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A review by p_t_b
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
5.0
somehow i never had to read this for school and i think in my twenties i maybe couldn't say for sure whether this was by ZNH or willa cather. anyway i got onside eventually. the idea that hurston wasn't always canonical hurts my brain. this is a stubbornly weird, lyrical novel about a woman coming into herself, not entirely of her own understanding or explicit intention, after marrying. basically middlemarch but in early 20th century AAVE and like 1/10th as long and with more rabies and hurricanes. i never want to say ppl gotta read a book but you should probably read this, or not, i respect your autonomy
"she left the porch pelting her back with unasked questions"
"Yes indeed. You know if you pass some people and don't speak tuh suit 'em dey got to go way back in yo' life and see what you ever done. They know mo' bout yuh than you do yo' self. An envious heart makes a treacherous ear."
"So long as they get a name to gnaw on they don't care whose it is, and what about, 'specially if they can make it sound like evil."
Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches.
Dey made it sound real bad so as to crumple mah feathers
night time put on flesh and blackness
Waiting for the world to be made
Nanny's words made Janie's kiss across the gatepost seem like a manure pile after a rain
"mule of the world"
de day and de hour is hid from me
Mah daily prayer now is tuh let dese golden moments rolls on a few days longer
feelings dragged out dramas from the hollows of her heart
Ah had too many feelin's tuh tell which one tuh follow
There are years that ask questions and years that answer
There is basin in the mind where words float around on thought and thought on sound and sight. Then there is a depth of thought untouched by words, and deeper still a gulf of formless feelings untouched by thought.
She turned wrongside out just standing there and feeling.
"too previous" as in "too early"
You can't get her wid no fish sandwich
Man, dese white folks got ways for tellin' anything dey wants tuh know"
She didn't read books so she didn't know she was the world and the heavens boiled down to a drop.
Is he bad 'bout totin' pistols and knives tuh hurt people wid?
Ah'm born but Ah ain't dead No tellin' whut Ah'm liable tuh do yet
[marriage] always changes folks, and sometimes it brings out dirt and meanness dat even de person didn't know they had in 'em theyselves.
tell me, what post office did you ever pee in
Janie looked down on [Tea Cake] and felt a self-crushing love.
their souls asking if He meant to measure teir puny might against His. They seemed to be taring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.
worry they guts into fiddle strings
you got tuh go there tuh know thereq
"she left the porch pelting her back with unasked questions"
"Yes indeed. You know if you pass some people and don't speak tuh suit 'em dey got to go way back in yo' life and see what you ever done. They know mo' bout yuh than you do yo' self. An envious heart makes a treacherous ear."
"So long as they get a name to gnaw on they don't care whose it is, and what about, 'specially if they can make it sound like evil."
Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches.
Dey made it sound real bad so as to crumple mah feathers
night time put on flesh and blackness
Waiting for the world to be made
Nanny's words made Janie's kiss across the gatepost seem like a manure pile after a rain
"mule of the world"
de day and de hour is hid from me
Mah daily prayer now is tuh let dese golden moments rolls on a few days longer
feelings dragged out dramas from the hollows of her heart
Ah had too many feelin's tuh tell which one tuh follow
There are years that ask questions and years that answer
There is basin in the mind where words float around on thought and thought on sound and sight. Then there is a depth of thought untouched by words, and deeper still a gulf of formless feelings untouched by thought.
She turned wrongside out just standing there and feeling.
"too previous" as in "too early"
You can't get her wid no fish sandwich
Man, dese white folks got ways for tellin' anything dey wants tuh know"
She didn't read books so she didn't know she was the world and the heavens boiled down to a drop.
Is he bad 'bout totin' pistols and knives tuh hurt people wid?
Ah'm born but Ah ain't dead No tellin' whut Ah'm liable tuh do yet
[marriage] always changes folks, and sometimes it brings out dirt and meanness dat even de person didn't know they had in 'em theyselves.
tell me, what post office did you ever pee in
Janie looked down on [Tea Cake] and felt a self-crushing love.
their souls asking if He meant to measure teir puny might against His. They seemed to be taring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.
worry they guts into fiddle strings
you got tuh go there tuh know thereq