Zora Neale Hursto Silence

Silent people appear to be hiding characteristics about themselves through their quietness. When a person, specifically a woman, is silent, it is perplexing. Her silence is strange and worrisome to the people who care for her. To a reader, one may compare a female character’s silence to a loud noise. It calls for questions to be raised. No one questions why someone is loud; it is only when one becomes silent that people are concerned. In the translated Romance “Silence” by Sarah Roche-Mahdi and the novel “Their Eyes were watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston, the struggle that the main characters deal with is shown throughout their silence. It distances the characters, Silentius and Janie, from the real world by having to hide who they are as
Nature takes time to “assemble[s] more beauty/ than a thousand of the most beautiful girls possess” (II.1182-1883 p. 89). Although Silentius is genotypically a female, her beauty as a female does not escape once she portrays her life as a male. Her beauty entices the wife of King Evan, Eufeme. The outward appearance of Silentius is intriguing. For Eufeme, she “pretended that she couldn’t eat/ that she couldn’t stand the least bit of noise/ or bare anyone come near her—except the harper” (IV. 3732-3735 p. 189). The way Eufeme acts towards Silentius is a characteristic of how one in love feels. To the reader, the lust after Silentius that Eufeme has is dramatic irony, as the reader knows what the identity of Silentius is behind closed doors. The harper, being Silentius, was not interested in the admiration of Eufeme because she is a female and is interested in
Nurture in the Romance plays apart of the most important relationship that Silentius experiences. This relationship tears Silentius apart. Is the role of Nature going to prevail? Alternatively, are the surroundings of the environment providing the nurturing hand in constructing the progeny of Cador and Eufemie, specifically? When Cador and Eufemie decide to portray Silentius as a man, Nature steps in and says, “[t] here are a thousand people who think I' m stingy/ because of the beauty I stuffed you with” (11.2509-2510 p. 119). Cador and Eufemie making Silentius portray herself as a man is a mark of unsatisfaction to Nature who took precious time to create a beautiful work of art. Her true beauty as a woman in hidden just as that of Ms. Janie