by Yuval Taylor
Soon, refusing to compromise and thus abandoned by practically all of her black friends, she lost her faith in black culture and went adrift. The concluding chapter of an early draft of her autobiography, written in 1941, was called “Seeing the World as It Is,” and in it she made the case that “Negroes are just like anybody else. . . . I wash myself of race pride and repudiate race solidarity [and] by the same token I turn my back upon the past.” It is wholly incompatible with the beliefs she had espoused for years. And from then on, success eluded her. By the time of her death in 1960, despite having published more books than any African American woman in history, all of them had fallen out of print, and she was buried in an unmarked grave.
Alice Walker helped resuscitate Zora’s reputation in a 1975 article for Ms. magazine entitled “In Search of Zora Neale Hurston.” She later wrote of “the quality I feel is most characteristic of Zora’s work: racial health—a sense of black people as complete, complex, undiminished human beings, a sense that is lacking in so much black writing and literature.” I believe that Langston shared that sense, especially in his work of the 1920s. As a college student, Walker had been befriended and supported by none other than Langston Hughes. Just a few months before his death in 1967, he published The Best Short Stories by Negro Writers. It was a synthesis of sorts: it included his own “Thank You, M’am,” Zora’s “The Gilded Six-Bits,” and the first story published by Walker, who was only twenty-one years old, “To Hell with Dying.” Alice Walker is indeed, in a sense, the last living link between these two writers. Unfortunately, however, as Walker informed me, Langston never spoke to her about Zora, and she never asked him about her either. Exactly how Langston felt about Zora at the end of his life can only be guessed.
Nevertheless, the debt that contemporary black fiction, drama, and poetry owe to the innovations of Langston and Zora is immense. For in their wake, and partially because of their writings, African American literature has followed a largely different path than white American literature. For earlier writers like James Weldon Johnson, art in America had to be, in scholar Ann Douglas’s words, “a miscegenated affair, whatever the denials and demurrals on either side.” Langston and Zora were the first great American writers who implicitly claimed that their work was purely black.
As a result of their pioneering work, most of the trends that dominated white American fiction, poetry, and drama through the remainder of the twentieth century found few parallels in African American work. Similarly, the trends that shaped that work, from the social protest novels of the 1940s to the Black Arts movement of the late ’60s and the Afrofuturism, street lit, and slam poetry that followed, found few parallels in mainstream white literature either. Although there was distinctive African American literature long before Zora and Langston, they helped to keep the most vital strands of it separate by insisting that its value was distinct from that of white literature, and by writing lasting works that proved the point.
Would they have accomplished this even if they had not been such good friends? Certainly their idiosyncratic writing styles were firmly in place by the time they met. Yet their most important statements about black art—Langston’s “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain” and Zora’s “How It Feels to Be Colored Me” and “Characteristics of Negro Expression”—were written only after they had gotten to know each other, and reflected their conversations. Charlotte Mason’s ideas, however abhorrent they may seem today, influenced them both, and helped them forge their path. The three of them shared an uncommon—for the time—reverence for the traditions, behavior, and character of the black lower and working classes, and this reverence would shine through their work from beginning to end. This reverence helped maintain the singularity of African American literature, and made it come alive as a distinct and unique body of work. Zora and Langston’s friendship played a vital role in establishing the identity of African American literature in its time—and throughout its future.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
In writing these words of thanks, I am probably leaving out more people who helped me than I’m including. My memory is somewhat faulty, this book has been so long in the making, and I have a tendency to be excessively concise.
The idea for this book came out of research I did for Darkest America, a book I wrote with Jake Austen; he instilled in me a certain way of thought that I try to not lose sight of. My agent, William Clark, and editor, Amy Cherry, were supportive from the start and helped me develop the project organically; Amy made hundreds of valuable suggestions, brought many of its scenes to life, and steered me to the right course whenever I went too deep into the woods or was unfair to one of its protagonists. Nancy Green expertly copyedited the book, tightening many of its nuts and bolts.
The staff at the libraries of the University of Kansas, Yale University, Emory University, and Howard University were all extremely helpful, going out of their way to make my research pleasant and easy; I’d especially like to thank Randall K. Burkett at Emory for discussing the Louise Thompson Patterson papers with me. Carla Kaplan helpfully answered my questions about her astonishingly deep research into Hurston and Mason’s lives and writings. For granting me permission to use written material, I’m grateful to Craig Tenney and Alex Smithline at Harold Ober Associates, MaryLouise Patterson, Leah Hattermer Hemenway, Peter London at HarperCollins, and Adam Reed at the Joy Harris Literary Agency.
Talking with Imani Mtendaji illuminated Southern history, made real to me aspects of Zora and Langston’s Southern road trip, and helped me understand how their connections to folklore remain alive. My conversations with my fellow Chicago writers, including Jacqueline Stewart, Julian Dibbell, Ethan Michaeli, and Ben Austen, gave me much insight and courage. I worked with several editors at the Oxford American on an article I wrote for them about my attempt to retrace Zora and Langston’s 1927 Southern road trip; Jay Jennings was exceptionally helpful, making hundreds of suggestions that improved the article immeasurably, and Maxwell George and Eliza Borne were masterful in their edits. Andrew Szanton read the first draft and alerted me to details I never would have thought of without him.
My children Thalia and Jacky have provided excellent aperçus over the years and have kept my spirits light and even.
Most importantly, from the beginning, I have discussed practically everything in the book with my wife, Karen Duys; she has been my sounding board, traveling companion, unofficial editor, and constant support, making thousands of valuable suggestions, and investing untold hours of her time in bringing this work to fruition. This book would have been impossible without her brilliance, dedication, and love.
NOTES
EPIGRAPH
viiiAlice Walker, “Turning Into Love: Some Thoughts on Meeting and Surviving Langston Hughes,” Callaloo, no. 41 (Autumn 1989), 664–65.
INTRODUCTION: LOVINGLY YOURS
3a perfect ‘darkie’ Langston Hughes, The Big Sea: An Autobiography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1940), 239.
3best friend . . . nearest person Hurston to Hughes, January 18, 1931, in Carla Kaplan, ed., Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters (New York: Doubleday, 2002), 203.
4the most prolific Charles H. Nichols, ed., Arna Bontemps–Langston Hughes Letters 1925–1967 (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1980), 8.
5the cross of her life Bontemps to Hughes, November 24, 1939, in Nichols, Bontemps–Hughes Letters, 44.
1. OPPORTUNITY
8banquets, after-lodge suppers Advertisement, The Nation 115, no. 2995 (November 29, 1922), 592.
8if you had a pocket flask Bruce Nugent, interview by Robert E. Hemenway, n.d., Robert E. Hemenway Personal Papers, PP487, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas Libraries.
9something was always arranged Nugent, interview.
9the root of the so-called Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road, in Folklore, Memoirs, & Other Writings, ed. Cheryl A. Wall (New York: Library of America, 1995), 682.
9did more to encourage Langston Hughes, The Big Sea: An Autobiogr
aphy (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1940), 218.
10the greatest gathering Arnold Rampersad, The Life of Langston Hughes, Vol. 1, 1902–1941, I, Too, Sing America, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 107.
13highly polished stuff David Levering Lewis, When Harlem Was in Vogue (New York: Penguin, 1997), 95.
14The women ate heartily Zora Neale Hurston, “Spunk,” in The Complete Stories (New York: HarperCollins, 1995), 32.
15You are America Langston Hughes, “America,” in The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, ed. Arnold Rampersad (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994), 52.
16all Africa awoke Zora Neale Hurston, “Black Death,” in Complete Stories, 206.
17Zora was patronizingly fond Nugent, interview.
17peasant mind and imagination Alain Locke, “The Negro Spirituals,” in The New Negro, 1st Touchstone ed. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997), 204.
17primitive in the American Negro Alain Locke, “The Legacy of the Ancestral Arts,” in The New Negro, 254.
18a sort of ‘Dean’ Johnson to Locke, March 7, 1924, Alain Locke Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, Howard University.
19stuffed with a pedantry Quoted in Leonard Harris and Charles Molesworth, Alain L. Locke: Biography of a Philosopher (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008), 271.
21bright, rangy, intelligent Carl Van Vechten, The Splendid Drunken Twenties: Selections from the Daybooks, 1922–30, ed. Bruce Kellner (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2003), 86.
22lots of bangles Robert E. Hemenway, Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biography (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1977), 61.
22but she had an ease Arna Bontemps, interview by Robert E. Hemenway, November 18, 1970, Hemenway Papers.
22the gift of walking Fannie Hurst, “Zora Hurston: A Personality Sketch,” Yale University Library Gazette 35, no. 1 (July 1960), 19.
22Zora is picturesque Carl Van Vechten, “Some ‘Literary Ladies’ I Have Known,” Yale University Gazette 26, no. 3 (January 1952), 113.
23He had done everything Richard Bruce Nugent, “Lighting FIRE!!,” insert in reprint of Fire!! 1, no. 1 (1982).
24is a clever girl Hughes to Van Vechten, June 4, 1925, in The Selected Letters of Langston Hughes, ed. Arnold Rampersad and David Roessel with Christa Fratantoro (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2015), 46.
2. I LAUGH, AND GROW STRONG
25city of five lakes Zora Neale Hurston, Mules and Men, in Folklore, Memoirs, & Other Writings, ed. Cheryl A. Wall (New York: Library of America, 1995), 12.
25a Negro town Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road, in Folklore, Memoirs, 561, 565.
26a center of wealth Ibid., 563.
26extra strong Ibid., 585.
26the one girl who could take Ibid.
26was the heart and spring Ibid., 599–601.
27Like clearcut stereopticon slides Ibid., 596–98.
28certain instructions Ibid., 617.
28Papa held me tight Ibid., 617–18.
29She called me a sassy Ibid., 625–627.
30to finish the job Ibid., 627.
30I was hungry Fannie Hurst, “Zora Hurston: A Personality Sketch,” Yale University Library Gazette 35, no. 1 (1960), 17.
31I had been in school Hurston, Dust Tracks, 662.
32He could stomp Ibid., 744.
32At the time I was going Herbert Sheen, interview by Robert E. Hemenway, n.d., Robert E. Hemenway Personal Papers, PP487, Kenneth Spencer Research Library, University of Kansas Libraries.
33greatest ambition is Quoted in Valerie Boyd, Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston (New York: Scribner, 2003), 87.
34making the white folks laugh Richard Wright, “Between Laughter and Tears,” New Masses 25 (October 5, 1937), 22.
34I am not black Langston Hughes, The Big Sea: An Autobiography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1940), 11.
35My grandmother never Ibid., 303.
36Then it was that books Ibid., 16–17.
37the people will live on Carl Sandburg, The People, Yes (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1936), 284.
37Carl Sandburg’s poems Hughes, Big Sea, 29.
38My father hated Negroes Ibid., 40–41.
39I was in love with Harlem Langston Hughes, “My Early Days in Harlem,” Freedomways 3 (1963), 312, in The Collected Works of Langston Hughes, Vol. 9: Essays on Art, Race, Politics, and World Affairs (Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 2002), 395–96.
39At last! Hughes, Big Sea, 80.
39Manhattan takes me Langston Hughes, “The Fascination of Cities,” Crisis 31, no. 3 (January 1926), 138–40, in Collected Works 9, 30.
40The octoroon choruses Quoted in Carla Kaplan, Miss Anne in Harlem: The White Women of the Black Renaissance (New York: HarperCollins, 2013), 113.
40Everybody seemed to make me Hughes, “My Early Days,” 396.
41learned people Hughes, Big Sea, 93.
42Melodramatic, maybe Ibid., 3.
42ur-trope Henry Louis Gates Jr., The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism (New York: Oxford University Press, 1989), 143.
43All my childhood Hughes to Mason, February 23, 1929, Langston Hughes Papers, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, New Haven.
44that poetry should be Arnold Rampersad, The Life of Langston Hughes, Vol. 1: 1902–1941, I, Too, Sing America, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 146.
44I, too, sing America Langston Hughes, “I, Too,” in The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes, ed. Arnold Rampersad (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994), 46.
45Write to him Cullen to Locke, January 20, 1923, quoted in Jeffrey C. Stewart, The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 342.
46looking like a virile Quoted in Leonard Harris and Charles Molesworth, Alain L. Locke: Biography of a Philosopher (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2008), 160.
46infatuation with Greek ideals Locke to Hughes, February 10, 1923, quoted in Rampersad, Life, 68.
46how wonderful it would be Hughes to Locke, undated, Alain Locke Papers, Moorland-Spingarn Research Center, Howard University.
46afraid of learned people Hughes, Big Sea, 93.
46MAY I COME NOW PLEASE Hughes to Locke, telegram, February 2, 1924, Alain Locke Papers.
46I had been reading Hughes to Locke, February 4, 1924, Alain Locke Papers.
46I do not recognize myself Locke to Hughes, February 5, [1924], Alain Locke Papers.
47We’ve been having a jolly Hughes to Jackman, August 1, 1924, in The Selected Letters of Langston Hughes, ed. Arnold Rampersad and David Roessel with Christa Fratantoro (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2015), 37.
47See Paris and die Locke to Cullen, July 26, 1924, quoted in Rampersad, Life, 92.
47every breath has the soothe Locke to Hughes, August 10, 1924, quoted in Stewart, New Negro, 440.
48galvanized Arna Bontemps, The Harlem Renaissance Remembered: Essays, Edited with a Memoir (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1972), 19.
48lose my boyish faith Langston Hughes, “L’histoire de ma vie” (unpublished, 1925), quoted in Rampersad, Life, 98.
49Never before had I seen Langston Hughes, “Our Wonderful Society: Washington,” Opportunity 5 no. 8 (August 1927), 226–27, in Collected Works 9, 42.
3. THE NIGGERATI
52first publicity break Langston Hughes, The Big Sea: An Autobiography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1940), 212.
53furniture party Quoted in Valerie Boyd, Wrapped in Rainbows: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston (New York: Scribner, 2003), 120.
53violently interested in Negroes Carl Van Vechten, “The Reminiscences of Carl Van Vechten: A Rudimentary Narration,” Oral History Research Office, Columbia University, 193.
53the Livingstone of this Richard Bruce Nugent, Gentleman Jigger: A Novel, ed. Thomas H. Wirth (Philadelphia: Da Capo Press, 2008), 57–58.
53Photographs from around 1924 Emily Bernard, ed., Remember Me to Harlem: The Letters of Langston Hughes and Carl Van Vechten (New York: Knopf, 2001), xiii–xi
v.
54Jazz, the blues Van Vechten to Mencken, May 29, 1925, quoted in David Levering Lewis, When Harlem Was in Vogue (New York: Penguin, 1997), 98.
54personal nourishment Lewis, When Harlem Was in Vogue, 99.
55You just did what you wanted Quoted in Jeff Kisseloff, You Must Remember This: An Oral History of Manhattan from the 1890s to World War II (New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, 1989), 289.
55There were men and women Mabel Hampton, interview by Joan Nestle, Lesbian Herstory Archives, quoted in Boyd, Wrapped in Rainbows, 129.
55seemed to thrive without Arnold Rampersad, The Life of Langston Hughes, Vol. 1: 1902–1941, I, Too, Sing America, 2nd ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002), 133.
56obscured and shielded Ann Douglas, Terrible Honesty: Mongrel Manhattan in the 1920s (New York: Farrar Straus & Giroux, 1995), 97.
56Silence is as good Hughes, Big Sea, 200.
56smiling and self-effacing Wallace Thurman, Infants of the Spring (New York: Macaulay Co., 1932), 143.
57Behind the warm smile Arthur Koestler, The Invisible Writing (New York: Macmillan, 1954), 111.
57Once, dressed for a party Robert E. Hemenway, Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biography (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1977), 30.
58the arts of the people Zora Neale Hurston, “Folklore and Music,” in Folklore, Memoirs, & Other Writings, ed. Cheryl A. Wall (New York: Library of America, 1995), 876.
58From the earliest rocking Zora Neale Hurston, Mules and Men, in Folklore, Memoirs, 9.
58the greatest anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road, in Folklore, Memoirs, 683, 687.
59Oh, if you knew Hurston to Meyer, [January 1926], in Carla Kaplan, ed., Zora Neale Hurston: A Life in Letters (New York: Doubleday, 2002), 77.
60a person of the most contradictory Zora Neale Hurston, “Fannie Hurst,” Saturday Review of Literature (October 9, 1937), 15.
60shorthand was short Fannie Hurst, “Zora Hurston: A Personality Sketch,” Yale University Library Gazette 35, no. 1 (1960), 17.