Staff Pick

Their Eyes Were Watching God: A Novel

Zora Neale Hurston

$17.99

Publication Date: March 19th, 2013

Publisher:

Amistad

ISBN:

9780060838676

Pages:

272

Off the Beaten Path Bookstore

2 on hand, as of Apr 22 4:08am

(Literature)

On Our Shelves Now

Staff Reviews

I enjoy rereading classics from the past, because I am at a different stage of my life, and I tend to see things differently. Their Eyes Were Watching God is the heart-felt story of Janie Crawford, a strong-minded black woman living in the deep South in the 1930’s. Her inner, independent voice comes out strong and clear as she moves through three marriages; she wants to think and speak for herself. Yet Janie’s reality is that she is a married black woman and her outer voice cannot challenge the obedience and submission that is expected of her. This novel is a gentle reminder of the plight of many women, then and sometimes now! I thoroughly enjoyed it!

— Virgie

Description

A PBS Great American Read Top 100 Pick

“A deeply soulful novel that comprehends love and cruelty, and separates the big people from the small of heart, without ever losing sympathy for those unfortunates who don’t know how to live properly.” —Zadie Smith

One of the most important and enduring books of the twentieth century, Their Eyes Were Watching God brings to life a Southern love story with the wit and pathos found only in the writing of Zora Neale Hurston. Out of print for almost thirty years—due largely to initial audiences’ rejection of its strong black female protagonist—Hurston’s classic has since its 1978 reissue become perhaps the most widely read and highly acclaimed novel in the canon of African-American literature.

About the Author

Zora Neale Hurston was a novelist, folklorist, and anthropologist. She wrote four novels (Jonah’s Gourd Vine, 1934; Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1937; Moses, Man of the Mountains, 1939; and Seraph on the Suwanee, 1948); two books of folklore (Mules and Men, 1935, and Every Tongue Got to Confess, 2001); a work of anthropological research, (Tell My Horse, 1938); an autobiography (Dust Tracks on a Road, 1942); an international bestselling nonfiction work (Barracoon: The Story of the Last “Black Cargo,” 2018); and over fifty short stories, essays, and plays. She attended Howard University, Barnard College, and Columbia University and was a graduate of Barnard College in 1928. She was born on January 7, 1891, in Notasulga, Alabama, and grew up in Eatonville, Florida.