Book: Voodoo in Haiti in the 1930s

Sometimes, things call to you. You keep getting signs and realize it's time to stop ignoring them and just give in. That's what happened to me with the writer Zora Neale Hurston. Hurston was born in 1891 in Eatonville, Florida and died in 1960 in Fort Pierce, Florida. In between those years, this African-American woman saw more, did more, than I can ever hope to do.

Reading is something that I really enjoy, and southern women writers have a special place in my heart. Their writing always seems to be a good combination of the mystical and practical. So, a year or so ago when my friend's girlfriend, an English teach in a local high school, told me her favorite author was Zora Neal Hurston, an African-American writer from the South, I was a bit taken aback. How had I never heard of her? She promised to lend me some books, but time when on and we forgot about it. Then, a few months ago, I opened my Facebook feed and front and center some nonprofit or other had a large quote from Zora Neale Hurston.

"There are years that ask questions and years that answer." 

A few days later a New York Times crossword puzzle clue had something to do with a southern writer "Zora _____ Huston." I thought, what is going on? I jumped over to Wikipedia and learned that Hurston had written a book about her travels to Haiti where she studied Voodoo. I knew then that it was time for me to discover Zora Neale Hurston.

A quick text to my friend's girlfriend - now my friend, resulted in her lending me three books: a novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, an autobiography Dust Tracks on the Road, and the nonfiction "Tell My Horse: Voodoo and Life in Haiti and Jamaica." I read the three books in that order and am so glad I did.

The novel was amazing, the autobiography was fantastic (in all sense of that word), and the look at Voodoo was fascinating. For purposes of the blog, I'm going to focus on Tell My Horse.

Hurston was in her 40's when she got the opportunity to travel to Jamaica and Haiti. She had been studying southern American culture- specifically African American stories and songs prior to that. This would have been in the mid 1920s and 1930s. Although she doesn't say it, you can tell that Hurston had some very good contacts before she went to Haiti. She seems immediately able to make connections with the most important practitioners of Voodoo. Make no mistake- Hurston had grown up impoverished, often unwanted, and black in a time when this country had no place for educated women of any color. Hurston was educated through her own perseverance, but in this instance, her color and education gave her an advantage. She seems to have been able to successfully mix with both the high society of Haiti as well as the uneducated and illiterate poor.

She spends about 2 years in Jamaica and Haiti meeting with Voodoo practitioners, attending their rituals, and even studying with one Voodoo houngan (priest). Tell My Horse sets out to give us an overview of the loa (Voodoo gods), details of the ceremonies she attended, captures the music and chants that she heard, and paints a picture of pre-WWII Haiti that is as colorful as it is chaotic.

At times, I got a little lost with the unfamiliar terminology, but her description of the ceremonies had me entranced. I wasn't sure if she was hallucinating or if she really saw such things as a dead man sitting up during one ceremony or her description of a secret cult ceremony that sacrificed people. Her observations on zombies is mind-boggling. There is a chapter on poisons too.

If you have a weak stomach for things like animal sacrifice, you're going to have to brace yourself to get through some of ceremonial descriptions. So many chickens were sacrificed it's no wonder people were poor.

Overall, I found this book fascinating. I'm always interested in how other cultures come to grips with death and Hurston's experience showed that Haitians held both life and death in high esteem. I'm recommending this book to anyone interested in rituals, mysticism, and the celebration of life and death.