The Harlem Renaissance of the 1920's is a great time for black artists; it is a rebirth of art, music, books and poetry. In Zora Neale Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God Janie, the protagonist, is treated kindly for a black women. She does not go through the torment of black culture during that era or the previous eras. Throughout the book Hurston "fibs" about racial oppression. Janie gets respect by the white people she encounters. Hurston makes the reader imagine that African-American life is easygoing. Richard Write's critique of Their Eyes Were Watching God is accurate and therefore, the book should not be included in the Harlem Renaissance.
             Hurston breaks several of the themes of the Harlem Renaissance. One in particular is to make other Americans aware of the African-American experience. Richard Write states, "Their eyes, as a novel, exploits those quaint aspects of Negro life that satisfied the tastes of a white audience. It did for literature what the minstrel show did for theater, that is, made white folks laugh"(1). Write, as a critic, fulfills his duty to critique literature truthfully. In Hurston's novel she rarely states anything about the reality of the South at that time. '"Brothers and sisters, since us can't never expect tuh better our choice, Ah move dat we make Brother Starks our Mayor until we can see further"'(40). In this passage Hurston uses a soft pleasant type of diction. In that south at the time, people were not accepted into towns if they were new to the area. Jody, Janie's second husband, takes charge and becomes the mayor. The people in the novel respect Jodie and Janie. Being a black man and also the mayor seems a little strange for the South. Most white people of the South dislike black people because most black people are thought to be only "slaves" even though slavery was abolished. Towards t...