A Study On Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God And Autobiographical Writing

Zora Neale Hurston has become one of the pre-eminent writers of20thcenturyAfrican-American literature, as the first black woman writer who expresses the theme ofblack women’s search for identity in her writings. Both she and her literary products weresignificant. Their Eyes Were Watching God is Hurston’s best-known novel, which waspublished in1937. In this novel, she breaks down the stereotype of inferior black woman andcreates a new black woman image Janie, who searches, over twenty-five years and threemarriages, for her true identity. By now this novel has gained universal acceptability for thewonderful representation of the American black’s life and the heroine’s positive andoptimistic attitude towards life. This novel also establishes the framework for contemporaryblack feminist literary tradition. As we all know that Hurston takes her own life experiencesas sources to compose this novel. This thesis analyzes mainly the autobiographical color ofHurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and African-American women’s autobiographicalwriting through the perspective of autobiographical theories. This thesis consists of five parts:Chapter one is introduction, it presents Zora Neale Hurston and her masterpiece TheirEyes Were Watching God, and also its literature review. This part also introducesAfro-American women’s autobiographical writing in detail including its definition,emergence, and development.Chapter two analyzes the theories in this thesis, including the theory of autobiographyand Black Feminist Criticism. In this part, these two theories will be presented systematicallyand completely.Chapter three proves mainly that Their Eyes Were Watching God is the truthful kind ofautobiography from three dimensional facts of an autobiography. Hurston’s three marriagesand growth experiences are autobiographical facts, which display the strong side of herpersonalities. Hurston describes some other people, such as the influence from her secondlover and the assistance from the white people, which constitutes the biographical facts.Hurston also records some historical facts, for example: the racial and sexual discriminationin America, the identity crisis of African Americans. These three dimensional facts are blended in the autobiography, aiming to illustrate the truthful autobiographical character ofthis novel.Chapter four explores the Afro-American women’s searching for their identities. First ofall, it is necessary to analyze the identities in Their Eyes Were Watching God. By introducingJanie’s quest for identity, Janie experiences her awakening for identity, the process of theidentity quest and finally she earns self-respect and identity for herself. It indicatesAfro-American women’s road seeking for identity is very tough. Then, try to summarize theidentities in the Afro-American women’s autobiographical writing, and further analyzes therelationship between identity and Afro-American women’s autobiographical writing.In the conclusion, Their Eyes Were Watching God is not only an excellent feminist novel,but also an Afro-American women’s autobiographical novel by using the three dimensionalfacts. In fact, Hurston wants to encourage all the Afro-American women to search for theirself-identities bravely by the role of Janie in this novel. And her contributions toAfro-American women literature have been exerting great influence on the black womenwriters. Autobiographical theory offers a new perspective to study Their Eyes Were WatchingGod and the study further proves Hurston’s important contributions to modern Americanliterature.