# Zora Neale Hurston's best quotes (with the book they come from)

"Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board", "There are years that ask questions and years that answer" and "jump at de sun": the most quoted lines by Zora Neale Hurston, from Their Eyes Were Watching God to her autobiography Dust Tracks on a Road.

- 64 votes · 13 items
- May 2, 2022 · roamer_lost
- https://even.best/en/l/5186/zora-neale-hurston-s-best-quotes-with-the-book-they-come-from

## Top 13

1. **Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches.** (6 · ▲6 ▼0) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 2.
2. **Love is lak de sea. It's uh movin' thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it's different with every shore.** (5 · ▲7 ▼2) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 20.
3. **There are years that ask questions and years that answer.** (5 · ▲5 ▼0) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 3.
4. **Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves.** (4 · ▲4 ▼0) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 20.
5. **If you haven't got it, you can't show it. If you have got it, you can't hide it.** (3 · ▲5 ▼2) — Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), chapter 12, "My People! My People!".
6. **You got tuh go there tuh know there.** (3 · ▲4 ▼1) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 20.
7. **I am not tragically colored.** (3 · ▲4 ▼1) — Essay "How It Feels to Be Colored Me" (1928).
8. **Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.** (2 · ▲3 ▼1) — Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), chapter 10, "Research".
9. **Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to "jump at de sun." We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.** (2 · ▲2 ▼0) — Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), chapter 2, "My Folks".
10. **Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board.** (1 · ▲3 ▼2) — Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), chapter 1.
11. **Gods always behave like the people who make them.** (1 · ▲3 ▼2) — Tell My Horse (1938), chapter 15.
12. **Love, I find, is like singing. Everybody can do enough to satisfy themselves, though it may not impress the neighbors as being very much.** (0 · ▲1 ▼1) — Dust Tracks on a Road (1942), chapter 14, "Love".
13. **Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me.** (-1 · ▲2 ▼3) — Essay "How It Feels to Be Colored Me" (1928).

How is this ranking ordered? By people's votes: each ▲ adds a point and each ▼ takes one away. Anyone can vote and add what is missing.