Summary Of Seraph On The Suwanee

The opening of Seraph on the Suwanee by Zora Neale Hurston is abundantly filled with literary techniques that give the town, Sawley, a dull and mundane image. The citizens living in this town are also described through the use of imagery, diction, and point of view as absentminded and heedless.
Hurston paints the picture of Sawley starting with the geographic location. The town “flanked” amongst the quaint Suwanee River is described to have “primitive” forests. She further elaborates on the town by describing the plants as “scratchy,” giving off the feeling that they are a nuisance. Here the citizens are being described as devoted to lumber and turpentine. Hurston goes deeper into the imagery by giving the audience a comparison of the tree and the people. This gives the trees a sense of personification because there is no possible way of a person looking like a tree. Imagery gives the audience a perfect visualization of Sawley and its inhabitants.
The beginning of the second paragraph starts with the word “However,” meaning there is contrast in views. The first paragraph uses words like “famous” and “primitive” to give a lighter tone, but the second paragraph uses darker and harsher words such as “scratchy” and “poverty.” The word “streamed” shows how much Sawley functioned off the sawmill and how much the citizens depended on it. Deeper into the passage, the choice of the words “horseless carriage” shows the emphasis of the roads of the nations. Without the creation of those roads, the “horseless carriage” would not have been successful. In line 40, the simply two words “nobody cared” shows the true feelings of the Sawley