Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God was published in 1937.
The novel explores the life of the protagonist Janie Mae Crawford and her experiences with marriage.
I have picked some of the best quotes from Their Eyes Were Watching God novel.
Table of Contents
Their Eyes Were Watching God Quotes by Zora Neale Hurston
“They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Love is like the sea. It’s a moving thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from the shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She knew now that marriage did not make love. Janie’s first dream was dead, so she became a woman.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“In the cool afternoon the fiend from hell specifically sent to lovers arrived at Janie’s ear. Doubt.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Her old thoughts were going to come in handy now, but new words would have to be made and said to fit them.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“But any man who walks in the way of power and property is bound to meet hate.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She was too busy feeling grief to dress like grief.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She tore off the kerchief from her head and let down her plentiful hair. The weight, the length, the glory was all there. She took careful stock of herself, then combed her hair and tied it back up again.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
Other Books Quotes: Gone with the Wind Quotes by Margaret Mitchell and A Clockwork Orange Quotes by Anthony Burgess
Quotes from Their Eyes Were Watching God
“You’se something tuh make uh man forgit to git old and forgit tuh die.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“And I can’t die easy thinking maybe the menfolks white or black is making a spit cup out of you. Have some sympathy for me. Put me down easy, Janie, I’m a cracked plate.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“The morning air was like a new dress. That made her feel the apron tied around her waist. She untied it and flung it on a low bush beside the road and walked on, picking flowers and making a bouquet… From now on until death she was going to have flower dust and springtime sprinkled over everything.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She wanted to struggle with life but it seemed to elude her.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Please God, please suh, don’t let him love nobody else but me. Maybe Ah’m is uh fool, Lawd, lak dey say, but Lawd, Ah been so lonesome, and Ah been waitin’, Jesus. Ah done waited uh long time.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Two things everybody’s got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“There are years that ask questions and years that answer.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She had waited all her life for something, and it had killed her when it found her.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
Best Their Eyes Were Watching God Quotes
“There is a basin in the mind where words float around on thought and thought on sound and sight. Then there is a depth of thought untouched by words, and deeper still a gulf of formless feelings untouched by thought.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Half Gods are worshipped with wine and Flowers. Real Gods require Blood.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“…she starched and ironed her face, forming it into just what people wanted to see…” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Love is lak de sea. It’s uh movin’ thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“The varicolored cloud dust that the sun has stirred up in the sky was settling by slow degrees.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Sometimes she stuck out into the future, imagining her life different from what is was.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Tea Cake, the son of the Evening Sun, had to die for loving her.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She had an inside and an outside now and suddenly she knew how not to mix them.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
Famous Quotes from Their Eyes Were Watching God
“If you kin see de light at daybreak, you don’t keer if you die at dusk. It’s so many people never seen de light at all.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“It was the meanest moment of eternity.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Some people could look at a mud puddle and see an ocean with ships.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“He was the average mortal. It troubled him to get used to the world one way and then suddenly have it turn different.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“No hour is ever eternity, but it has its right to weep.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“It was not death she feared. It was misunderstanding.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“The sun was gone, but he had left his footprints in the sky. It was the time for sitting on porches beside the road.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Honey, de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able tuh find out. Maybe it’s some place way off in de ocean where de black man is in power, but we don’t know nothin’ but what we see.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She stood there until something fell off the shelf inside her.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Look lak she been livin’ through uh hundred years in January without one day of spring.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She didn’t read books so she didn’t know that she was the world and the heavens boiled down to a drop.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“She was saving up feelings for some man she had never seen.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“He looked like the love thoughts of women.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“It was funny if you looked at it right quick, but it got pitiful if you thought about it awhile.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Janie looked down on him and felt a self-crushing love. So her soul crawled out from its hiding place.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“All gods who receive homage are cruel. All gods dispense suffering without reason. Otherwise they would not be worshipped. Through indiscriminate suffering men know fear and fear is the most divine emotion. It is the stones for altars and the beginning of wisdom. Half gods are worshipped in wine and flowers. Real gods require blood.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“Oh to be a pear tree – any tree in bloom! With kissing bees singing of the beginning of the world!” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
“There is two things everybody got to find out for their selves. They got to find out about love and they got to find out about living.” ~ Zora Neale Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God).
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