Mule Bone

by Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, George Houston Bass

Mule Bone is the only collaboration between Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes, two stars of the Harlem Renaissance, and it holds an unparalleled place in the annals of African-American theater. Set in Eatonville, Florida--Hurston's hometown and the inspiration for much of her fiction--this energetic and often farcical play centers on Jim and Dave, a two-man song-and-dance team, and Daisy, the woman who comes between them. Overcome by jealousy, Jim hits Dave with a mule bone and hilarity follows chaos as the town splits into two factions: the Methodists, who want to pardon Jim; and the Baptists, who wish to banish him for his crime.

Included in this edition is the fascinating account of the Mule Bone copyright dispute between Hurston and Hughes that ended their friendship and prevented the play from being performed until its debut production at the Lincoln Center Theater in New York City in 1991--sixty years after it was written. Also included is "The Bone of Contention," Hurston's short story on which the play was based; personal and often heated correspondence between the authors; and critical essays that illuminate the play and the dazzling period that came to be known as the Harlem Renaissance.

Genres: Plays, Classics, Drama, African American, Fiction, Theatre, American

320 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1930

About the author

Novels, including Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937), and nonfiction writings of American folklorist Zora Neale Hurston give detailed accounts of African American life in the South.

In 1925, Hurston, one of the leaders of the literary renaissance, happening in Harlem, produced the short-lived literary magazine Fire!! alongside Langston Hughes and Wallace Thurman shortly before she entered Barnard College. This literary movement developed into the Harlem renaissance.

Hurston applied her Barnard ethnographic training to document African American folklore in her critically acclaimed book Mules and Men alongside fiction Their Eyes Were Watching God . She also assembled a folk-based performance dance group that recreated her Southern tableau with one performance on Broadway.

People awarded a Guggenheim fellowship to Hurston to travel to Haiti and conduct research on conjure in 1937. Her significant work ably broke into the secret societies and exposed their use of drugs to create the Vodun trance, also a subject of study for fellow dancer-anthropologist Katherine Dunham, then at the University of Chicago.

In 1954, the Pittsburgh Courier assigned Hurston, unable to sell her fiction, to cover the small-town murder trial of Ruby McCollum, the prosperous black wife of the local lottery racketeer, who had killed a racist white doctor. Hurston also contributed to Woman in the Suwanee County Jail , a book by journalist and civil rights advocate William Bradford Huie.

Reviews

[Jan Priddy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mule Bone by Zora Neale Huston. (screw alphabetical order)

I find it interesting that Langston Hughes receives first billing for this play. In fact, as I write this review only his name shows on my screen as author. There was an enormous fight over authorship, and Hurston and Hughes agreed that it would never be performed during either of their lifetimes. And then it was rediscovered after both had died.

By the time I finally read this disputed play by Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Huston, I had already read several other plays by Hughes (and his poetry, of course) and the short story by Hurston that provided the base for the play as well as several books by her. I had read about the lives of these two great American authors in their memoirs and other sources, so knew the play existed long before it was available. Then it was, and I read the play.

This is my conclusion about The Mule Bone: Hurston had not written drama before but Hughes had written at least one incredibly powerful short drama and several other plays (mostly all set in NY, but including a terrible play set in the south); it was inspired by Hurston's story and that story provides the plot; the dialogue is clearly hers since Hughes could never get southern dialect right; the play has her sense of humor since, again, Hughes' plays didn't have that sort of humor, and therefore it is her play. I see not a scrap of Hughes in it. Maybe he helped carry in some heavy objects to be placed upon the stage, but it's her play.

Go read his work and hers and see for yourself. And then appreciate that both authors wrote better.

[Bill on GR Sabbatical · Rating 3 out of 5]

Guitarist Jim Weston and dancer Dave Carter have been best friends as long as they can remember and they make a living entertaining white audiences in the area around Eatonville, Florida. The flirtatious Daisy Taylor comes between them, leading Jim to clobber Dave over the head with a mule bone, knocking him out. A trial splits the town between Methodists, Jim's church, and Baptists, Dave's, and leads to the denouement among the three.

Over this skeletal plot, Harlem Renaissance giants Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes fleshed out a colorful script of dialect, in the process ending their friendship over authorship and control issues. A production by the Gilpin Players in Cleveland in 1931 was called off over the conflict and it was never performed until a 1991 Broadway production, which received mixed reviews.

The Kindle edition I started with didn't include Act Three, but I read it from a Project Gutenberg online edition. Neither included the trial referenced in the Wikipedia plot summary, so I suspect there's another edition out there.

[Raymond · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Dis ain't no trial. Dis is a mess!" -Methodist Sister

Mule Bone is a comedy and a tragedy all in one book. The book is divided in three parts: 1. "The Bone of Contention" by Zora Neale Hurston, the short story that the play is based on, 2. Mule Bone by Zora and Langston, and 3. The Mule Bone Controversy, a collection of retrospectives and correspondence between and about Zora and Langston's falling out as result of the play. The play, Mule Bone, was a comedy about two close friends Jim and Dave who are always together and also play in a band. Their friendship is peaceful until a woman that they both like, Daisy, causes them to split. They get so jealous of each other that Jim hits Dave over the head with a mule bone and is brought to trial for his assault on Dave. The play's ending is not tragic but the real life story of the authors of this play is. The third part of the book which will probably interest readers more than the play itself is also about a friendship that breaks up because of a variety of reasons. The editors who compiled these documents did a good job so that it doesn't seem to my mind that one person is more to blame than the other. You will learn that Zora and Langston's fight was alot more complicated than Jim and Dave's dispute. As I read, I kept forgetting the events were already in the past, because I was holding out hope that they would somehow resolve their differences, they tried multiple times but it was not to be. Zora and Langston's split was certainly a mess and unfortunately it tanked a play that could have open alot of theater doors for Black people in the 1930s and beyond.

[Becky]

I liked the play a lot.
I found this review to be really interesting and I think she sums up my own feelings pretty well: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Both authors have written some amazing stuff, and I enjoyed this, but there's a lot of baggage around the play.

[Illiterate · Rating 2 out of 5]

The lively repartee enlivens this otherwise dull play.

[Julia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This play was written and copyrighted in 1931, but not published until 1991, it was based on a short story by Hurston, “The Bone of Contention.” The story and the language, written in the southern dialect of her better known novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, and the folklore she collected as an ethnologist working under Franz Boas. This play has only rarely been produced. Hughes and Hurston wanted to write it, in part, as a reaction to Shuffle Along: The 1921 Broadway Musical: Complete Libretto, Porgy and other plays of its time, written by whites, about the black experience. After writing the play, Hurston and Hughes fell out. Based on the letters they wrote to others and the timeline in this volume, their wealthy white patron seems to have been the real culprit of their rift. I would love to see this play! Although, I’d prefer the play included some of why we haven’t seen the play before. I bought this used, somewhere, somewhen. Read Harder Challenge 2017 #7, Published 1900- 1950.

[Octavia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mule Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life lives up to its title by two of the greatest names in literary history, Ms. Zora Neale Hurston and Mr. Langston Hughes. It's actually very hard to even write this review because this movel sparked so many different emotions for me. Any reader that has read several books from these authors should be able to discern which author this work belonged by the dialect, etc. I knew exactly when I saw the word, AKIMBO!! It brought back a huge smile on my face just as it did every time I read it; laughing in Ms. Hurston's novel called Jonah's Gourd Vine 😊 . And, I do agree also.. this is a True tragedy as well. It was very interesting to learn of everything transpired between Ms. Hurston and Mr. Hughes, at the time. The same people that left Poweful Legacy for so many Generations. But, I have to add that I became so emotional while reading about their Differences, etc that I began to tear up..Also, thinking of how her Life ended so sadly,. After all the those years of writing, Ms. Zora Neale Hurston passed away in1960. And, For 12 years, her remains were placed in an unmarked grave until author Alice Walker located her grave. And, created a marker for her. Continue to Rest Peacefully. We Pay Homage to You Both, With LOVE 💫 The World still ADORES YOUR MARVELOUS WORK..

[Justin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not sure what to make of it. To judge it as a comedy, it's not that funny. It's a lot of playing the dozens and ribbing and it's kind of fun in a way, but not something where you leave saying, "wasn't that hilarious when that guy said the girl smelled bad for the fifth time?" Then, if you try to take it as anything more serious, it just leaves you disappointed. Like, was the titular mule bone a metaphor for something? If so, it's so underdeveloped as to be meaningless. The only thing I though had some resonance was the lack of separation between church and state (although again underdeveloped to the point of being demonstration rather than commentary) and this idea that the law is inherently antithetical to any notion of Black life (again, too underdeveloped to really say anything about). Maybe as a corollary to that final point you could also say something about how the scope of the law is limited, but there's not really any higher sense of justice to contrast.
Not really providing any positive value, the play then risks reproducing certain negative characteristics, namely racism and sexism. You could definitely read this play through a racist lens where you are laughing at the Black people for acting foolishly throughout, almost to the point of minstrelsy. The central premise of two guys fighting over a woman also conveys tropes of women being agentless prizes to be won. And then it ends with the two central characters both agreeing that they don't want to do any work and instead just want to sing and dance--another minstrel stereotype.
In the end, the best I can say is that it seems like there's a lot of squandered potential here, although I'm also not entirely certain what the "good" version of this play looks like.

[Rogue Reader · Rating 4 out of 5]

I find it curious and ironic that Goodreads lists only the first author of Mule Bone, as the authorship of the work is a riveting and divisive break between two superb African American writers - Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes. The editors, George Houston Bass and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. do a good job of pulling in the secondary and critical writings that describe and analyze the dispute. A good account too of sugar mama sponsorship, which must have been both painful and welcome during the depression. Loved the dialect, loved the personal and intimate depiction of everyday life and sorry that the play was buried for so long. I wonder where it's been performed and how it's been directed.

[Izy Carney · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reaaaally interesting account of the fallout between Hughes and Hurston with lots of source materials included like the play itself and their letters. Even with the same source material, the bias toward one artist over the other really changes whose side the reader is on in this fight.

[Derek · Rating 5 out of 5]

The actual play and short story on which it was based took up only 120 pages of the book and it was great. The remainder of the book was various accounts and interpretations of the 1930-1931 creative process and ultimate falling out between the two authors. Basic details were paraphrased no less than four times but the background did serve to introduce me to the fickle real-life patron "Godmother" Mrs. Mason who doled out monetary allowances to chosen artists in order to pull their strings and keep them beholden. Another fascinating part of the supplementary material was the collected correspondence between the authors and each other, their lawyers, etc. Each letter was extremely well-written, represented a self-contained idea, and further reinforced each writer's stance. While this book consisted of two distinct parts (the actual story and the supplementary non-fiction information, each justifying a 5-star rating), it is the rare reader who would expect to indulge in both at one sitting.

[Gail · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the play that nearly erased an amazing writer's name from history. The thoughts and wordplay are a sheer delight!

[Jo Dunn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mule Bone: A Comedy of Negro Life in Three Acts, play about African American rural life written in 1931 by Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes. Drawing on Southern black oral tradition and folklore, the play features such customs as “mule-talking,” a type of verbal one-upmanship. (Hurston, an anthropologist as well as a writer, had collected examples of mule-talking in black communities.) The play remained unfinished and unproduced during the authors’ lifetimes; it was published in 1990.
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I'd read about the, quite contentious, collaboration Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes (who was not always included in the reviews I read) underwent while writing this play - it piqued my interest. FINDING an online copy of the play - written in book format - was a SIGNIFICANT challenge; libraries are closed due to the Coronavirus pandemic. I finally resorted to utilizing Gutenberg.org's computerized system and voila!! For whatever reason, I was bound and determined to read this specific play for a Summer Reading Program. I downloaded the book and read it in one sitting.

I feel the book was factually accurate in relation to the tumultuous 1930's in the deep South. Educational, eloquent and enlightening. Highly recommended. 4*

[Jeff · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5/5 - Mule Bone is a play written collaboratively by Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston. From my basic “research” (i.e.skimming Wikipedia), the two wanted to write a play that was not based on racial stereotypes. Hurston based the play on a folktale she gathered while in Florida. The two ended up having a falling out and the play was never performed.

The plot is simple. The members of a small town are hanging out at the general store. Two musicians arrive and start competing over a woman. One of them hits the other with a mule bone. The town decides to have a trial at a church. The play ends with Baptists and Methodists insulting each other.

I’m sure seeing this play live would be much better than reading it on paper. It’s more about the zingers and one-liners in early 1900s African American dialect.

[Sandra de Helen · Rating 3 out of 5]

A play never finished by Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston because of a "falling out" according to Hughes. Interesting introduction by Henry Gates, Jr. It includes the original story by Hurston, the play itself, and documentation of the controversy surrounding it. I preferred the documentation to the story and the play because, while their intentions were good and honorable and right at the time, today it is too hard to read the racist stereotypes. At least for me. I understand about honoring the language of a specific site and time, because I frequently invoke my own grandmother in my writings. I find the language of her place and time interesting and colorful. I wish they could have overcome their differences and produced their work in their own time. It could have changed live theater and created evolution of the genre much faster.

[Dawn · Rating 2 out of 5]

This is an extremely difficult read. You take a step back into a time of extreme racism, accepted by both whites and Blacks. The most nauseating part is reading Zora Neale Hurston's groveling letters to the narcissistic Mrs Mason, the white woman who was the patron of both Hurston and Hughes. I can readily believe that Hughes' health returned once he was financially separated from Mason. However, both Hurston and Hughes continued to seek to ingratiate themselves to her. The woman patronized them, saw them as "exotic" and she clearly viewed herself as superior to them, which they reinforced! It was a time of sickening white supremacy that is tough to read.

[Autumn · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was really interesting to read the progression of this play-from folk tale, to short story, to play, to controversy. I appreciated the inclusion of correspondence from Hughes and Hurston to various players in this situation. However, the details did get repetitive between the accounts from Hughes' autobiography and biography, Hurston's biography, the letters, and the front matter (introduction, essays). Some of the same quotes were used 3-4 times.

[Serendipity]

I decided to finish my exploration of Langston Hughes with one of his plays, The Mule Bone. Might as well read across the genres, right? I don’t think this play has aged well, especially with regards to its treatment and portrayal of women. Despite the first copy that I looked at crediting Hughes as the author, it was co-written with Zora Hurston and she seems to have contributed more. Disputes between them over authorship meant this play wasn’t actually performed until 1991.

[Colin Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Mule-Bone is a beautiful expression of what makes both Hurston and Hughes such excellent writers. However, I want to double-check the edition I read because it feels incomplete, even though the version I read includes references to the trial that so many readers on this platform seem to miss.

[Alysses · Rating 4 out of 5]

The play was a 4.5 stars.
The backstory/drama/mess was just messy and I could have done without. 3 stars.

This is a comedy play. I listed it as contemporary because it was when it was written and historical fiction because it is historical now.

The characters were fictional but their way of life was not. ZNH captured the essence of the people of this town and Hughes ran with it.

[Carlee Beatty · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was fun and the insults in it are glorious, my kids were hollering and engaged the whole time we were reading it. My biggest issue is that apparently a draft of act 2 scene 2 exists, but it is impossible to get access to!

[Steven · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just read the play portions mostly as I had read other parts in a previous book. While the work on the dialect is interesting, the plot was lacking and the middle section just dragged on.

[Stephanie Taylor]

Super

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting use of language and creativity. Reminds me a bit of janie and Jody Starks in "Their Eye's Were Watching God". Just a bit of it-the store.

[Alyssa · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.25 stars.

[Jared]

Definitely unfinished work.

[sam °❀⋆.ೃ࿔* · Rating 5 out of 5]

conflict as a quintessential facet of human experience!

[Darby Gallagher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Play #1 for my drama class! Really funny, wish it had more plot but an easy read

[Nikki Renae · Rating 3 out of 5]

"If they try to keep you out dat town we'll go out to dat swamp & git us a mule bone a piece & come into town & boil dat stew down to a low gravy."
"You mean dat, Dave?"

[Val · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my favorite play but still a quick and interesting read while still maintaining a quotidian atmosphere among the characters.