Zora and Langston
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“Harlem Night Song,” 241
“I, Too,” 44–45, 65, 226
“The Jester,” 15
“Lament for Dark Peoples,” 65
“The Little Frightened Child,” 65
“Merry Christmas,” 182, 183
“Mother to Son,” 144
“Mulatto,” 103, 144
Mulatto, 165, 224, 233
The Mule-Bone (play), 163–67, 171, 174–75, 178, 183, 184–86, 188–89, 190–218, 220, 230, 237 (see also literary quarrel between Hughes and Hurston)
“My People,” 41
“The Negro” (“Proem”), 37
“Negro,” 41
“The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain,” 62–64, 73, 75, 92, 94, 241, 242, 244
“The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” 38, 41
Not Without Laughter, 135, 165, 167, 179–80, 208, 214
“Poem,” 73
The Poetry of the Negro, 235
“Poet to Patron,” 227
“Proem,” 37
“Red Flag on Tuskegee,” 108
“Rejuvenation Through Joy,” 223
“Song for a Dark Girl,” 103
“Songs to the Dark Virgin,” 15
“Thank You, M’am,” 243
“These Bad New Negroes: A Critique on Critics,” 93–94
“Tower,” 181
The Ways of White Folks, 223, 225
The Weary Blues, 20, 44–45, 52, 62, 63, 73
“The Weary Blues,” 13, 14–15, 37, 42
“The White Ones,” 65
Hull, Elizabeth, 224
Hunt, Florence, 115–16, 122
Hunt, Henry, 115–16, 122, 123
Hunter, Alberta, 48
Huntsville, Alabama, 110
Hurst, Fannie, 13, 21, 60–61, 66–67, 231
Hurston, Everett, 77, 82
Hurston, John, 25, 26, 28–30, 31–32, 220
Hurston, Lucy, 25, 26, 28
Hurston, Sarah, 188
Hurston, Zora Neale, 12–13, 15, 30, 50–51, 82, 217, 218. See also Hurston, Zora Neale, correspondence of; Hurston, Zora Neale, works of
abandoned by literary establishment, 5
African American critics of, 67, 68–69
African American culture and, 57–58, 236
aftermath of literary quarrel and, 219–37
in Alabama, 98–99, 103–8, 112–14, 183
appetite of, 30
arrested for child abuse, 233
arrives in Cleveland, Ohio, 209–10
attacks Hughes for his politics, 234
attends Howard University, 32–33
attends performance of Hughes’s The Barrier, 233–34
aversion to commitment, 24
in Baltimore, Maryland, 31
at Barnard College, 21, 61, 131, 137, 140
becomes wardrobe girl in theater company, 31
birth of, 25
calls herself “Queen of the Niggerati,” 53
in the Caribbean, 227
character of, 238–39
childhood of, 24, 25–28
in Cleveland, Ohio, 210, 211–12
collaborations with Hughes, 61–62, 128–29, 135–36, 161–67, 171, 174–78, 183–88, 190–218, 230, 236–37
at Columbia University, 57–60
condemned by black literati, 242
condemns court-ordered desegregation, 235–36
cooks dinner in Langston’s honor, 81–82
death of, 237, 243
decides literature is her calling, 31
defended by Hughes, 94
defiant view of black literary production, 70
distances herself from Hughes, 178
divorce from Sheen, 136
in Du Bois’s theater company, 164
in Eatonville, Florida, 24, 220
enrolls at Morgan Academy, 31
expeditions to the South, 133, 135, 136, 139, 140–44, 148, 174, 194
on faculty of North Carolina College for Negroes, 227
falls out of favor, 235–36
fights with her stepmother, 29–30
film footage from the South, 157
finances of, 23
Fire!! and, 77, 81
flamboyance of, 21–22
in Florida, 24, 99, 220, 233
folklore research by, 57–61, 68, 91–92, 98–99, 101, 113, 120, 132–33, 135–45, 158, 160–61, 174, 178, 188–89, 224–25, 242
on friendship, 240
in Georgia, 114–24
graduates from Barnard, 140
helps found Little Negro Theatre, 164
homosexuality and, 158–59
on Hughes’s character, 238, 239
identity as African American, 57
included in The Book of Negro Folklore, 235
increasing conservatism of, 234
initiated into hoodoo, 141–42
in Jacksonville, Florida, 29
jealousy of, 175–78, 217–18, 228, 230, 239
at Johnson’s literary salon, 33
leaves Langston out of her autobiography, 3, 231
leaves Westfield, New Jersey, 174, 185, 203
legacy of, 243–44
life before arriving in Harlem, 25–34
literary quarrel with Hughes, 3, 178–79, 190–218, 219, 230, 238
lives with sister in Asbury Park, New Jersey, 188–89
Locke and, 142–43, 207, 208, 209–10, 215, 222–23, 225, 226–27, 236, 238
loneliness of, 91
marriage to Price, 228
marriage to Sheen, 91–92, 100
Mason and, 83–84, 127–37, 142–48, 152, 157–62, 166–80, 183–84, 188–89, 194–96, 201–9, 215–17, 220–21, 225–26, 231–32, 235, 238–39, 244
minimization of African American resentment, 65, 67, 68–69
in Mobile, Alabama, 98, 103–7
on Negro storytellers, 67–68
in New Orleans, Louisiana, 141–42
in New York, New York, 21, 34, 52–53, 57–61, 128–34, 137, 140, 159, 166, 174
Nugent and, 77–78, 219–20
as only black student at Barnard College, 21
at Opportunity award ceremony, 10
photographs with Hughes, 113–14
plan to create artists’ colony, 143–44
playwriting and, 5–6, 161–67
politics and, 234, 235–36
portrayed in Hughes’s The Big Sea, 227–31
primitivism and, 153
profile of Hurst in Saturday Review of Literature, 60
publishes her first short story, 33
publishes in Opportunity, 33–34
racial injustice and, 64, 65, 66–70, 76
reads Hughes’s The Big Sea, 231
reception of, 90, 224
represented as Sweetie May Carr in Thurman’s Infants of the Spring, 221–22
scholarship to Barnard College, 21
sexual and emotional solitude of, 57
in the South, 157, 98–126, 227, 230
studies anthropology under Franz Boas at Columbia, 57–60
the supernatural and, 27–28
theater and, 137–38, 161–65
Thompson and, 158–59, 170, 175–78, 184–87, 196, 201–4, 210–12, 217–18, 225, 228, 234, 239
tools of, 140
Van Vechten and, 20–21, 54, 75–76, 186, 188, 194, 197, 200–201, 204, 224, 231–32, 237
vernacular prose of, 19
visions of, 27–28, 30, 128
Washington, D.C., 32–33
in Westfield, New Jersey, 159, 166, 174
wins prizes in Opportunity contest, 14–16
work featured in The New Negro, 17, 19
work in Fire!! 78
works on volumes about religion, 144
works for Fannie Hurst, 60–61
writes about Harlem for Pittsburgh Courier, 90
Hurston, Zora Neale, correspondence of
with Hughes, 91, 92, 135, 142–45, 148, 183, 195–98, 202–8, 213–16, 220, 236, 240–41
with Locke, 138
with Mason, 83–84, 185, 188, 202–3, 212, 215–17, 220–21, 226
with Van Vechten, 118
Hurston, Zora Neale, works of
“Art and Such,” 66
autobiography of (see Hurston, Zora Neale, works of, Dust Tracks on a Road)
“The Back Room,” 90–91
Barracoon, 106, 189, 224
“Black Death,” 16
“The Bone of Contention,” 162, 163, 164, 198
“The Characteristics of Negro Expression,” 71, 75, 136, 226, 244
Collected Plays, 192
Color Struck, 15, 78, 80, 193
“Crazy for This Democracy,” 67
“Cudjo’s Own Story of the Last African Slaver,” 106
“Dance Songs and Tales from the Bahamas,” 157
De Turkey and de Law, 192–94, 198, 217
“Drenched in Light,” 33–34
Dust Tracks on a Road, 3, 28, 30, 68, 91–92, 129, 133, 142, 159, 231, 235, 238, 240, 242
“The Eatonville Anthology,” 59–60, 164–65
The First One, 193
“The Gilded Six-Bits,” 243
The Great Day, 224
“Hoodoo in America,” 224
“How It Feels to Be Colored Me,” 64, 67, 70, 72–73, 147, 244
“The Inside Light—Being a Salute to Friendship,” 240, 241
“John Redding Goes to Sea,” 33
Jonah’s Gourd Vine, 30, 61, 102, 180, 224, 225, 235
Meet the Momma, 16, 192
The Mule-Bone (play), 3, 5–6, 16, 59, 163–67, 171, 174–75, 178, 183–89, 190–218, 220, 224–26, 230–32, 236–37
Mules and Men, 58, 67–68, 141, 142, 189, 190–92, 220, 224, 235, 236
“My Most Humiliating Jim Crow Experience,” 67
The Negro and His Songs, 147
Polk County, 194
“The Race Cannot Become Great Until It Recognizes Its Talents,” 64
“Seeing the World as It Is,” 242
Spears, 16, 193
“Spunk,” 14, 17
Spunk, 194
“Sweat,” 79, 80
Their Eyes Were Watching God, 4, 16, 59, 224, 226–27, 229, 242
“What White Publishers Won’t Print,” 67
Hutchinson, George, 18
identity, black arts and, 64
Imes, Elmer, 128
Immigration Act of 1924, 70
Inter-State Tattler, 154
Jackman, Harold, 47, 177
Jacksonville, Florida, 29, 220
jazz, 11, 54, 63, 65, 92
Jelliffe, Rowena, 192, 195, 199, 202, 208, 209–13, 218, 231
Jelliffe, Russell, 192, 195, 199, 202, 211–13, 218, 231
Jewish Americans, 15
Jim Crow laws, 67, 183
Jim Crow South, 148
John Reed Club, 183
Johnson, Charles Spurgeon, 8, 9, 11–13, 18, 23, 33, 34, 48, 75, 116, 219
Johnson, Georgia Douglas, 33
Johnson, Hall, 11, 89, 129
Johnson, Jack, 111
Johnson, James Weldon, 6, 9, 11–13, 18, 19, 48, 51, 75, 82, 89, 215, 243
Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, 12
The Book of American Negro Poetry, 12
at Fisk University, 219
funeral of, 227
in Harlem, 39–40
“Lift Every Voice and Sing,” 14
Johnson, J. Rosamond, 82
Jones Point, 42
Jook (collaborative opera), 136
Joplin, Scott, 61
Jordan, Larry, 165, 170
Journal of American Folklore, 224
Journal of Negro History, 49
Kaplan, Carla, 85, 86, 96, 153, 170, 171
Karamu House, 210
Karamu Theatre, 192, 200
Keck, Charles, 113
Kellogg, Paul, 18
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 107
Kinstler, Everett, 236
Knopf, Alfred A., 11, 93, 155, 189
Knopf, Blanche, 11
Knopf, Samuel, 93
Koestler, Arthur, 57
Krigwa Players, 164
Ku Klux Klan, resurgence of, 10
labor practices, unfair, 101
Lafayette Theater, 162
Langston, Carolyn. See Hughes, Carrie
Langston, Charles, 34–35
Langston, John Mercer, 35, 49
Langston, Lucy, 34
Langston, Mary, 35–36
Larsen, Nella, 128, 177, 180
Lawrence, Kansas, 24, 35–36
Leary, Sheridan, 35
Leslie, Lew, 138
Lewis, Cudjo, 98, 105–6, 113
Lewis, David Levering, 13, 54, 76, 180
Lewis, Sinclair, 75
liberation, literacy and, 43
The Liberator, 11–12
Lincoln, Abraham, 111
Lincoln, Illinois, 36
Lincoln University, 52, 81, 108, 125, 153–54
Lindsay, Vachel, 51–52
Lippincott, 224
literacy, abandonment of, 43
literary innovation, 78–79
literary models, independence from, 78–79
literary quarrel between Hughes and Hurston, 3, 178–79, 190–218, 219–37, 230, 238
Little Negro Theatre, 164
Little Theatre, 226
Liveright, Horace, 11
Locke, Alain, 5–6, 9–13, 17–19, 33, 45–49, 73–75, 80, 113, 129, 131–33, 135, 177, 188, 190, 242
on African American art, 88
“Art or Propaganda?,” 65
“Beauty Instead of Ashes,” 65
correspondence with Hughes, 140
exoticism and, 73
Hughes and, 153, 172, 178, 207, 213, 215, 217, 222, 238, 241
Hurston and, 138, 142–43, 207–10, 215, 222–23, 225–27, 236, 238
jealousy of, 210
Mason and, 88–90, 94–97, 146–47, 160, 181, 188, 201–2, 210, 215–16, 222–23, 233
The New Negro, 17–19, 94, 227
review of Fire!! 81
review of Hughes’s Fine Clothes to the Jew, 93
review of Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, 226–27
takes Hurston’s side in dispute over Mule Bone, 207, 208, 209–10, 215
Thompson and, 150, 187–88
Van Vechten and, 215
Louisiana, 101–2
love, 177
“low” culture, 64
Lucy (sworn enemy of Zora), 141
lynchings, 11, 69, 101, 102, 103
Macon, Georgia, 120, 121, 122, 123
magazines, black, 74. See also specific magazines
Maine, 61
Maitland, Florida, 25–26
Maran, René, 44
Marbury, Elizabeth, 216
Marbury agency, 216, 217
Marinoff, Fania, 81, 82, 121
Marshall, Thurgood, 52
Mason, Charlotte Osgood, 4, 5, 43, 62, 73, 83–90, 130, 190
account of Mule-Bone dispute, 209
African American culture and, 236
anti-Semitism and, 223–24
background of, 85
correspondence with Hughes, 170–74, 178–81, 182, 189, 213–14, 241
death of, 232–33
falling out with Hughes, 166–71, 176–83, 188, 189
Hughes and, 89, 94–97, 100, 109–12, 127–28, 131–48, 152–55, 158–61, 166–83, 188–89, 201–9, 212–17, 220–27, 231–32, 238–41, 244
Hurston and, 127–34, 135–48, 152, 157–62, 166–80, 183–84, 188–89, 194–96, 201–9, 212, 215–17, 220–21, 225–26, 231–32, 235–39, 244
Locke and, 88–90, 146–47, 160, 180, 188, 201–2, 210, 215, 222–23, 233
loses half her fortune on Black Tuesday, 154
McKay and, 146
mysticism and, 171
“The Passing of a Prophet,” 85
portrayed in Hughes’s The Ways of White Folks, 223–24
primitivism and, 85–86
, 131–32, 152, 153, 171
telepathic abilities of, 129
Thompson and, 150–52, 154, 160, 166–74, 175, 186–88, 201–2, 212
Mason, Rufus Osgood, 85
Matheus, John F., 13–14, 94
Matthias, Blanche, 84, 87
McKay, Claude, 11–12, 89, 137, 146, 154
Harlem Shadows, 12
Home to Harlem, 140
Negroes in America, 12
Memphis, Tennessee, 29
Mencken, H. L., 54, 74
The Messenger, 8, 51, 59–60, 74, 93
Mexico City, Mexico, 38
Meyer, Annie Nathan, 21, 59, 216
Meyerowitz, Jan, 233
Miami, Florida, 144
Micheaux, Oscar, 12
Millay, Edna St. Vincent, 79
Miller and Lyles, 11
Mills, Florence, 11, 48, 138
minstrelsy, 161–62, 163
Mississippi, 102
Mobile, Alabama, 98–99, 103–7, 136, 148, 194
modernism, 72
Montgomery, Alabama, 107
Moore, Marianne, 44
Morgan Academy, 31
Moylan, Pennsylvania, 184, 186
Ms. magazine, 243
Mtendaji, Imani, 119, 235
music, 14–15, 31, 48, 54, 63, 65, 78–79, 137
blues, 14–15, 54, 62, 63, 65, 68, 92, 120–21, 136–37
jazz, 11, 54, 63, 65, 92
musicals, 11, 16
opera, 61–62
spirituals, 54, 92
musicals, 11, 16
mysticism, 131–32, 171
NAACP, 8, 48, 52, 74, 76, 148, 183, 206
Nassau, Florida, 144
The Nation, 62–64
National Urban League, 8, 51
the Negro, vs. the Nordic, 70
Negro Digest, 67
Negro idiom, 63–64
Negrophilia, 71–72
“Negrotarians,” 53, 54
Negro World, 33
the Nest, 54
New Gayety, 233
New Masses, 183
The New Negro, 80
“New Negro,” 18
New Negro writers, 94
New Orleans, Louisiana, 102, 136, 141
New School for Social Research, 148
New World Cabaret, 54, 72–73
New York, New York, 52–54, 57, 82, 127, 128–34, 144, 153–54, 174, 217. See also Harlem, New York
black music scene in, 48
as epicenter of African American music and theater, 11
nightclubs in, 154
New York Age, 51, 93
New York Botanical Gardens, 7
Niagara Falls, 61
Nichols, Charles H., 4
“Niggerati,” 50–82, 90, 143, 221, 226, 229
“Niggerati Manor,” 51
nightclubs. See also specific nightclubs
nonpropaganda work, 64–65
the Nordic vs. the Negro, 70
North Carolina College for Negroes, 227
Notasulga, Alabama, 25, 113
Nugent, Bruce, 8–9, 17–19, 23, 33, 51–58, 72, 74, 80–82, 89–90, 131, 139, 143, 177, 231