2.  "I have the nerve to walk my own way, however hard, in my
search for reality, rather than climb upon the rattling wagon
of wishful illusions."
- Letter from Zora Neale Hurston to Countee Cullen
3. CHILDHOOD
 B. January 7, 1891
 Notasulga, Alabama
 Moved to Eatonville, Florida as a toddler
 Eatonville was always home
 Slightly idealized
4. EATONVILLE
 Eatonville was the nation’s first
incorporated black township. It was
established in 1887. Growing up here
influenced ZNH greatly—she was
surrounded by positive, black role -
models.
5. TRAGEDY STRIKES
 Hurston's mother died in 1904. Zora was only 13.
 She said, "That hour began my wanderings. Not so much in
geography, but in time. Then not so much in time as in spirit .“
 Her father quickly remarried
 Zora and her stepmother did not get along
 Leaves home
6. GOING BACK IN TIME
 In 1917, ZNH ended up in Baltimore where she knocked ten
years of f her age so she could finish high school. She was ten
years younger from that day on…
7. ZNH AND THE RENAISSANCE
 Zora graduated from Barnard college in 1928, where she had
written—and published—several stories and articles.
 She “elbowed” her way into the Harlem Renaissance,
befriending the likes of Langston Hughes
8. MAJOR WORKS
 Jonah's Gourd Vine (novel)
 Mules and Men (a collection of folklore).
 Their Eyes Were Watching God (novel, 1937)
 Her most famous and well-received novel
 Tell My Horse (a study of Caribbean Voodoo practices , 1938)
 Moses, Man of the Mountain (novel, 1939)
 Dust Tracks on a Road, (autobiography, 1942)
9. A FAMILIAR FATE
 Like many writers of her time, Hurston was not rich, although
she was famous in her lifetime.
 She died on January 28, 1960 of a stroke.
 Her neighbors had to take up a collection for her funeral. Her
grave remained unmarked until 1973.