Their Eyes Were Watching God

Title: Their Eyes Were Watching God
Author: Zora Neale Hurston
Original Publishing Date: 1937
Genre: African-American Literature, Classics
Rating: A


My husband, Jerry, recommended this book to me. He, like so many others, had read it in high school and remembered it to be pretty good. Since I have embarked on this mission to read the classics, he thought it would be a good addition to my internal library.

I began the book without any real expectations. Jerry warned me that the dialog was written phonetically in rural Southern black dialect and therefore might be difficult to read, so at least I was prepared for that. I also had limited knowledge that it was written by one of the premier writers of the Harlem Renaissance of the 1930s and 40s, Zora Neale Hurston (**Note: visit Zora Neale Hurston's official site to listen to Ruby Dee read the fist couple of pages of the book! Its awesome!).

So, I began reading the book a few months ago and while its been slow going because of my busy lifestyle and because I was ambitions enough to start two books at once, I did find it to be a very enjoyable read. The story flowed remarkably well and kept my interest piqued from the very beginning.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is the story of Janie Crawford, a beautiful, middle-aged woman of African-American and Caucasian decent. The book begins on the porches of several of Janie's neighbors in her all-black community of Eatonville, Florida. Her neighbors watch (and gossip) as Janie returns home from a long hiatus, under "mysterious" circumstances dressed in a pair of overalls as opposed to the fancy satin dress she left town in. Janie's self-appointed best friend, Phoeby Watson, is elected to go find out what happened to Janie during her absence and report back to the neighbors. They are also quite curious as to the whereabouts of the the young man, Tea Cake, that Janie had left town with. Knowing her neighbors like she does and how they would speculate until her name was dragged through the mud and back, Janie decides to tell Phoeby her story from the beginning.

Janie was raised by her grandmother, Nanny, who was born a slave and was freed at the end of the Civil War, shortly after her only daughter was born (the progeny of one of those master-slave mistress affairs). Nanny loved her daughter dearly and vowed to give her a fabulous life after she was freed from the bonds of slavery. Unfortunately it was not to be and when her daughter turned up pregnant after being raped by a white man herself, Nanny had to rethink her views on free life. When Janie was born, her mother more or less took off, leaving the baby girl to be raised by her grandmother. This time, Nanny's plan was to have Janie married off to a man of prosperity and substantial social status, ensuring the girl's security, at the first inclination of her maturity, which in Janie's case was at the tender age of 16. The man that Nanny chose was Logan Killicks, a much older farmer and landowner. But Janie longed for love and to find her own identity and she certainly did not love Logan and he certainly wouldn't allow her to be herself. Finally, after several months of mediocre married life, Janie finds the opportunity to escape and pursue her chances to fine love and her sense of self.

Janie's story takes us through her trials and tribulations and the events that lead to her return to Eatonville, alone and under a cloud of neighborhood gossip. It was beautifully told. Hurston had an almost poetic way of writing and often used powerful metaphors to drive her descriptions home. The dialog really was not an issue for me because I have read several books with that type of writing before, particularly my all time favorite, Gone With the Wind, so I was used to it. There were some instances when slang terms that have long since died were used and I had trouble understanding that she was referring to, but in most cases, I was able to discern what the author was talking about through the context.

I do plan to read this book again in the future and I would recommend it to anyone who is interested in African-American literature, or who, like me, is interested in the classics. This one definitely falls under that category. Next time I read it, though, I will be sure not to read any other books at the same time, and will spend much more time absorbing the story and the writing style.