Their Eyes Were Watching God Cd Unabridged [Audiobook] [Audio CD]

Hurston's novel is a very interesting portrayal of the life of

black people in the fictional black town of Eatonville. Set in

the early 1900's Hurston is able to convey through a handful of

characters the vernacular, and thinking of black folk in the

early American south. The Language may require some getting use

to but it is well worth it. The novel incorporates a myriad of

oral performances- personal narratives, folktales, and sermons-

and charts the comming to womanhood of protagonist Janie Starks.

The novel is not for those who demand sex or high drama,instead

it is a video of words that depict the entirety of the basic

concerns of black folk in a new town of their own. There are ex-

amples of black men that lived from"hand to mouth" everyday who

casually gather around Janie's general store to "cut the fool"

and talk of the subtle foolishness in their lives, and there is

Joe Starks the talented negro with his plan to go to Eatonville

with 300.00, his new bride ,and make a name for himself.The wo-

men of the town tend their poorches every evening and anyone's

business they can. Janie was married to an older man(Mr. Logan

Killicks) through her grandmother when she was about 16, Mr Kil-

licks could never satisfy the desires of his ambitious maidens

heart,therefore Janie runs away with the dynamic,most ambitious

Joe Starks who promises her everything except the loving she de-

sires.At first Janie imagines this is the relationship she has

dreamed of until Joe's male chauvinistic beliefs begin to

stifle her ambitions. After 20 years of marriage,and the death

of Joe, Janie meets a young "Jiggalo" named "Tea Cake" who

helps her come to some self actualization which she is pleased

with. Because citizenship, and racial equality were hot issues,

Jim Crow was in full effect,and lynching of black men a regular

Sunday outing durning this era in America, Hurston's novel was

the target of much criticism from literary peers like Richard

Wright because there was no voice of black militancy,or outrage

at circumstances confronting black folk,and the issues seem to

have been ommited from the story, with the exception of Janie

discovering she was the child of a white rapist school teacher.

I feel Hurston's millitant was Janie herself. She was a woman

that was always told what to do, and when to do it. Most of her

actions or lack of action throughout the novel were motoviated

by submission, or liberation.

As the vernacular thickened, and the climax is approached,Janie

achieves the freedom of love,freedom of speech, and the liber-

ation of her feminine conscious through her affair with Mr. Tea

Cake. Reader besure, this is a great American fiction novel.It

takes the reader to Main Street Eatonville, your black narrator

delievers a story of the everyday struggles of a real people in

a fictional town trying to find their way in a new living con-

dition. Perhaps, Zora Neale Hurston's monumental accomplishment

in "Their Eyes Were Watching God" is the creation of a literary

language that captures a place in time.