ENGL 281 Lecture Notes - Lecture 42: Zora Neale Hurston, Melia Azedarach, Alice Walker
Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960)
• Wrote with a very folklorist and anthropological manner that was
able to capture the heritage of blacks during the Harlem Renn
• Alice Walker helped revive the works of Zora after her death with
her essay, Looking for Zora
Sweat (1926)
http://wwwi.mcpherson.edu/~claryb/en255/handouts/sweat.pdf
An abused woman named Delia provides for her and her husband by
washing white peoples’ clothing, but he is ungrateful, does not provide,
until Delia has had enough. Sykes is unfaithful and uses the money Delia
makes to please the new women, until he places a snake inside their
home to scare her. One night, the snake gets into her hamper, to which
she hides in the barn all night. In the morning, Sykes goes into the house, only to be strangled by the
snake pleading for Delia’s help
• Woman empowerment in standing up to her husband fearlessly
o The snake might have been the one to bring justice to him, but she was the one that
took the stance to no longer be abused and taken for granted
▪ Realization that she never needed him and can live perfectly well on her own
The Chinaberry tree: the fruit of these trees is actually poisonous; Delia sits under the tree simply
waiting for Sykes to die, where the tree stands as a marker of her victory and growth as a woman
Follows a standard plotline of man being evil to the innocent woman
Sykes is more of a type, rather than an individual; no development of character
The Gilded Six-Bits 1933
https://vimeo.com/20910370
• Joe loved Missie May for who she was and the life they led, although demonstrated an
admiration for the wealth that Slemmons is able to project, which Missie takes notice of
• In order to buy Joe something nice, she decides to sleep with Slemmons, which leads into a
sour relationship between the two until Missie bores him a son.
o Joe finds out that the chain that Slemmons wore was fake chain. That is to say, the
wealth that both Joe and Missie were looking for was worthless
▪ All that glitters ain’t gold is the moral of the story; the true gold is love and
support for those you really love
In this story, both characters experience a sense of development
Setting: they live on the outskirts
Joe: works shoveling crap. Has the lowerst of the lowest occuparion you can have.
• We have come to believe that those in the lowest points in society are the most humble. We
then associate this humility with being good
o We hold esteem for Joe
o Written for an American audience that at the moment is going through social
stratification that comes from the diversification of American work places [move
from agrarian to industrialization]
Writes knowing that her audience
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
