More than a few Western New Yorkers are all reading the same book: Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. A coincidence? Not really. Just Buffalo Literary Center has distributed 3,000 copies of the book throughout the community and is hosting a month-long series of events relating to this book as part of The Big Read, an initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) designed to revitalize the role of literary reading in American popular culture.

This is the second year that Buffalo has participated in The Big Read. Just Buffalo was one of only ten cultural organizations across the nation chosen by the NEA in 2006 to bring the initiative to their local communities in the project’s first year. As a result of the success in the pilot phase, Buffalo was chosen to continue to participate in the Big Read this year as it expands to 72 cities nation-wide.

Published in 1937, Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God was the first African American novel of affirmation by a woman, and it is now considered an American classic. This book was selected because of the vital relevance of its themes to our community. A true literary marvel, Their Eyes remains as pertinent and affecting today as when it was first published. Hurston presents the protagonist, Janie Crawford, and her search for identity and love in a racist and sexist society in which it seems that the odds are against her. The author gallantly rejects stereotypes of women and ultimately imbues Janie with a powerful sense of agency. For this reason the novel has been, since the mid-1970s, considered a feminist classic.

Because of its integration of southern black dialect and structural elements of the oral tradition, some deem this novel to be one of the most important works in the entire canon of African American literature. However you categorize it, Their Eyes is an extremely significant work of twentieth-century American literature and a classic in every sense of the word.

In her prologue to I Love Myself When I Am Laughing . . . and Then Again When I Am Looking Mean and Impressive: A Zora Neale Hurston Reader, Alice Walker states, “I think we are better off if we think of Zora Neale Hurston as an artist, period—rather than as the artist/politician most black writers have been required to be.” In the same way, it is far more gratifying to read Janie’s story as a profoundly human quest than as a story that is markedly female or distinctly black. By and large, Their Eyes is about discovering selfhood, rising up against oppression, and finding one’s own voice. The true power of this novel lies in the universality of the themes and the intensely personal portrayal of the story. Much of the story is told by Janie to her close friend Pheoby while sitting on Janie’s back porch. The strength that Janie demonstrates while telling her story and the shear power of the tale motivates Pheoby to change her life.

In this way, Their Eyes truly lends itself to community-wide dialogue. What happens when individuals sit down and share the stories of their lives? What can we learn from one another through talking and listening? In hearing a story, what inspires us to take action? How might another’s story change our lives forever?

Zora drumming in Haiti

It has been Just Buffalo’s mission this month to encourage the community to ask such questions, to open up a dialogue about the book and to spark meaningful discussion that builds on and transcends the themes presented in this novel.

One upcoming event that allows the whole community to participate is Tell My Horse: Zora Neale Hurston at the Albright-Knox. Tell My Horse, part of the Albright Knox’s Gusto at the Gallery series, is a full day of events in celebration of Their Eyes Were Watching God. The day has been designated “Tell My Horse” based on Hurston’s book of Caribbean folklore by the same name. The title was adopted from a phrase used in voodoo ceremonies, where a person becomes possessed by a spirit and is ridden by that spirit like a horse. The spirit then speaks through the person, beginning with the words “Tell my horse...” Many of the events presented here relate in some way to traditional Caribbean folklore, voodoo and storytelling, themes that appear in much of Hurston’s work. There will also be mini-workshop activities for children including writing, photography, dance and art workshops.

Also at the Albright-Knox on Friday is the theatrical presentation Symphony Down in My Soul, a celebration of music and verse presented by Annette Daniels Taylor, Joyce Carolyn and Harold Luther White with musicians John Marx, Marlow Wright, Charles Reedy and Max Thein. An assortment of hymns, work songs, blues, gospel and jazz will accompany a collection of poems and stories by such notable African-American writers as Paul Lawrence Dunbar, James Welden Johnson, Gwendolyn Bennett and Langston Hughes, as well as original works by Annette Daniels Taylor.

What better way to end an evening than to view a B-horror film about voodoo and zombies? Tell My Horse will be capped off with Off Beat Cinema’s presentation of White Zombie, a cult-film classic starring Bela Lugosi.

Another event worthy of mentioning is the Hallwalls panel discussion which takes place the following Friday, May 25. Alexis DeVeaux, Lorna Hill and Lucy Anne Hurston, niece of Zora Neale and author of Speak, So You Can Speak Again: The Life of Zora Neale Hurston, will discuss the subject of telling stories of African American women’s lives.

As Janie explains to Pheoby in Their Eyes, “‘Tain’t no use in me telling you somethin’ unless Ah give you de understandin’ to go ‘long wid it. Unless you see de fur, a mink skin ain’t no different from a coon hide.” Simply telling a story will not suffice, we need to provide the “understandin’ to go long wid it.” The many events organized around this year’s Big Read open up a number of opportunities for our community to “see de fur” and to share ideas about one truly inspiring novel.