In some of his writing, Richard Wright critiques Zora Neale Hurston for seeming to be a minstrel figure, playing to the white people's desired entertainment. He also is criticizing Hurston for not speaking about real social issues. In doing this, is Wright calling Hurston a "pale poet?" I think he is calling Hurston a "pale poet" because he is saying that she doesn't talk about real issues, but only pristine and courtly things, like the white romantic writers. Is Hurston really a pale poet though? Maybe.
One major difference between Native Son and Their Eyes Were Watching God is that Richard Wright wrote Native Son intending it as a protest novel, but Zora Neale Hurston did not write Their Eyes Were Watching God as a protest novel, rather as a depiction of what she found in her anthropological studies and as a way to expose the Everglades culture and Eatonville culture to the rest of society. Wright criticizes Hurston for not writing a good protest novel. That's true, because she didn't write a protest novel. I think that this part of Wrights argument is futile and invalid.
Part of the "pale poet" argument that Wright makes has to do with the fact that Hurston does not blatantly state and argue against an issue in society as a way of provoking change. However, Hurston does show issues with gender roles and institutionalized racism by including Jody and Mrs. Turner. This is just not the central point of the novel and it does not focus on the issues too much, because if it did, it wouldn't be quite as accurate a depiction of the culture. Jody's confinement of Janie to the lonely inside of the store critiques gender roles. Mrs. Turner is "colorstruck" and can't look past the shade of a person's skin tone to see their real personality. These characters are the social critiques that Wright didn't seem to acknowledge in Hurston's writing.
I think that Hurston is not a pale poet, because she depicts both the joys and the hardships of the culture she is describing in Their Eyes Were Watching God. She is in fact making a statement about the reality of American society in the south, but that is not her purpose. Hurston's purpose is to separate the culture she studied in her travels from minstrelsy in a novel, not connect them.
I definitely agree that Hurston is not a "pale poet". An additional argument is how Hurston is presented in the documentary that we watched. She didn't care what other people thought about her, and wanted to be free to write about whatever she chose. This doesn't strike me as a characteristic of someone who would use sugarcoated, lavender, language or skirt around topics that weren't "pristine and courtly".
ReplyDeleteI also agree with what you're saying about Hurston's critique not being "pale" at all. I also feel like part of the significance of the novel is how maybe Hurston is being a little "pale" and also trying to argue that that's not necessarily a bad thing. In the critiques we read about the novel, Wright keeps saying that the only thing a black writer can justifiably do is write about race. Hurston's novel, and what we know about her from the documentary, seems to contradict that. There's obviously racial struggles in the book, but it's clear that the main focus is on Janie and her search for identity. Writing about love could seem "pale," but writing a novel with someone like Janie as the main character is also a social criticism.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Elizabeth--this novel is primarily the story of Janie's search for identity. However, I can see where Wright is coming from with his criticism of Hurston's portrayal of the majority of black characters in the novel. They do give off a sort of 'minstrel' vibe, although I would also say Hurston has the right to depict her characters as she saw fit based on her extensive research.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Hurston is not a pale poet. Because Their Eyes Were Watching God was such a different book than Native Son was and was not a protest novel i can see where Wright is coming from especially because of the minstrelsy of many characters and the town itself. Furthermore, the novel since it is not a protest novel can be seen as "pale" but i feel like that doesn't necessarily have to be a bad thing, and Hurston did a good job of showing this with her observations on gender roles as well as depictions of the town. Nice post!
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