The Thumbnail Book Reviews
by John Q McDonald --- 14 May 1999
by Zora Neale Hurston
In this brilliant 1937 novel, Hurston tells the story of a beautiful African-American woman and the trials of love she enjoys or endures. We meet Janie when she returns to the gossiping neighbors gathered on the porches of a little Florida town. She opens up to tell her story to her curious best friend Phoeby. Janie wanted to love and live life in a broadly adventurous way. When still a girl, her grandmother warned her to settle with a man for security. Love would come later, she advised. Janie wouldn't stand for that, though, and walked out into a life she hoped to make her own. This book is small, but dense with Janie's life with three different men. The tale is thick with a country drawl that takes a little getting used to, and an atmosphere in which the characters, and particularly Janie, seem tossed on a sea of circumstance. Janie sees a lot of southern Florida, and comes home in the end, unhappily, but with her horizons broad, and with a sense of satisfaction. Hurston touches lightly on issues of her day, including the percieved differences between light and dark skinned African-Americans, and the struggle of people to make their way in an unequal society. The book is popular, and heavily studied, so that this edition (Harper Perennial, 1990) sports both a foreword and an afterword. Try not to let the academic analysis keep you from experiencing the pure intensity of this novel.