For the Love of Literature
BY KHADIJA POUNSEL
A Novel New Year’s Invitation
She’s my book of Genesis, my foundation, my touchstone for literature. Zora Neale Hurston. I have read other classic authors with more name recognition, more published works, more accolades, but no matter. It’s a done deal for me. Their Eyes Were Watching God, her 1937 novel, sealed that. Hurston’s language is lyrical and lovely, full of dialect and humor. The anthropologist and Harlem Renaissance author’s novel follows the life of Janie Crawford through migration in the southern United States, friendship and relationships. I reread it regularly with glee, shaking my head and wiping tears.
The novel and I have history, but it’s a history that does not begin with me. I was just a girl, but I remember going into the adjoining room to see what had turned over my mother’s tickle-box. She lay reading Their Eyes Were Watching God. I loved hearing her laugh out loud. It would be years before I would read it for myself. By that time, I was in high school and Alice Walker had acted on her diligent commitment to bring Zora Neale Hurston’s novel back to the world (and get a marked grave for Hurston), so there it was on our English class reading list.
In class, the poetic prose was so pretty, the dialect a struggle for some classmates, the characters’ relationships complicated. We argued about who was good, who was bad, about gender roles, motives, race and love. I reread it in my college years. One of Janie’s relationships established relationship goals for me then. Never mind that I glossed over the problems in that romance. As a fully grown woman, though, not so much. These days, I’m asking, what is this novel telling me about the heart? It’s coming through, and I’m nodding my head that, in 1937, Hurston already knew. Writing what you know—and being specific—will connect every time.
With the new year upon us, as is my tradition, I select books to read for the year. New authors and new releases make it on the list, but the tried-and-true are ever present. Their Eyes Were Watching God is in the number. In a changing world, it’s a familiar good thing, full of quotable lines and unforgettable scenes—a sure-fire way to get my footing in a new year full of new goals, pressures, problems and pleasures. For first-timers, grab a copy. For returnees, you know how good it is. Join me.
Loving literature,
Khadija Pounsel