Baritone thunder. Snarling winds.
Consuming downpours.
Okeechobee, the disastrous hurricane
of 1928,
tore through the North Atlantic basin,
laying waste to entire communities.
In Eatonville, Florida,
the storm forced many to flee.
But for Janie Crawford,
it inspired an unexpected homecoming.
Janie’s return begins
“Their Eyes Were Watching God,”
Zora Neale Hurston’s acclaimed novel
about a Black woman’s quest
for love and agency
in a time that sought to deprive
her of both.
When Janie arrives back in Eatonville,
her arrival is shrouded in mystery.
Her neighbors and friends are quick
to gossip about her reappearance,
her finances, and most importantly,
the whereabouts of her missing husband.
But only Janie’s friend Pheoby
gets to hear the whole story.
Over the course of a conversation
that spans most of the novel,
Hurston untangles Janie’s life story;
from her complicated childhood
and her life in Eatonville,
to her scandalous departure
and the shocking events that followed.
The specifics of Janie’s story
are often larger than life,
but many of the book’s details reflect
the incredible experiences of its author.
Zora Neale Hurston was
raised in Eatonville,
one of the first planned and incorporated
all-Black communities in America.
Like Janie, she also left
Eatonville abruptly,
traveling first to Jacksonville and DC,
before eventually moving further north.
In New York City,
Hurston studied anthropology
and became a renowned author
in the Harlem Renaissance,
a cultural, literary and artistic movement
that’s still considered a golden era
of Black artistry and creativity.
Here, her work garnered enough support
to fund research trips through the South,
where she collected stories and folktales
from Black Americans.
By 1937, her fieldwork had taken
her all the way to Haiti,
where she wrote most
of “Their Eyes Were Watching God.”
Hurston drew on all these experiences
for the novel,
incorporating folkloric elements alongside
her own family and romantic history
to bring readers into the intimate spaces
of Black southern life.
She uses regional phrases and sayings
to capture the dialect
of her Floridian characters.
And the novel’s omniscient
third-person narration
allows Hurston to unleash
her poetic prose on everything
from birdsong, architecture, and fashion,
to her characters’ deepest feelings
and motivations.
Perhaps more than any specific details,
Hurston’s experiences of being
a Black woman in America at this time
are more evident in the novel’s themes.
Over the course of one long evening,
Janie and Pheoby discuss the nature of
family, marriage, spirituality and more.
But their conversation always comes back
to Janie’s truest desire:
to live honestly
and be truly loved in return.
As a teenager, Janie resents
an arranged marriage,
despite the safety it offers her
and the wishes of her loving grandmother.
When her family becomes well-respected
in Eatonville,
she struggles with the
judgmental eyes of strangers
and a husband who wants her
to be something she’s not.
Throughout her life, Janie frequently
feels she’s at the whim
of natural and spiritual forces
that can shift the course of her existence
without warning.
And when she finally does find true love,
these unknowable powers
continue to act on her,
threatening to destroy the life
she's so painstakingly built.
The story takes place during a time where
women had little to no agency,
and Janie’s life is full
of complicated characters
who demand different kinds
of love and submission.
But despite the loneliness
of her situation,
Janie navigates these trials
with defiance and curiosity.
Her questions and commentary
push back in subtle, clever ways.
And as the reader follows Janie’s journey
from childhood to middle age,
her confidence becomes infectious.
Just like Hurston, Janie defies
the restrictive expectations
for a woman in her time.
Early in the novel, Hurston writes that
“there are years that ask questions
and years that answer,”
suggesting that life can only truly
be understood by living it.
But through her empathetic storytelling,
Hurston invites us into Janie’s life,
her life,
and the lives of so many other women.
