'Sweat' by Zora Neal Hurston and Religion Essay

Perhaps the most important event in the story occurs when Sykes brings home a huge six-foot living snake. Fear once again overcomes Delia and she pleads, “Syke! Syke, mah Gawd! You take dat rattlesnake ‘way from heah! You gottuh. Oh, Jesus, have mussy” (360). Sykes, on the other hand, stands in amusement almost as if he loves to see Delia psychologically abused. His cockiness unravels as he acts like he is invincible and like anyone and anything should and will comply with him. In regards to the enormous snake, Sykes boasts, “…He wouldn’t bite me cause Ah knows how tuh handel ‘im” (360). He makes sure to instill fear into Delia by telling her to be careful because the snake would have no problem coming after her. Hurston also has Sykes portray his own death. In this same scene, Sykes’ reply to

After this incident, she received rejection after rejection. Near the end of her life, Zora Neale Hurston suffered from, “overweight, hypertension, poor diet, gallbladder trouble, ulcers, and various stomach ailments”(Carson 3). She had a stroke and according to Warren J. Carson, she “was placed in the Saint Lucie County welfare home, where, alone and penniless, she died on January 28, 1960”(3). She is now buried an in unmarked grave. Clearly, Hurston struggled in life, but through leaning on God and her faith, she pushed through the tough times. Hurston is now recognized as a distinguished author, and was able to overcome her hardships just like Delia.

Missie May was slowly regaining the position she once held in the relationship. In "Sweat," the power dynamics started off a bit differently. Sykes seem to have all the power in the household, as he did come and go as he pleased and beat Delia considerably. Hurston begins "Sweat" by illustrating Sykes' dominance over Delia. Delia is in a submissive position on her knees while Sykes is towering over with a whip. Delia is frightened because she believes the whip to be a snake. The whip is described as "something long, round, limp, and black"(Sweat 1491) which creates the illusion of a penis. Delia's feeling for the one-eyed snake, the whip, equates to her sexual desires to Sykes. But throughout the story, time and time again, Delia attempts to grasp some power. When her house becomes threatened, she stands up to Sykes. This is such a surprise to him that he doesn't beat her as he usually would, he instead leaves. The story does leave one wondering how much power Sykes really has in the town. He parades around town with his mistress. He beats on his wife and tries to woo every woman he sees. These are all points brought up by the townspeople themselves as they complain about him. They even talk about killing the man, but they continur to remain at a distance and watch everything he does. Can one really argue that Sykes isn't powerful in a town that allows him to do whatever he wants? But this power is, indeed,

     As she lies on her bed, Delia gains a moment of comfort, and a getaway from her great disdain. She is able to create a spiritual barrier from the mistreatments she receives from her unscrupulous husband. The bed is her Eden, her only resource for relaxation and a content being. Even the hamper in the bedroom is the only group of clothing that is considered neat and tidy, representing the cleanliness of the room. Everywhere else in the house, Sykes would step on and trample over the clothing Delia had to clean. He had no respect for his wife and her work. The bedroom used to be the only place that hadn’t been defiled by Sykes, until he slept with Bertha in it. Knowing of this travesty brings Delia over the edge.

Sykes personality is totally different than Delia’s. Sykes Jones is physically and emotionally cruel to Delia. He is immoral and unfaithful; furthermore he takes the money that is earned from Delia's tough labor and squanders it away on his mistress, Bertha. Whereas Sykes may be strong in body, he does not have any belief in God. Sykes in a sense can be compared to the devil because like the devil he drained Delia of her beauty, joy and happiness that she once possessed. This point is brought up in the story when Joe Clarke and the village men are talking about Delia and Sykes ” …But dey squeeze an’ grind an’ wring every drop uh pleasure dat’s in ‘em out” (443). According to Davis Masson, who wrote, Essays Biographical and Critical “All sadness and melancholy come from the devil” (86). Once their marriage starts to fall apart, Sykes uses Delia’s anxiety of snakes against her. Andre’ Ménez, who wrote The Subtle Beast, states, “Being sometimes poisonous, hidden in the shadows; slowly and mutely guiding, snakes have often been deemed powerful and shifty, evil creatures whose major aim was to frustrate the natural and proper development of life” (9).

Delia represents the good in the story. She remains calm, level-headed, and spiritually in tune despite her husband‘s determination to make her miserable. Once a "right pretty li'l trick," Delia is now worn and dried out like sugar cane that's been chewed to no end (“Sweat” 43). However her soul remains strong as she turns to her spirituality for comfort and hope. She has smarts although uneducated and the fact that she built her own house and now supports her and her husband by washing white

Above all the evilness from Sykes, Delia’s strength lies in her religion and her humility towards her husband, in the end, victorious over his brutal strength and attitude. In the beginning of the story, Delia was very tolerant of her husband’s pranks and malicious threats. Being strong towards her religion, she would still attend church every Sunday and pray every night before she goes to bed. Towards the end of the story, Delia’s tolerance towards Syke’s actions begins to change and she becomes more aggressive towards him. She starts talking back to him and draws an iron skillet and strikes a defensive pose, which Sykes is in shock, coming from her. Also towards the end of the story, Sykes lets loose a poisonous snake knowing Delia is afraid of them. Delia then sees the snake in her basket and leaves it loose for Sykes. At the end, thanks to karma, the snake bites Sykes on the neck and Delia refused to help while he is dying.

Not only does he drain her financially, but he has also abused her mentally and emotionally for the most of their marriage. Delia reminds Sykes that all she does is "Sweat, sweat, sweat! Work and Sweat, cry and sweat, pray and sweat!" from the fifteen years she has been washing laundry and laments (Hurston 278). However, despite all the cruelty that is happening, the author still portrays her persona with great compassion. Delia has enormous love, but soon discovers that she has the capacity to hate as much as she loves which has developed from her long-suffering life with Sykes. The author creates Delia based off her own life of being a Christian woman, therefore, in the story "Sykes is clearly wrong throughout the story, and Delia is right in living out the principles of Christian love, tolerance, and humility" (Banks). The importance of this quote is that it puts Delia's character into perspective and reveals why the way she is. The author's beliefs and practices are demonstrated through Delia and explain her actions in the story.

Delia was physically abused many times by her husband, Sykes. He was also mentally and verbally abusive to her by calling her names and constantly teasing her. This can be seen when he pretends to scare Delia with a snake, and then calls her names for being scared. In Zora’s life, this is seen where she also grew up as an abused child from her father. Her father did not like her very much because her sassy attitude. He said that she “was too spirited and too mouthy for her own good” which hurt her feelings and made her very aware that she was not his favorite child in the family (Boyd 27). Her father would also physically abuse her by threatening and spanking her as a child. In the story, Sykes represents Zora’s father because they were both abusive towards women. Zora included this detail in her story to explain her life as a child. The story is put in the perspective of a grown woman who had been abused, but how she would feel the same pain a child would feel who had been abused. No matter the person’s age, anyone

Weeks later Delia comes home to find Sykes already there, standing in the doorway. As she attempts to walk through the door,

In “Sweat”, Hurston’s use of Sykes’s evil qualities illustrates the actions and the personality of the character Sykes. For example, Sykes has kicked the clothes around the ground because Delia refuses to stop cleaning white men’s clothes and kept working. Hurston’s description of how Sykes is threatening Delia as “Next time, Ah’m gointer kick’em outdoor!,” foregrounding his intimidation (Hurston 517). Snakes were known for being demanding to get what they want and Sykes used a ruthless tactic to hope that Delia would do what he wanted. Also, another illustration of his wicked qualities is shown when Merchant talks to the village men about Sykes seducing his wife with a basket of pecans. The description is described as “He's allus been crazy 'bout fat women, put in Merchant. He'd a' been tied up wid one long time ago if he could a' found one tub have him. Did Ah tell yuh 'bout him come sidlin' roun' mah wife-bringin' her a basket uh pee-cans outa his yard fuh a present? Yessir, mah wife! She tol' him tub take 'em right straight back home, cause Delia works so hard ovah dat washtub she reckon everything on de place taste lak sweat an' soapsuds. Ah jus' wisht Ah'd a' caught 'im 'roun' dere! Ah'd a' made his hips ketch on fiah down dat shell road,” emphasizes this fact (Hurston 519). The author makes use of Sykes’s womanizing ways to show that he tries to win the affection of Merchant’s wife instead of taking the pecans to Delia. His relationship is indifferent when it comes to romance toward Delia, which often

The snake in the story symbolizes evil which portrays domestic violence. Sykes tried getting rid of Delia so he could go and be with Bertha, his mistress. He knew how afraid Delia was of snakes so he decided to bring one home. “Then, moved by both horror and terror, she sprang back toward the door. There lay the snake in the basket!” (Hurston 8). He really wanted the snake to bite Delia so he could get rid of her. Leaving the snake in the basket where he knew was the easiest place for it to bite her. Sykes knew that the snake would bite her. He was pure evil. The snake however did not bite Delia but it bit Sykes. “He crept an inch or two toward

“Sweat” by Zora Neale Hurston, is a short story that takes place in Florida. The story tells the life of a hard-working wash woman named Delia, who’s the protagonist and her abusive worthless husband Sykes who’s the antagonist. The story shows how Sykes takes pride in living off of his wife’s work and the way he mistreats her, which causes for Delia to stand up for herself and morph her into a different woman that isn’t the humble and timid person Sykes married. “Sweat” is a good title for the story because the author makes use of several connotations of the word and brings these definitions and ideas together to suggest the many conflicts of the story as well as its troubling ending.

Delia’s religion helps her to overcome the challenges that she went through. Zora Neale Hurston made a Biblical reference in her style of writing in “Sweat,” where it displays a connection between Adam and Eve when the snake bites Sykes. Sykes was used as a metaphor “for the evil who the Satan associated with sin” (Carter). Unlike Delia, she has always been a positive and

Delia decides to defend herself from her husband’s cruelty, this happens not once but twice. The first time is when Sykes steps on Delia’s white laundry that she needs to finish for her work. Moreover Sykes threatens to beat her, but Delia’s usual “meekness” started to slip away at that moment, she was finally done with his antics. She grabbed an iron skillet ready for a fight and challenged “Naw you won’t […] You aint paid for nothin' on this place, and Ah'm gointer stay right heah till Ah'm toted out foot foremost.”(Hurston 2). The second time was when Sykes told her he was keeping the snake. She maintained her composure, stood her ground and spoke her mind, “Ah hates you, Sykes” (Hurston 6). In addition to stating her hatred toward him