Zora Neale Hurston Biography

Zora Neal Hurston was criticized by other African American writers for her use of dialect and folk speech. Richard Wright was one of her harshest critics and likened Hurston’s technique “to that of a minstrel show designed to appease a white audience” (www.pbs.org).Given the time frame, the Harlem Renaissance, it is understandable that Zora Neale Hurston may be criticized. The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement which redefined how America, and the world, viewed African Americans, so her folk speech could be seen as perpetuating main stream society’s view of African Americans as ignorant and incapable of speaking in complete sentences. However, others, such as philosopher and critic Alain Locke, praised her. He considered Hurston’s “gift for poetic phrase and rare dialect, a welcome replacement for so much faulty local color fiction about Negroes” (www.pbs.org).

Zora Neale Hurston was an influential African-American novelist who emerged during the Harlem Renaissance. (Tow 1) During the Harlem Renaissance Hurston’s novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God, was written in southern dialect so that the African American audience can relate, mainly because Hurston could only write about what she knew. “In the case of Hurston, dialect, as a regional vernacular, can and does contain subject, experience emotion and revelation.” (Jones 4) when Hurston's novel first was released many people didn't not accept the writing for what it really was. “When Their Eyes Were Watching God first appeared in 1937, it was well-received by white critics as an intimate portrait of southern blacks, but African-American reviewers rejected the novel. (Telgen, Hile 1) In this modern day the novel is well accepted and has been called "a classic of black literature, one of the best novels of the period" (Howard 7) In "Their Eyes Were Watching God", Janie takes on a journey in search of her own identity where each of her three husbands plays an important role in her discovery of who she is.

The Harlem Renaissance marked the coming out of many brilliant black authors and thinkers. Names like Jessie Redmon Fauset, Alain Locke, Ralph Waldo Ellison, Langston Hughes, and Zora Neale Hurston marked the scene. Hurton portrays many messages in her stories without having to explicitly spell it out. This among other reasons make Hurston's writing so rich. Two of her almost fable-like stories, "Sweat" and "The Gilded Six-Bits", each portray powerful messages individually. In "Sweat," you get a message of "whatever goes over the Devil's back, is got to come under his belly." You will reap what you sow among other messages. In "The Gilded Six-Bits," you learn that time will heal, money is the root of all evil, and other morals. These

Zora Neale Hurston was a great example of an independent woman, and her books made that possible to believe. Hurston was born on January 7th, 1891 in Eatonville, Florida, where she encouraged African Americans like herself to honor their heritage. We are told by authors Harold Bloom and Norma Lutz that the author of The Color Purple, Alice Walker, read the book Their Eyes Were Watching God and became very interested in Hurston and her writing. Walker traveled back to Eatonville to learn more about Hurston's life, and while she was there she located Hurston's unkept grave. Respectfully, she bought an engraved headstone and placed it there (47).

Zora Neale Hurston was so proud to be from the black community that she mentioned it in her writings; she even changed it to her birthplace. Eatonville, Florida, had a massive impact on Zora’s life. It shaped her life and writing style. Hurston explains: "Anyway, the force from somewhere in Space which commands you to write in the first place, gives you no choice. You take up the pen when you are told, and write what is commanded. There is no agony like bearing an untold story inside you."

Setting her independence, Hurston at the age of 14 left her residence to work as a maid of a traveling Gilbert and Sullivan theatrical troupe. Given the opportunity Hurston was sent to Morgan Academy in Baltimore, Maryland by one of her employers. Finishing up her high school studies in Morgan Academy and graduating on June 1918, Hurston studied part-time at Howard University in the same year. While Hurston studied in college she decided to support herself as “a manicurist, a waitress, and a maid in order to support herself” (D. Kaplan 2). Hurston’s talent towards literature started to emerge while studying at Howard. She made such an impact in her first short story titled, “John Redding Goes to Sea" in 1921, that it was included in the university’s literary magazine named “Stylus”. Sociologist Charles S. Johnson, immediately caught the attention of such excellent work who also encouraged Hurston to move to New York City in the year of 1925 (Bomarito 89). Beside Johnson mentoring her to go to New York he also inspired her to enter the literary contest of his magazine entitled “Opportunity: A Journal of Negro Life.”

The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement in the 1920s that led to the evolution of African-American culture, expression through art, music, and literary works, and the establishment of African roots in America. Zora Neale Hurston contributed to the Harlem Renaissance with her original and enticing stories. However, Hurston’s works are notorious (specifically How it Feels to Be Colored Me and Their Eyes Were Watching God) because they illustrate the author’s view of black women and demonstrate the differences between their views and from earlier literary works.

Zora Neale Hurston was born on January 7, 1891 in Alabama. She is known to be one of the most influential novelist of the twentieth century in African America literature. Hurston is described to be a very opinionated woman that stood for what she believed in; which reflected in some of her works. In addition to her many titles such as, being an anthropologist and short story writer, she was closely related and heavily focused on the Harlem Renaissance. Zora Neale Hurston and her political opinions placed her at odds with important figures during that time which I wholeheartedly believe played a part in the undeniable attraction that most people have towards her works. Being that Hurston was such a unique writer, to understand the ethics and themes of her and how she contributed to African American literature comes with an understanding of the background and childhood she had.

Hurston prides herself on who she is because of her background. Her identity of being a black woman in a world

     In the fall of 1919, Zora Neale Hurston became a freshman at Howard University. Hurston studied intermittently at Howard for the next five years; the institution she would proudly call “The capstone of the Negro education in the world.” Hurston enjoyed college life even though she was a decade older than other freshmen. With

Zora Neale Hurston was born and raised in Eatonville, Florida which was the first all-black town in the United States to be incorporated and self-governed. Due to Hurston growing up in an all-black community, she was protected from racism. She states that the only white people she knew were the ones passing through the town going to or coming from Orlando. When she moved from the town of Eatonville to Jacksonville, she was introduced to a different lifestyle where she was

Zora Neale Hurston was an African-American folklorist, novelist and anthropologist. She was born in 1891 and lived in the first all-black town in the United States, Eatonville, Florida. Her 1937 novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God and played a vital role in the literacy movement the Harlem Renaissance is what she is best known for. Zora Neale Hurston depicts racism in her writings and has contributed greatly to African-American literature. Her work became more popular posthumously.

She uses idealistic examples and real world situations to get the best realistic interpretation on the matter of the harlem renaissance. This novel also is a great way to learn and understand the importance of women's roles and rights during the harlem renaissance era for the black/african american women. All in all, Hurston’s depiction of the harlem renaissance reflects and departs the major topics and does so

Some time passed, she turned up in Baltimore where she lied about her age to finish high school. After which she enrolled in Howard University in 1920 where earned an associate’s degree. She then transferred to Barnard College and after graduating in 1928, she started coursework for a PHD in Anthropology at Columbia University. Some years later, she moved to Harlem deep in the middle of the Harlem Renaissance, where she became a fixture in its thriving art scene along with friends, Langston Hughes and Countee Cullen who she was known to be acquainted with. She wrote several short stories and plays, such as “Mules and Men”, “The Great Day”, “From Sun to Sun” and “Mule Bone”. She also a few novels, two highly regarded works of anthropology and an autobiography titled, “Dust Tracks on a Road”, which has had some controversy on whether some parts of her life’s story in truly accurate. One example would be that she claimed to have written “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, in seven weeks “under internal pressure” while on a Guggenheim fellowship to Haiti to study the folklore. Hurston struggled through the last years of her life, as she continued to write but

Zora Neale Hurston, also known as the queen of the Harlem Renaissance, contributed to the Harlem Renaissance by writing several works of literature. Hurston didn't take the typical approach of writing