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It is so easy to be hopeful in the daytime when you can see the things you wish on. But it was night, it stayed night. Night was striding across nothingness with the whole round world in his hands . . . They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against cruel walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God.
Zora Neale Hurston
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Interpretation

What this quote means

The quote reflects on the contrast between hope in the light and despair in darkness, emphasizing a struggle to find faith and meaning.

Zora Neale Hurston’s quote explores the theme of hope and despair, capturing the human condition of yearning for faith even in moments of darkness. It suggests that while hope may be more accessible during the day, it becomes a profound challenge at night, where doubt and despair can take over. The imagery of night and darkness symbolizes an existential struggle, yet the act of watching God signifies an enduring quest for meaning and divine connection despite despair.

Themes

HopeDarknessStruggleFaithExistence

In practice

Example use cases

This quote could be used in a discussion about resilience during tough times.

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It seems that fighting is a game where everybody is the loser.
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Lack of power and opportunity passes off too often for virtue.
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From barren brown stems to glistening leaf-buds; from the leaf-buds to snowy virginity of bloom…It was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again. What? How? Why? This singing she heard that had nothing to do with her ears. The rose of the world was breathing out smell. It followed her through all her waking moments and caressed her in her sleep.
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Someone is always at my elbow reminding me that I am the granddaughter of slaves. It fails to register depression with me.
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Don't you realize that the sea is the home of water? All water is off on a journey unless it's in the sea, and it's homesick, and bound to make its way home someday.
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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.
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