooth black woman you runnin’ with ain’t comin’ heah to pile up on mah sweat and blood. You ain’t paid for nothin’ on this place, and Ah’m gointer stay right heah till Ah’m toted out foot foremost.” (Hurston 680). Her home is all Delia has. She worked hard for years and years to build and maintain the house she loves, and the last thing she will ever allow to happen is for someone to take that away from her.

The spiritual correlation of good and evil is set up in two occurrences in this narrative. On one occasion, Sykes sneaks up behind Delia and uses a whip to frighten Delia by placing it on her shoulders, making her assume that it was a snake. Delia yells, “Sykes, why you throw

Delia represents the good in the story. She remains calm, level-headed, and spiritually in tune despite her husband‘s determination to make her miserable. Once a "right pretty li'l trick," Delia is now worn and dried out like sugar cane that's been chewed to no end (“Sweat” 43). However her soul remains strong as she turns to her spirituality for comfort and hope. She has smarts although uneducated and the fact that she built her own house and now supports her and her husband by washing white

Delia is a hard working woman who uses her faith in God to guide and protect her from her husband’s physical and emotional abuse. She, as a protagonist, is physically weak but yet spiritually strong. Sykes, in the story, tormented Delia in many ways throughout the story. One incident was with the bull horn when he tried to scare Delia while she was sorting

This story took place during the 1900’s around 1926 when there was difficulty being a black woman. The use of poor diction really puts emphasis on the fact that there is going to be sympathy shown to Delia. Delia is living in a poor environment where she is uneducated and beat by her husband. On page 603, Delia is doing her laundry and wash for the “white folks”, and Skyes does not approve of that. Hurston makes sure to show sympathy to Delia as Skyes tries to tear her work down by saying, “Yeah, you just come from de church house on a Sunday night, but heah you is gone to work on them clothes. You ain’t nothing but a hypocrite,” (Hurston 603). The way that Hurston uses the word choice really makes a difference when reading the story. The reader can start to really feel the tone and imagine where it is taking place. When the men in the store start talking about Skyes new girlfriend Bertha, there is sympathy because Delia is being betrayed. Once again Delia is getting betrayed and abused by her husband in an emotional way. Hurston once again uses poor diction to convey the workers at the stores attitude towards the new women. When Skyes walks in with Bertha, immediately the clerks of the store leave. The way Skyes tried to show Bertha off was hurtful, “Git whutsoever yo’ heart desires, Honey” (Hurston 606). Skyes would never talk to Delia that way, he would beat her if she tried to get

To begin the story, Hurston, with the use of the narrator being from third person omniscient, introduces us to Delia as a wash-woman who was working on a Sunday night all the way until eleven o’clock after church earlier in the

Clothing is one symbol that plays a major role in the short story that reveals some truth in Delia's and Sykes' marriage. Throughout the story, clothing represents Delia's job and the hard work she does. Sykes demonstrates his disrespect and ungratefulness for the hard work his wife does when he steps "roughly upon the whitest pile of things, kicking

Delia was physically abused many times by her husband, Sykes. He was also mentally and verbally abusive to her by calling her names and constantly teasing her. This can be seen when he pretends to scare Delia with a snake, and then calls her names for being scared. In Zora’s life, this is seen where she also grew up as an abused child from her father. Her father did not like her very much because her sassy attitude. He said that she “was too spirited and too mouthy for her own good” which hurt her feelings and made her very aware that she was not his favorite child in the family (Boyd 27). Her father would also physically abuse her by threatening and spanking her as a child. In the story, Sykes represents Zora’s father because they were both abusive towards women. Zora included this detail in her story to explain her life as a child. The story is put in the perspective of a grown woman who had been abused, but how she would feel the same pain a child would feel who had been abused. No matter the person’s age, anyone

Delia was a hard-working woman, who was the sole provider for both her and her unemployed husband Sykes, and was also forced to work to pay for Sykes mistress, Bertha, who lived over

First, Delia had to stand up to her husband by expressing her true feelings to him and to show that she was no longer afraid to stand up for herself, “she seized the iron skillet from the stove and struck a defensive pose, which act surprised him greatly, coming from her. It cowed his and he did not strike her as he usually did.” (Hurston 350). I believe that the snake represented her fear and her feeling of helplessness. But rather than letting it consume her, she let it, literally, consume her husband. Despite a rather gruesome ending, the story ends in a place of empowerment and the character is now in control of her own

In “Sweat” adoration and hatred continuously go back and forth and Delia even “attempted friendliness, but she was repulsed each time” (1092). The despair and isolation Delia felt in the end of the story, perhaps even more than the straightforward and steadily building anger, is what caused her to allow him to die in the end.

The snake in the story symbolizes evil which portrays domestic violence. Sykes tried getting rid of Delia so he could go and be with Bertha, his mistress. He knew how afraid Delia was of snakes so he decided to bring one home. “Then, moved by both horror and terror, she sprang back toward the door. There lay the snake in the basket!” (Hurston 8). He really wanted the snake to bite Delia so he could get rid of her. Leaving the snake in the basket where he knew was the easiest place for it to bite her. Sykes knew that the snake would bite her. He was pure evil. The snake however did not bite Delia but it bit Sykes. “He crept an inch or two toward

2. Characterize Delia’s relationship with her husband, Skyes. Why do you think that she tolerated his behavior? Why do you think she decides to stand up for herself at this particular point in time?