One of the most prolific writers of the twentieth century, Zora Neale Hurston was born on January 7, 1891 and grew up in Eatonville, Florida, the first incorporated all-black town in the United States. Hurston’s upbringing had a profound impact on her timeless novels, including Dust Tracks on a Road, Mules and Men, Their Eyes Were Watching God, among many others. Hurston’s novels and folklore were products of her extensive anthropological research, which embodied such poignant historical details on African American history.
Robert Hemenway, Hurston’s biographer, refers to her as, “a woman of fierce independence,” who “was a complex woman with a high tolerance of contradiction.” Hurston was skilled in the art of masking, covering her own life in ambiguity. Scholars suggest that this had to do with Hurston’s life from 1904 to 1914, what Hurston calls “The Haunted Years.”
Hurston’s mother died in early 1904. After the death of Hurston’s mother, she left her home. As family life became more difficult, she moved to Jacksonville to live with her siblings. Jacksonville was a staunch contrast to the independence she had in Eatonville.
It was part of the Jim Crow South, which brutalized and controlled Black Americans. At 16, she took a leap of faith and joined a traveling theater company, which ended up in New York during the Harlem Renaissance.
Hurston decided to craft her own identity with her own imagination and passion. For example, although Hurston claimed to be born in Eatonville in 1901, she was actually born in Alabama in 1891. There are claims that she did this seem younger than she was, but she also might have been referring to the birth of her true self, not simply her natural birth.
She studied at both Howard University and Barnard College and obtained her Bachelor’s degree from Barnard in anthropology. She continued to study anthropology at Columbia University for two years. Hurston then studied folklore in the African American south, all the while crafting fruitful and timeless literature.