Talk:Zora Neale Hurston

Discussion

Langston Hughes was surely a more prominent member of the Harlem Renaissance than Wright (and he was, of course, quite political, writing for a communist magazine in favor of a Stalin show trial, although he never joined the CPUSA officially). Wright was a bit later and more emergent when Hurston wrote. Further, Hughes was friends with Hurston, although occasionally. Hurston's work was well received in her own day, and she made quite a living, intermittently, as an author for magazines. Her Harlem contemporaries regarded her as lavish, apparently, and shied away from her as being erratic. Further, she did other work than writing. The article should be broadened to include these facts. I believe a biography of Hurston has appeared in 2003 that is a bit more inclusive, if anyone has read it and can bulk up the article.

Article needs expansion

There's more to be said about Hurston's work and the distinction between her contributions to fiction and to folklore/anthropology. I hope someone will expand this, I may add some things. Bruxism 21:47, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

mural in flagstaff az

Where is this mural in flagstaff? It sure looks like a Barnes and Noble cafe to me.

That IS the mural inside the B&N cafe. It's the same one in all of thier cafe's. 66.167.110.12 00:09, 8 January 2007 (UTC) LeeAnn92

Deleted repeat passage

The following paragraph appeared twice in the article:

Hurston's detachment from the wider civil rights movement struggle was demonstrated by her opposition to the Supreme Court ruling in the Brown v Board of Education case (1954). She voiced this opposition in the letter, Court Order Can’t Make the Races Mix, which was published in the Orlando Sentinel in August 1955. This letter caused a furor and proved to be Hurston's last public intervention.

I deleted the second instance in the "Politics" section, but I know that this leaves this section to be expanded. I don't know enough about Hurston's biography to make this happen, but I hope someone who does else can.--Pinko1977 01:12, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Birthplace

About her birthplace! According to sparknotes.com she was born in Alabama and later as a toddler moved to Florida. Someone should do some research on this and clarify the text. I don't have the time at the moment unfortunately. Thanks!

According to page 13 of Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biography by Robert E. Hemenway, "Hurston had been born in Eatonville on January 7, probably in 1901; birth records of the period do not survive, and she was purposefully inconsistent in the birth dates she dispensed during her lifetime, most of which were fictitious." (Amazon online reader)

The "Chronology" section of my copy of Their Eyes Were Watching God says "January 7, 1891: Born in Eatonville, Florida, the fifth of eight children, to John Hurston, a carpenter and Baptist preacher, and Lucy Potts Hurston, a former schoolteacher."

Though the years are different, the sources agree that she was born in Eatonville. But, as pointed out by an editor, filmmaker Kristy Andersen has found evidence that Hurston's birthplace was Notasulga, Alabama; it would be nice to have a scholarly reference for this. - mako 07:51, 8 July 2006 (UTC)

I looked through some books at the library, and the recent ones all agree on Notasulga as her birthplace. One book cited John Lowe's Jump at the Sun (1997) as the source for this information, but I didn't have time to track it further. Lowe credits Cheryl Wall with discovering that Hurston was born in 1891. - mako 06:48, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I looked at the 1900 US Census record, which gives Alabama, Jan 1891 for her birth, though no info on whether the 7th of 15th of that month, both dates being found in various sources. KingkongUK 12:01, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Links

This article is full of external links hidden as internal ones. Someone (I don't know how) needs to change this. Thanks Denis Diderot II 00:34, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

questioning 2 claims in politics section

The section on Hurston's politics is interesting, but I'm not sure about a couple of things. First, we say Hurston was "opposed to integration". Second, we say, "she worried about the demise of black schools and black teachers as a way to pass on cultural tradition to future generations of African-Americans." The only source in the paragraph is this letter, which is the explicit source for the second claim and perhaps the implicit source for the first. The letter does establish that she opposed Brown v. Board of Education and the mainstream integrationist movement, but it does not, to my eye, oppose integration itself; in fact, it calls for "ethical and cultural desegregation." And I don't see anything about black teachers as a way to pass on cultural tradition, though it does seem plausible that she would have worried about losing that. Are there other sources for these claims? --Allen 02:56, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

I'd say that the implication of the letter are clear enough. She states vefore the line about ethical and cultural degregation "Thems my sentiments and I am sticking by them. Growth from within." hence referring back the ideal that segregating schools would in turn disrupt black culture. I think that the line regarding Booker T. Washington ought to be removed, however, there is absolutely no evidence to support that whatsoever. --Farazy 03:53, 19 December 2007 (UTC)