TONI MORRISON AND ZORA NEALE HURSTON
             Imagine two strong and courageous African-American women who searched to find their own voice and uncovered a gift for being remarkable writers. These two women are the one and only Toni Morrison and Zora Neale Hurston. Both women were successful at what they did and overcame the obstacles that stood in their way. These women not only wrote literature, but also helped to make it what it is today. Both Toni Morrison and Zora Neale Hurston had unprecedented achievement for black American women writers.
             "I have never lived an easy life, but struggled on to achieve my ideas." These words, written by Zora Neale Hurston summarize both her life and career as a writer (Witcover 7). Zora Neale Hurston was born in the small town of Notasulga, Alabama on January 7, 1891. She was the fifth of eight children in her family. Her father was a carpenter, sharecropper, and a Baptist preacher; and her mother was a former schoolteacher (Yannuzzi 3). Within a year of Zora's birth, her family moved to Eatonville, Florida, which is known as the first incorporated black municipality in the U.S. When Zora was just thirteen years old, her mother died and she was sent to care for her brother's children by her father (Yannuzzi 19). At the age of sixteen, she became a member of a traveling theater and also began to work for a white household. The woman Zora worked for arranged for her to attend high school at Morgan Academy where she graduated from in June of 1918 in Baltimore. After graduatio!
             n, Zora enrolled in Howard Prep School to prepare for Howard University (Witcover 36). She spent four years at Howard University and graduated only with a two-year associate's degree (Witcover 54). It was during this time that Zora began to publish her first stories. The early 1920's marked the beginning of Zora Neale Hurston's career as an author.
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