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Their Eyes Were Watching God

Zora Neale Hurston

3.93 · Rating details · 258,801 ratings · 13,240 reviews

Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person -- no mean feat for a black woman in the '30s. Janie's quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots.

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Paperback, 219 pages

Published May 30th 2006 by Amistad (first published 1937)

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Jan 15, 2019 Emily May rated it really liked it

Shelves: 2019, classics

Janie saw her life like a giant tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches.

I've spent many years wanting to read this book, but also not wanting to read it because the title made me think it was going to be heavy on religion, which is something I generally avoid in books. It's not, though. It's a wonderful, lyrical tale of a woman's life and search for independence.

Now I'm fascinated by interpretations of the title because religion and God don't feature much in the story at all. I’ve been reading about the idea that the title implies how Janie must look to God - not white people, not husbands, not well-meaning family members - to determine her future. While this theory doesn't give her much agency, it does fit with her search for a life outside of others' expectations (except God's).

It's set in Florida in the early 20th Century, at the height of Jim Crow. The novel begins with Janie Crawford sharing her life story with her friend Pheoby. We are taken back to her youth and sexual awakening-- an event that triggers her grandmother's insistence that she marry for protection. Nanny, herself, is fascinating. You feel both Janie's frustration toward her controlling grandmother, and Nanny's desire that Janie will have a better life and be taken care of.

"She was borned in slavery time when folks, dat is black folks, didn’t sit down anytime dey felt lak it. So sittin’ on porches lak de white madam look lak uh might fine thing tuh her. Dat’s whut she wanted for me – don’t keer whut it cost. Git up on uh high chair and sit dere. She didn’t have time tuh think whut tuh do after you got up on de stool uh do nothin’."

As you can see from above, the novel's dialogue makes strong use of dialect and colloquialisms.

Through three marriages and many instances of physical abuse, Janie remains fierce and unapologetic. It was a terrible time in America for a black woman to find freedom and independence, but Janie pursues it nevertheless. It's now eighty years after the book's first publication and Janie's indistinguishable spirit is as captivating as it surely always was.

In the end, the book is about defying expectations and living for oneself. Everyone in Janie's life wants and expects something from her. Her Nanny wants her to marry for protection, white men want to keep her down, darker-skinned African-Americans feel she should emphasize her lighter skin, each of her husbands wants her to behave and dress in a way that suits them. But Janie remains wholly herself throughout. I love her.

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Feb 20, 2017 Jesse (JesseTheReader) rated it liked it · review of another edition

I have mixed feelings on this book. On one hand I loved the writing style and I loved the main character and following her journey through life's struggles. On the other hand it was slow moving, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I felt things could've been cut to keep the story moving better. I understand why this is such a well loved classic, but I didn't love it as much as I'd hoped to! :(

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Sep 10, 2016 Michael Finocchiaro rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: favorites, african-american-lit, american-20th-c, novels, fiction

I read this masterpiece for the first time in high school. The love story of Janie and Tea Cake is one of stupendous beauty. Zora Neal Hurston's text is a treasure:
"So she went on thinking in soft, easy phrases while all around the house, the night time put on flesh and blackness."
Early in life, Janie is taken care of by her grandmother Nanny,
"Every tear you drop squeezes a cup uh blood outa mah heart"
As she grew, "Janie waited for a bloom time, a green time and an orange time."
She is married of ...more

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Dec 01, 2012 Jeffrey Keeten rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: southern

”Dey gointuh make ‘miration ‘cause mah love didn’t work lak they love, if dey ever had any. Then you must tell ‘em dat love ain’t somethin’ lak uh grindstone dat’s de same thing everywhere and do de same thing tuh everything it touch. Love is lak de sea. It’s uh movin’ thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore.”

Janie Crawford knows about love. She knows how life is with it and she knows how life is without it. She had three marriages ...more

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Jun 24, 2013 Fabian rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

A story as melancholic for its relationship to the writer's own life/destiny as another Southern masterpiece "Confederacy of Dunces." I cannot imagine that this isn't Toni Morrison's true foundations of prose--the beauty of which borders on the sublime. The modernism of "Their Eyes" lies in the intermixing of 1930's black vernacular with poetic lines which themselves carry astute and precise craft--this is outstanding. Lightning in a bottle--that's what this book reads like.

I love to choose side ...more

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Jan 13, 2013 Samadrita rated it it was amazing

Shelves: by-women-who-matter, timeless-classics, human-drama, cherished, modern-classics, in-by-about-america, 1001-and-more, re-readable, adoration, slice-of-life

Here is a woman who led a wretched life for years, doomed to stagnate in the drab depths of oblivion even after her death which had gone under the radar and generated no nostalgia-soaked, emotional obituaries. She lay in an unmarked grave in the Garden of Heavenly Rest, Florida, treated by her own contemporaries like an outcast because of a difference in perspectives, to be resuscitated and acknowledged as one of the foremost powerful voices that ever reverberated across the African-American lit Here is a woman who led a wretched life for years, doomed to stagnate in the drab depths of oblivion even after her death which had gone under the radar and generated no nostalgia-soaked, emotional obituaries. She lay in an unmarked grave in the Garden of Heavenly Rest, Florida, treated by her own contemporaries like an outcast because of a difference in perspectives, to be resuscitated and acknowledged as one of the foremost powerful voices that ever reverberated across the African-American literary landscape years later. And here is her creation, a 'coffee-and-cream' skinned Janie Crawford, a child born out of a possible rape, a sure forerunner to Toni Morrison's Sethe, Denver and Beloved or Alice Walker's Celie and Nettie. A mulatto woman in a white man's world, who grew aware of an identity not shackled by notions of race, skin color, and even gender, who could look beyond the small horizon carelessly conferred on her by an era which was bluntly apathetic to her kind, who could aspire to be free of a legacy of mere victimhood.
And here I am, trying to make sure I do not fuse Zora and Janie together, unable to decide how to love, revere and pity them at the same time.

I watched the young and carefree Janie, who bubbled over with an enthusiasm for life, eventually morph into the Janie who embraced the bittersweet realization of having loved and lost. My eyes traced her unsure footsteps from financial servitude to financial stability, from the daily battle of ignoring the sting of self-denial to grasping at a life free of emotional subservience. I loved the hapless, innocent Janie who consented to being passed over like property from her grandmother's ownership to her first husband's just as much I admired the Janie who found her salvation in Tea Cake's good-natured laughter after two marriages which had simultaneously stripped her of her last shred of self-esteem and caused her to listen to that stifled inner voice. And I felt a strange kind of happiness building up inside for the Janie who would not succumb to the temptation of self-loathing like the misguided Mrs Turner, the Janie who found the firm ground of self-awareness to tread on while the world of conflicting ideas rotated on its axis like ever.

Zora Neale Hurston had a rich dual voice - one of them fearlessly recounting the quirks characterizing the Black American community in the deep south still clinging on to the outer fringes of a white-dominated society intertwined with the lyrical, oneiric voice of a philosopher and a feminist, possibly one of the first among her kind. And it is this wholly harmonious union of these two voices which transforms this bildungsroman into a honeyed ballad of love and grief, of psychological bondage and emancipation.

"He looked like the love thoughts of women. He could be a bee to a blossom-a pear tree blossom in the spring. He seemed to be crushing scent out of the world with his footsteps. Crushing aromatic herbs with every step he took. Spices hung about him. He was a glance from God."

Janie never bore a grudge against her 'God' for making her path to fulfillment so long and arduous. She merely watched Him with hopeful eyes, lovingly accepting all He bestowed on her. And I watched Janie with a tear-strained smile. ...more

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Jul 04, 2014 Michael rated it it was amazing

Shelves: favorites

Written in lush prose that blossoms around lines of vernacular dialogue, Their Eyes Were Watching God follows Janie Crawford as she wades through three turbulent marriages toward a state of financial and emotional independence. The story begins at its end, with a forty-something Janie returning to her old town after years spent elsewhere; her best friend Pheoby calls upon her, and Janie begins to recount her many travels and experiences to Pheoby. But, despite the frame's promise that Janie will ...more

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Jul 03, 2007 AJ Griffin rated it liked it

Recommends it for: people interested in historical ebonics, I suppose

Another "I don't remember it very well, but I know I liked it" story. Here's what I do recall:

A) The main character was a woman, and she had something like 3 lovers throughout the book. Saucy.
B) One of these dudes was named either Teabag, Cornbread, Teabread, or Breadbag. Or something.
C) There was some issue with the weather towards the end.
D) Zora Neal Hurston got arrested for fucking a kid, or something (I guess that wasn't really in the book, but whatever).

Somehow I managed to get through th ...more

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Feb 23, 2017 Robin rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 2017, literary-fiction, american

I was prepared, based on the many five star reviews for this novel by many of my esteemed Goodreads friends, for a worthy book. I was prepared, based on its 1937 publishing date and its setting of Eatonville, Florida and then the Everglades, that important racial themes would be present. What I wasn't prepared for, however, was to be knocked over completely by the shimmering, feathery-fine, poetic prose. I wasn't prepared to be told a courageous, all-in, love story.

Zora Neale Hurston's incredibl ...more

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Jun 25, 2014 Lisa rated it it was amazing

Shelves: 1001-books-to-read-before-you-die, persuasive, so-good-it-hurts, unforgettable

"Love is like the sea. It's a moving thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from the shore it meets, and it's different with every shore."

In the beginning, there was Nanny. Nanny knew what it meant to be a slave to men. And Nanny had a daughter. She saw what happened to her, how she chose to escape pain in oblivion. And Nanny was scared. She was so scared that she wanted to prevent the same thing from happening to her daughter's daughter, even if it meant that she had to force her grandc ...more

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Aug 08, 2014 Diane S ☔ rated it really liked it

When I was in school we were given a choice to read Soul on Ice, Johnny got his gun or this book. I choose Johnny, a book that haunts me to this day. Hurston's book always remained in the back of my mind, though I can't help but wonder if I would have appreciated it back then as much as I did now.

I did find the dialect difficult at times, but I found if I read it out loud it made more sense. Of course my husband thought I was demented, but he often does. I cannot imagine being married as young a ...more

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Jan 24, 2008 Melissa Rudder rated it really liked it

Shelves: teach-it, master-s-exam

When I teach Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, I tell my students the Alice Walker headstone story and teach the book as a Black Feminist novel that is far, far ahead of its time. I noticed this year that my introduction made my students expect the protagonist, Janie, to jump from the novel's pages as a woman warrior, take no shit from anyone, and--I don't know--burn her bra. But the real beauty of Hurston's novel is that her heroine is a real character living in a real world--a When I teach Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, I tell my students the Alice Walker headstone story and teach the book as a Black Feminist novel that is far, far ahead of its time. I noticed this year that my introduction made my students expect the protagonist, Janie, to jump from the novel's pages as a woman warrior, take no shit from anyone, and--I don't know--burn her bra. But the real beauty of Hurston's novel is that her heroine is a real character living in a real world--albeit, one that is touched by literary genius and reflective of literary genres as varied and vital as (Hurston's scholarly focus) African American Folk Tradition and the odyssey of the "high mimetic form". (A Black woman presented as the hero of an epic journey in 1937--simply amazing.) Janie struggles. Janie submits. Janie silences herself. But Janie grows. And, in my mind, a revolution begins.

Hurston's character construction is superb. At once, her characters are strongly allegorical AND so real that they are breathing entities in the reader's mind (and disturbingly remind you of that uncle you don't really like). Janie is as real as they come. By the end of the story, I, as a reader, am her best friend Pheoby, sitting on that porch with her and listening her to tale. I understand her insecurities, I feel her pain, I smile as she inexplicably giggles for two pages, and I am full of that emotion the conclusion of Hurston's epic tale creates.

I love that Hurston gives her readers the tools to understanding Janie's motivation and responses very early in the book in the form of her beautifully constructed pear tree and mule metaphors. It is a wonderful book to teach to those teenagers who still think literary analysis is a sham that teachers come up with to torture students, because Hurston stitches her novel together with meaningful patterns of metaphors and symbols that deliberately guide readers through Janie's experience.

Hurston's literary talent shines in her ability both to construct believable, life-like dialogue in strong southern dialect and to create poetic prose rich in metaphor and meaning, as well as in her ability both to spin a tale that leaves the reader in greedy suspense and to write a story that says so much about the nature of love, power, language, race, gender, and identity. The more I read this book, the more I like it.

On a side note: As the book is so strongly embedded in oral tradition, my classes listen to a few chapters of the audio book, which is read by Ruby Dee (who also played the role of Janie's grandmother in Oprah's movie). It is simply fantastic. If you're a fan of the book, you should definitely listen to it. ...more

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Jul 04, 2018 Kevin Ansbro rated it it was amazing

Shelves: black-american, heartwarming, human-imagery, uplifting, as-per-lisas-intriguing-review, human-emotions, gentle-humour, inspirational

Zora Neale Hurston was born to write.
This 1930s deeply human story of one indefatigable black woman's life, loves and catastrophes dazzled and delighted me from start to finish.
It was apparently written in a hurry and the story does have a breakneck feel to it. Characterful expressions burst from its pages; the syncopated, lively dialogue of the black people of the day is lush and gorgeous to read.
But please don't accept my effusive review as a recommendation. This book is not a generic crowd-pl ...more

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Jul 27, 2007 Tara rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: collegereadinglist1994-1998

I recently reread this book, in February 2011 and wrote a new review. It's a lengthy review, but I learned a lot on the second reading, hence the length. I posted that review on my blog, so here's the link: http://left-handedright-brained.blogs....

***I decided to remove the original review I posted for this book due to the new review I wrote in February 2011. The original review I posted for this book is no longer how I feel about the book and therefore wanted to move forward with the 2011 revi ...more

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Jun 07, 2008 Amanda rated it it was amazing

Shelves: kick-ass, blog

Another book that I recently re-read that stands up well to a second reading. Hurston's novel, unlike many classics, is as impressive and as relevant today as it was when written.

Hurston's story of Janie, a fair-skinned black woman caught in the time period between the end of slavery and the civil rights movement, is the first woman in her family who has the opportunity to be defined as something other than property. Despite this, Janie is unable achieve self-actualization or seek out the indepe Another book that I recently re-read that stands up well to a second reading. Hurston's novel, unlike many classics, is as impressive and as relevant today as it was when written.

Hurston's story of Janie, a fair-skinned black woman caught in the time period between the end of slavery and the civil rights movement, is the first woman in her family who has the opportunity to be defined as something other than property. Despite this, Janie is unable achieve self-actualization or seek out the independence for which she longs; however, this is not due to the racism or prejudices of white society (in fact, there isn't a prominent white character in the book). Instead, Hurston takes a fascinating look at intraracial racism. Janie's obvious "whiteness" sets her apart from the black community. At first, she's envied for her pretty hand-me-down dresses and hair ribbons that she obtains from the kind white family for which her grandmother works. Coupled with her straight hair (which hangs down to her waist), her exquisite beauty, and her light skin, she defies color categorization and leaves the question of "What is black?" lacking a definite answer. Later, she's an outcast because her second husband's "big voice" and quest for power in the all black community of Eatonville comes to be identified with the white masters of days gone by, and Janie comes to be seen in the role of the Southern plantation "mistress."

In addition, Hurston explores the repression of women in a patriarchal society. Janie's grandmother tells her that the black woman is the "mule of the world," the lowest of the low. Janie finds this to be true in her first two marriages, as she is treated like property by Logan Killicks and is later objectified by Jody Starks. It isn't until she meets Tea Cake, a man half her age, that Janie begins to live life on her own terms and not by the definition her man has set forth for her.

Whether you like the novel or not, it's importance to African-American and feminist literature is undeniable.

Cross posted at This Insignificant Cinder ...more

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Feb 08, 2018 Matthew rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: historical-fiction, 2018, audio, completist-book-club, classic, hoopla, tear-jerkers

There are two ways to approach this book:

1. Enjoy the writing! Take in the dialect and try to put yourself in the atmosphere that is created by Hurston’s fantastic prose and poetry. (Side note: The audio version narrated by Ruby Dee only makes this better)
2. While reading, think about this as more of a historical fiction story. Take a moment to read a bit about the South between the Civil War and World War I. How does the end of slavery and the establishment of a free black community in the Sout There are two ways to approach this book:

1. Enjoy the writing! Take in the dialect and try to put yourself in the atmosphere that is created by Hurston’s fantastic prose and poetry. (Side note: The audio version narrated by Ruby Dee only makes this better)
2. While reading, think about this as more of a historical fiction story. Take a moment to read a bit about the South between the Civil War and World War I. How does the end of slavery and the establishment of a free black community in the South affect the progression of the story? What are the attitudes within the black community?

I was able to do a bit of both with this.

I thought the writing was great. While there were times the dialect and the content caused me to get a little lost, in general I loved getting into the world created by Hurston. While the story was simple, the simple intricacies of the writing were anything but. Sometimes when combining poetical writing into a story it feels forced – almost like the writer is trying to impress you with their ability to be flowery and fancy. That was not the case here. With this book, the Hurston couldn’t help but combine poetry with her prose.

As I was reading I could not help but think about the climate of the Southern United States at the time of this story. I am reading Gone With The Wind at the same time as I am reading this and it really is a great companion story to give additional fuel to my thoughts on where black Americans in the south stood during the Civil War, how they came out of it, and where things were for them going into the 20th century. What is also fascinating is to read about the attitudes within the black community; while we might think that everyone was united in the black community after the Civil War, that was not necessarily the case.

If you like historical fiction, stories about American people during different eras, well-written prose combined with well-written poetry, you should check this book out. It is great for either a getaway into great writing, or lots of fuel for a discussion about a volatile era in American history. ...more

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Sep 23, 2018 Beverly rated it really liked it

Talking about what a revelation this book was to me with a girlfriend, I told her this is essentially a feminist novel that was published in 1937. Gone With the Wind was published in 1936, so this was what shook me to my core. Here is Thurston with her main character, Janie, not content with what others have decided for her; she will live her life on her own terms and decide for herself. It is truly a modern idea. Unlike Gone With the Wind (which I hated), in which all the black people are depic ...more

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Dec 30, 2013 Dolors rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Unheard voices which have much to say

Recommended to Dolors by: Steve Sckenda

Shelves: dost, read-in-2014

“To meet as far this morning  
From the world as agreeing  
With it, you and I  
Are suddenly what the trees try

To tell us we are:  
That their merely being there  
Means something; that soon  
We may touch, love, explain.”
Some Trees by John Ashberry.

Janie returns to Eatonville with the sunbeams glowing on her shoulders giving her the appearance of a luminescent and almost unearthly goddess whose bare feet voluptuously caress the dusty road. Women on porches sing a harmonious chorus of gossip a ...more

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Feb 13, 2009 Chloe rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Poets, Lovers and Screenwriters

Recommended to Chloe by: Sally

Shelves: classics, 1001-list, racism, fiction, southern-lit, african-american

You know those books that sit on your shelf and mock you for being too hesitant to pick them up? We all have them. They sit there, perched on the edge of the shelf like hooligans on a stoop tossing out insults to passersby and just daring them to pick them up and give 'em a spin. For me, Their Eyes Were Watching God was the ringleader of my abusive books. It would yell vicious things at me as I sat near the shelf and once, in collusion with my long-time archenemy gravity, contrived to whap me up You know those books that sit on your shelf and mock you for being too hesitant to pick them up? We all have them. They sit there, perched on the edge of the shelf like hooligans on a stoop tossing out insults to passersby and just daring them to pick them up and give 'em a spin. For me, Their Eyes Were Watching God was the ringleader of my abusive books. It would yell vicious things at me as I sat near the shelf and once, in collusion with my long-time archenemy gravity, contrived to whap me upside the head. Suffice to say, I was intimidated. Yet we all have to face our fears at some time and February seemed like the right time for me.

Looking back on my years-long avoidance of this book, I can't help but think that I make some truly awful decisions. This is one of the most lyrically beautiful books that I have ever read and, at the same time, one of the most ground-breaking portraits of an independent woman's voice that I've ever come across. Neale Hurston's book is simultaneously a work of art and a strong declaration of independence for the entire female gender.

Janie is a woman who first tries to conform herself to the molds that she has been taught in the form of two very dissatisfying marriages to men who feel compelled to, after heaping praise upon her for her independent spirit, snuff it completely out. After the death of her second husband, Janie chucks social propriety out the window and listens instead to that niggling voice inside that dares her to dream of a better life, even if the person she wants to share that life with is far beneath her on the limiting rungs of social positioning. Instead this man, the charming and appreciative Tea Cake, is a rascal who cares more about enjoying the everyday moments of life than he does for climbing to the top of the dung heap. His very lack of sober seriousness is what draws Janie to him, his living example proof of what is possible for her.

Hurston's style is beautiful, her poetic prose balanced perfectly with spot-on accurate renderings of the rural Southern dialect. J.D. Salinger, who I hold in the absolute highest esteem when it comes to rating dialogue, is put to shame by Hurston's ability to craft the slow drawl and missing consonants in her characters' speech. Reading it can not help but conjure each person's voice within your head so that, after a while, it's as though you're listening to a radio telecast rather than reading a book. ...more

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Nov 18, 2016 LeAnne: GeezerMom rated it really liked it

I am not African American, and no matter what genuine empathy is in my heart, there is no way a white woman can truly understand the life experiences and the collective family experiences of my girlfriends and guy friends who are in fact black.

But reading this classic by Zora Hurston let me pretend to do so for a while.

Wow, what a book! When Ms. Hurston, born in 1891 ,wrote this, she had already attended Howard University and Barnard College studying anthropology and attended Columbia for gradu ...more

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May 08, 2016 Perry rated it it was amazing

Shelves: mina-favoritböcker

A Classic That Hasn't Finished Saying What It Has to Say
Seeing Within You More than Before

Their Eyes Were Watching God should be more highly revered as an American classic. Italo Calvino defined a "classic" as "a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.” The current racial turmoil brewing in the United States today leaves no doubt that this Zora Neale Hurston classic still hasn't finished saying what it has to say.

Ms. Hurston's decision to attain a verisimilitude by using the A Classic That Hasn't Finished Saying What It Has to Say
Seeing Within You More than Before

Their Eyes Were Watching God should be more highly revered as an American classic. Italo Calvino defined a "classic" as "a book that has never finished saying what it has to say.” The current racial turmoil brewing in the United States today leaves no doubt that this Zora Neale Hurston classic still hasn't finished saying what it has to say.

Ms. Hurston's decision to attain a verisimilitude by using the lively vernacular of African-Americans in the early 1900s American South transformed this book from a great novel to the lofty status, attributed to very few in the Western Canon, of "transcendent."

Reading her piercing, prismatic prose is as soothing and soulful as listening to Etta James sing the blues to the rhythm and flow of Janie Crawford's journey from a pubescent teen given away by her grandmother as wife to an old man (after being caught kissing a boy) to a 17-year-old young lady being swept away by a dapper, fast-talking traveling salesman who, after marriage, became an abusive, chauvinistic husband, and then to a mid-to-late 30s widow finding love, passion and zeal for life in a man named "Teacake," more than a decade her junior.

Toward journey's end, Ms. Hurston brews up and heaves at us a hellish hurricane crossing south-central Florida, and breaching the banks of Lake Okeechobee. The passage from which the book's name was derived is both profound and symbolic in describing the African-American denizens of central Florida in the wrath of the hurricane:

“It is so easy to be hopeful in the daytime when you can see the things you wish on. But it was night, it stayed night. Night was striding across nothingness with the whole round world in his hands . . . They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against cruel walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.”

Another reason for this novel's transcendence is its place in embedding Ms. Hurston in United States history as a (if not the) pioneer in speaking up for, and celebrating the unique voice of, African-American women, especially in the South. Hurston adroitly conveyed her message in this novel that these women were oppressed not only by whites but also others in their own segregated communities.

Perhaps most telling of all to the novel's place among classic social novels was the mainstream's rejection of the novel after its publication in 1937 because it did not play its part in "racial uplift".

I also rejoice in this novel's importance in showing how first-rate fictional narrative, honest and heartfelt, is not only creative art in its highest form but can also be a potent agent for change across the broader spectrum and one person at a time. A noted publisher/editor at The New Yorker observed that in reading a classic "you do not see in the book more than you did before, [but] more in you than there was before."

One of the greatest American novels. Period.

...more

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Oct 10, 2008 Alisa rated it did not like it

I hate, hate hated this book, and I really can't explain WHY very well, but I'll try.

It was well written, the metaphors, etc were good (I read it for an English class so I know ALL about the metaphors), the characters were well rounded, it IS a really fine example of Hurston's work.

What I hated was the forward in the particular version I read. It was about a conference of women who loved the book or something, and one lady just went on and on how Janie is a strong female character, and somethin ...more

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Nov 23, 2012 Lawyer rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Anyone

Recommended to Lawyer by: On the Southern Literary Trail

Shelves: feminism, love, male-dominance, zora-neale-hurston, sacrifice, group-read, richard-wright, harlem-renaissance, 1930s, reputation

Their Eyes Were Watching God: Zora Neale Hurston's Novel of an Independent Woman

"Dat's all right, Pheoby, tell 'em. Dey gointuh make 'miration 'cause mah love didn't work lak they love, if dey ever had any. Then you must tell 'em dat love ain't somethin' lak uh grindstone dat's de same thing everywhere and do de same thing tuh everything it touch. Love is lak de sea. It's uh movin' thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it's different with every shore."

"Lawd! ...more

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Sep 05, 2014 Paul rated it it was amazing

Shelves: african-american

This is a wonderful novel and I would recommend it. The speech is not easy to follow initially, but is easy to get the hang of if you persist and is well worth the effort.
The story of the life and loves of Janie Crawford; told in her own words and in a strong clear voice. It has had a mixed history in terms of reviews. Ralph Ellison criticised its “calculated burlesque” and others regarded it as not being serious fiction. Then there was the debate about racial uplift and improving image; an appr ...more

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Apr 14, 2016 Hugh rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: modern-classics, read-2016

I'll start by thanking Zadie Smith - her introduction to this edition is also the first essay in her collection Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays, which I read earlier this year. Hurston was not talked about when I was at school and I knew nothing of her or this book before reading the essay, but it was enough to persuade me that I had to read the book. Smith says "There is no novel I love more", and that kind of hyperbole creates very high expectations, but within a few pages I was drawn in t ...more

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Dec 28, 2016 Amanda rated it it was amazing

This book was so powerful and so beautiful. I will be haunted by Janie and Tea Cake for awhile. I first started this in print and was struggling to get into it because I was having trouble with the dialect. It made me feel like I was just learning to read and I found I was concentrating more on the words than the story but about 25 pages in I switched to the audible version narrated by Ruby Dee and oh my gosh she was amazing. She brought this story to life for me in ways the printed book never c ...more

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Dec 04, 2016 Cathrine ☯️ rated it really liked it · review of another edition

4★
“Uh woman by herself is uh pitiful thing,” she was told over and over again. “Dey needs aid and assistance. God never meant ‘em tuh try tuh stand by theirselves.”
But our protagonist Janie Crawford is determined to “find out about livin’ fuh [herself]."

After reading the two forewords explaining the literary history of this novel, and upon completion, I have come to regard this as the little book that could.
—After publication it was out of print for 30 years.
—Dismissed by the male literary est 4★
“Uh woman by herself is uh pitiful thing,” she was told over and over again. “Dey needs aid and assistance. God never meant ‘em tuh try tuh stand by theirselves.”
But our protagonist Janie Crawford is determined to “find out about livin’ fuh [herself]."

After reading the two forewords explaining the literary history of this novel, and upon completion, I have come to regard this as the little book that could.
—After publication it was out of print for 30 years.
—Dismissed by the male literary establishment.
—Harshest criticism coming from black male critics: “No theme, no message, no thought.”
—Out of circulation for a second time and brought back into print after petitioning.
In her opening comments Mary Helen Washington says she “loved it because it was about a woman who wasn’t pathetic, wasn’t a tragic mulatto, who defied everything that was expected of her, who went off with a man without bothering to divorce the one she left and wasn’t broken, crushed, and then run down.”
I can’t decide if it would be better to read these forewords afterwards. They give a lot away and prime the reader. I knew nothing about this story going in and all the high praise set me up with high expectations (many of which were met). I would have loved to be in on the Alice Walker class at Wellesley in the 70s when she was teaching the novel. Some phrase meanings were not altogether clear to me and at times the vernacular was a bit demanding and made for slower paced reading, yet was enticing and lovely throughout. I think an audio book version would be a great way to go on this one.

Written by a black woman in the 30s, a time when women of any color would be hard pressed to find a heroine like Janie in literature, let alone write her, it is quite a remarkable work and an ever present reminder that “you cannot keep a good woman down.”

My Afterwards:
I watched the film starring Halle Barry. It was well done and true to the book with minor changes. Elements were left out, others over-dramatized. Some of the richer and more controversial black dialog is missing (to make it more appealing perhaps?), and Tea Cake’s darker side was omitted (view spoiler). Overall a more polished, romanticized, and easier to follow version.
...more

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Mar 29, 2010 ·Karen· rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: usa, f2f-book-group-reads

Oh dear, I was just about to start my review by saying how I enjoyed the richness of the language in this novel until my GR friend Michele provided me with this quote from the Encyclopedia of African American Women:
--White reviewers, often ignorant of black culture, praised the richness of her language but misunderstood her work and characterized it as simple and unpretentious.
Does that condemn me as a white person who is ignorant of black culture? Well probably yes, it does, because surely the ...more

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Sep 22, 2013 Aubrey rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: person-of-everything, 1-read-on-hand, 4-star, reviewed, virago, antidote-think-twice-all, antidote-think-twice-read, reality-check, r-goodreads, person-of-reality

4.5/5

She had been getting ready for her great journey to the horizons in search of people; it was important to all the world that she should find them and they find her. But she had been whipped like a cur dog, and run off down a back road after things.

What do you live for? Love? Security? Money? Hope? There's something to said for any of them in every combination with one another, the melding usually a three of the four legs of a stool that is never quite stable. A great deal of literature is generated by that shakiness, that unsturdy swaying as time sends the legs protruding and withdrawing, thinning and thickening as one attempts to keep their balance in the constant effort to reach. A great deal of debate is generated by those variables in flux, questions of what is worthy of thought, form, and the crying out of the body, mind, and soul.

Do you know what should always be given priority in literature all day, every day, factoring in all the issues of both reality and culture, of faith and physical function? I certainly don't. Not even my love of social justice blinds me to the strength of Hurston's beliefs, her desire to see black literature in US reflecting more than the all too consuming racism. Her effort to write with the goal of "racial health—a sense of black people as complete, complex, undiminished human beings, a sense that is lacking in so much black writing in literature", as so wonderfully stated by Alice Walker.

She got nothing from Jody except what money could buy, and she was giving away what she didn't value.

I loved Native Son, I'm well aware of Trayvon Martin and the far too many others like him, I appreciate Richard Wright for writing on such a powerful issue that affects the US to this day, but I hate him for his decrying of Hurston and all that she wrote for. He is Jody, capable of great things with his ideas of equality, progress, and men, writer of brilliant sociological treatises and powerful indictments of racism at the expense of only a few 'girlfriends in a refrigerator.' Idealistic as it is to argue for that 'only', foolish as it is to dream beyond the Titan of whites and their institutional oppression of blacks, selfish as it that a story grants love and financial stability to a black woman, the unlikeliest of unlikelihoods, here we are.

"They's mighty particular how dese dead folks goes tuh judgment," Tea Cake observed to the man working next to him."Look lak dey think God don't know nothin' 'bout de Jim Crow law."

While racism is factored into the book, it is not allowed to hollow out the heart and reign in the center of things. Here, it is only a single factor in the lives of black people, replete with life, love, every facet of culture from dialect to public life. Perhaps more suspension of disbelief is required for reading such a story where hope is not immediately shackled to threat and made to understand who is king. Perhaps it is the lack of a king that is the most unsettling, his grandiose ideals of money always before love turned on its head by the queen with her own views of a life worth living. Equal rights and financial stability are all very well, but the patriarchy is not the highest one should be hoping for.

"...Dat's whut she wanted for me—don't keer whut it cost. Git up on uh high chair and sit dere. She didn't have time tuh think what tuh do after you got up on de stool uh do nothin'. De object wuz tuh git dere. So Ah got up on de high school lak she told me, but Pheoby, Ah done nearly languished tuh death up dere. Ah felt like de world wuz cryin' extry and Ah ain't read de common news yet."

"Maybe so, Janie. Still and all Ah'd love tuh experience it for just one year. It look lak heben tuh me from where Ah'm at."

"Ah reckon so."

Here's to Zora Neale Hurston for going against the flow. Here's to Alice Walker who brought her back to the seat of honor she so richly deserves. Here's to authors seeing the value in their beliefs without stomping on those of others.

Here's to a book that not only lives, but celebrates. ...more

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Jan 18, 2016 Brian rated it it was amazing

Zora Neale Hurston was a trained anthropologist, and her masterpiece "Their Eyes Were Watching God" is a study of mid twentieth century black culture. However it is also so much more than that. Hurston preserved for posterity the colloquialisms and cadences of black southern culture, one generation removed from slavery. But she does so in a universal and thought provoking novel that explores the very building blocks of the human condition: love, our personal dreams and growth, and every person's ...more

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About Zora Neale Hurston

Zora Neale Hurston

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Zora Neale Hurston was an American folklorist and author. In 1925, shortly before entering Barnard College, Hurston became one of the leaders of the literary renaissance happening in Harlem, producing the short-lived literary magazine Fire!! along with Langston Hughes and Wallace Thurman. This literary movement became the center of the Harlem Renaissance.

Hurston applied her Barnard ethnographic tr ...more

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