Their Eyes Were Watching God

Rating:
Summary: Edifying yet ponderous
Review: Their Eyes Were Watching God is very well written, and Zora Neale Hurston evinces her themes excellently; however, this book is exacting and requires a lot of effort from the reader. Most of the dialogue tries to mimic southern vernacular and can be a pain for the reader; you should be prepared to invest at least 3 weeks for this book because even though the story is slow to pick up you can't skimp on the beginning and have to pay attention to metaphores, yet this book deserves 4 stars because of the sheer way it is written and the method Zora uses to present her themes. This book should be studied, and not read for entertainment. You will not be on the edge of your seat, but you will marvel at and envy Zora's prose. The three weeks or more weeks you spend on this novel should pay for itself as you see a master at work.

Rating:
Summary: English
Review: I had to read this book for my AP English class last year, and it was absolutly amazing. The strenght of character is so comforting as well as inspiring. I liked it so much, I kept my loaned copy!

Rating:
Summary: Ruby Dee is a fantastic narrator
Review: This unabridged reading of "Their Eyes..." is wonderful. I first picked up an abridged version narrated by Ruby Dee and loved her interpretation of it, but hated the abridgement of the novel done for that tape. I have also heard another narrator for this book, but that version drove me (and my students) crazy. The woman's voice was great, but she paused so long between sentences that I just wanted to hurry her up.

But this new reading brings all the beauty of Hurston's words and the lushness of her metaphors to life without interminable pauses. It's very evident why Ruby Dee is one of the American theater's national treasures. The varied voices she uses for the different characters are not always what I imagined, but they are all effective and all are "right."

If you are an individual who wants a terrific interpretation of "Their Eyes Were Watching God" to listen to on your own, buy this. If you are considering buying the recording for a school (or as an institutional purchase), do so. In either case, you will have made a wise choice. To hear Ruby Dee read Zora Neale Hurston is worth every penny it costs to buy it and every minute it takes to listen to the tapes.

Rating:
Summary: It deserves to be a part of the canon
Review: This book took me by surprise, unfolding itself, layer after layer, page after page. I was wondering when it would become level, and my interest would wane. But it didn't! I kept being fascinated by the character development, the prose, the plot, the descriptions of everyday life. She was a great writer, and I want to read some of her other books. I hope more people get turned on to her and her book becomes a must read classic of American education, like The Great Gatsby or Moby Dick. It needs to be talked about forever, regardless if you liked it or not.

Rating:
Summary: thank you Alice Walker
Review: Even had she never written a word, Alice Walker would have secured her place as an important figure in the history of African American fiction simply by rehabilitating Zora Neale Hurston. In her own day, Hurston was recognized as a leading figure of the Harlem Renaissance, doing ground breaking work on black folklore, collaborating with Langston Hughes and writing an autobiography, several novels and many short stories. But she had the great misfortune to fall afoul of her fellow black intellectuals, like Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison, who took offense at her use of vernacular language in her stories and who thought that her writing was not sufficiently negative about the black experience in America. Her opponents were better connected politically and saw to it that she was dismissed by the Left intelligentsia. She died in obscurity in a Welfare home and her works went out of print, largely forgotten. Then, in 1975, Alice Walker wrote a piece for Ms Magazine, about her search for Hurston's grave and began a reawakening of interest in her work. Walker's attentions seem to have been amply repaid, as this fine novel seems to have been a significant influence on her own book The Color Purple.

Their Eyes Were Watching God tells the story of Janie Crawford. Raised in Florida by a grandmother, she experiences several loveless marriages, but develops into a strong and independent woman, then finds love with an itinerant worker named Tea Cake...Besides the central theme of Janie's growth as a woman, the story is similar to The Color Purple for the almost eerie absence of white people. This was, in fact, one of the complaints lodged against her in the 30's, that she shied away from the issues of race and racism that other authors were focussing on and bringing to public attention. The novel does also render characters' speech in unvarnished dialect. You can see why fellow authors would have been embarrassed by the language, but that does not delegitimize its use.

In the end, the very things that her cohort found objectionable about her work--the colorful dialogue and the relatively upbeat portrayal of black characters--make Hurston's writing much more enjoyable than the earnest but polemical, to the point of agitprop, works of folks like Wright and Ellison. I liked the book quite a bit; which actually, when you get right down to it, pretty much proves Richard Wright's point.

GRADE: B

Rating:
Summary: A rewarding and incredibly deep novel
Review: The charm in this novel is the apparent simplicity in which it was written. Readers liken Janie to a simple female who possesses an understanding of love. Unfortunately readers also sometimes liken Ms. Hurston completely to Janie. Although Ms. Hurston admitted to paralleling Janie in relationships it is the greatest mistake of readers to not fully acknowledge Ms. Hurston. Ms. Hurston is often considered the most educated writer in American history. She was educated at Columbia University and besides being a noted author she was the foremost anthropological expert for African American culture in the south-eastern United States. Ms. Hurston did not attempt to mimic the dialects of turn of the century African Americans in the south-east. Actually, scholars and linguists read Ms. Hurston's writings to determine the origins of such dialects.

A member of the Harlem Renaissance, Ms. Hurston fully incorporates the wonderful rituals of African Americans into this novel. While this book is wonderful when first read it is even more outstanding when one realizes the incredible depth of the work. I suggest that anyone who reads this book also read a scholarly analysis of the work to see Ms. Hurston's incredible writings in a more revealing light.

Ms. Hurston's complete meshing of powerful metaphors and symbolisms with the life travails of the story's main character make this novel one of the most excellent that I have ever read. I only hope that every reader appreciate this work half as much as I have.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Story and Perfect Writing
Review: Similar to what a previous reviewer said, this book was a a kind of book which I would have never have discovered if it weren't for it being a required summer reading book for my tenth grade English class. Most of these types of books are good works of literature, but are very boring to read. An example may be Iron and Silk by Mark Salzman for my eighth grade World Civilizations class. A boring book, but a good one. However, Their Eyes Were Watching God is not boring at all. It is very fun to read. And although it doesn't maintain the same suspense as books by Michael Crichton or Tom Clancy, it keeps you wanting to read more and more. The only downside in this book is that the dialogue in the beginning is very confusing, and I almost refused to go on with the book unless I knew what it meant. However, you do learn what it means later on in the book. Sometimes, because of the type of accent and speech, you have to actually analyze what each word means in a sentence to 'decode' or understand what a character is saying. Despite this confusingness among some readers, this book is an outstanding work of literature.

Rating:
Summary: Captivating
Review: I was so caught up in the drama of this book that when I finished it a part of my life ended as well. It totally captures how love takes over and engulfs your very being. You get into the flavor of the dialect in no time. One of the best books I have ever read.

Rating:
Summary: An Interesting Insight into the Black Community
Review: While at times I was confused as to the general structure or skeleton of the book, I found Ms. Hurston's most well-known work to be emotional and full of humanity. The book follows the life of the main character, Janie, through her different husbands, socio-economic statuses, and surroundings. If you enjoyed Things Fall Apart or even Lee's To Kill A M-Bird, I think you would enjoy Their Eyes Were Watching God.

Rating:
Summary: A talent that has influenced many other writers
Review: It was eye-opening to finally read this wonderful piece of literature after having read many books by authors such as Alice Walker and Toni Morrison. I see so much of Hurston's influence in the workds of these two latter-day, African-American, female writers. I thank Hurston, therefore, not only for this revealing and touching book, but also for the perpetual influence it has left on the literary world. As we see Janie looking out into the darkness "watching God", so we also see the desire by black Americans, sepcifically women, to reveal their true nature, embrace it, and share it with a mainstream society that has taken it for granted or ignored it. The emotions in this book run deep and are extremely intense, forcing the reader to care for these people, for what they are, and see their struggles as worthy of respect.