I was Looking through this book--from an essay in 1937 by Richard Wright, "Blueprint for Negro Writing." "Negro writing in the past has been confined to humble novels, poems and plays, prim and decorous ambassadors who went a-beggin' to White America." Previous to 1937. Do you agree with that appraisal?

Ah, no. (Laughs) But at the same time, I can understand where Richard Wright is coming from. And, one of the people that he's writing against is Zora Neale Hurston. And it becomes quite interesting because I've studied both of them. And I wound up doing a seminar, in which we did Zora Neale Hurston and Richard Wright. And it was absolutely fascinating, because you finally see that they're not really coming from, although their approach is quite different.

And in a way, one could say that Zora Neale Hurston writes in what has become the African American women's literary tradition. And Richard Wright is very much writing out of the African American male tradition.

Well, he's, yeah. One of the people that he would be directing this to would be Zora Neale Hurston, who he felt, sort of, was pandering to Whites. His intention, particularly with "Native Son," but even you see somewhat before, with, "Uncle Tom's," "Children," is social protest, in essence. That, it, that you write, writing is a weapon. That you use to achieve, freedom from oppression.

Zora Neale Hurston, I would say, also sees writing as a weapon, but wouldn't categorize it in that same way. And, wherein her interest, like the interests of many African American women writers, is, personal. In other words, one approaches things through the personal. You have, Richard Wright looking more at the system.

And, in fact, you'd asked me a question when we were talking on the telephone, in terms of why is there so much interest in, Black women writers. And actually, in that book, that you have, Reading Black, Reading Feminist, there's a wonderful quote, that's sort of excerpted from something Toni Morrison said.

And it talks about how Black men are writing, in a sense, against the oppressor. And, in essence, measuring themselves through the White male. And it talks about Black women not being connected, through either their gender or their sex, to, in a sense, the White male as the center, who are free to write about other things.

Well, there's a very interesting book, a literary history book, called Written by Herself, by Frances Smith Foster. And she does an excellent job, beginning, I think, in 1742, and sort of tracing, at least the beginnings of the tradition that Hurston is coming out of. So as early as, or instance, 1742, you have Lucy Terry, who writes this poem, "Mars Fight," which is probably the first poem, that we have extant, by African American woman writer, who was a slave. And of course there's Phillis Wheatley

Now, the tradition that I think Frances Smith Foster, sort of looks at--and she uses the phrase, "testifying and testing"--that, in essence, you have, these early African American women writers, testifying to their own experiences, and the uniqueness of their experience because of race, sex and class.

And at the same time, you have them, in a sense, testing the language, the language's ability to be able, through both their writing, to perhaps make changes. In other words, so there is a type of social protest, that's going along at all points. Which is something, I think, Richard Wright missed. Because they may approach it in a more personal level. So they're, in a sense, testing the language to be able to represent their stories, and also bring about change.

It's this tradition that I would say that Zora Neale Hurston is very much in. Not only, is she testifying to, in essence, the experience of the Black woman in America, but at the same time she tests the language. Their Eyes Were Watching God, which is perhaps her, most well known, novel, although she wrote six, is, what she's doing with language. And with the blues and the kind of signifying, and rhetorical devices that she uses to, in essence, show that Blacks are equal to Whites.

I mean, her approach is through language, not, in, not, like Richard Wright, through, necessarily, content. Although one would say that the content also is very much, a feminist concept. So, in other words, there's also the, the protest there, too.

Well, it's not in the sense of what she's doing. I mean, there are, you know, Langston Hughes is also, in a sense, going back to, indigenous, peoples and, and, and folk language and so forth. And Zora Neale Hurston is certainly doing this. The difference, perhaps, between Langston Hughes and what Zora Neale Hurston is doing is that she's also coming from the position of an anthropologist. So she's in many ways, documenting, and attempting to save and preserve, the language in somewhat different ways.