with partners who are determined to accomplish
the killing of the president whom they regard as a
Negro-lover.
Much to the dismay and outrage of his fellows,
however, he brings his mixed-race sweetheart with
him. Josephine, a woman of “supernal loveliness,”
is anxious, and in a moment of desperation, she
breaks in on the meeting and threatens to reveal
all unless Dick withdraws from the plan. Jackson’s
comrades quickly see him in the same light as they
do President Lincoln, one whose interest in
African-American people is both undesirable and
threatening.
News of General Lee’s surrender finally
reaches the men, and they disband just before po-
lice descend on their meeting place. The story
closes with the cryptic reference to the death of
Josephine. Murdered and discarded, her body is
found in the East River. The story is an elusive tale
that builds on the conspiracy theories that
emerged in the wake of Lincoln’s assassination.
“Spunk” Zora Neale Hurston(1920)
A prizewinning short story about courage and retri-
bution by ZORANEALEHURSTONthat appeared in
OPPORTUNITYa few months before its author was
honored in the journal’s prestigious annual literary
contest. In the 1925 Opportunityliterary contest, a
panel of nine judges that included FANNIEHURST,
CARLVANDOREN, ALAINLOCKE, Dorothy Can-
field Fisher, and ZONAGALEawarded second prize
to Hurston for “Spunk.” First prize went to JOHN
MATHEUSfor his story entitled “FOG,” and third
prize was awarded to ERIC WALRONDfor “THE
VOODOO’SREVENGE.” ALAINLOCKElater selected
the prizewinning tale for inclusion in THENEW
NEGRO(1925), his pioneering anthology of works
by and about African Americans.
“Spunk” tells the tale of Spunk Banks, a burly
mill worker who believes that his physical might
makes him invincible. Banks, who “ain’t skeered of
nothin’ on God’s green footstool,” begins a public
affair with Lena Kanty, a married woman. Joe
Kanty, the cuckolded husband, is no match for
Banks, but after a humiliating conversation in the
local store he decides to “fetch” his wife and end
the torturous gossip. Kanty, a man in whom “one
could actually seethe pain he was suffering,” in-
tends to use a razor to kill Banks and to reclaim his
honor and his wife. Unfortunately, Banks kills
Kanty with little effort. Then he plans to marry
Lena, and during the first night that the couple
spend together, a black bobcat circles the house re-
peatedly. The bully believes that the cat is a mani-
festation of Kanty. When Banks is pushed by an
invisible force into the saw at the mill, he uses his
last breath to tell onlookers that he intends to pur-
sue Kanty in the afterworld and seek vengeance for
his own death. The story ends as the town files
into Lena’s home for the wake. Joe Kanty’s father
stands over the dead man, “leering triumphantly”
now that he, too, has been felled, and the women
of the community begin to wonder about the next
man whom Lena will compromise.
Hurston’s story was part of the rich oeuvre of
folk narratives that she crafted during her career.
“Spunk,” like several of her novels and other works
of short fiction, delivered an evocative portrait of
long-suffering individuals prompted to heroic,
though not necessarily victorious, action.Bibliography
Gates, Henry Louis Jr., and K. A. Appiah, eds. Zora
Neale Hurston: Critical Perspectives Past and Present.
New York: Amistad, 1993.
Harris, Trudier. The Power of the Porch: The Storyteller’s
Craft in Zora Neale Hurston, Gloria Naylor, and Ran-
dall Kenan.Athens: University of Georgia Press,
1996.Starter, The: A Comedy of Negro Life
Eulalie Spence(1927)
A fast-paced prize-winning one-act play about
HARLEMby EULALIESPENCE. Written in the fall of
1926, the play garnered much praise the following
year when Spence was honored by the NATIONAL
URBANLEAGUEand was selected for inclusion in a
prominent collection of plays by and about African
Americans.
The Starterfeatures two primary and two pe-
ripheral characters. Set in a park in “Present day
Harlem” on a sweltering summer day, the play fo-
cuses first on the thoughts and antics of T. J. Kelly.
Kelly is an ambitious but professionally thwarted
young man. Current racial prejudice keeps him
working as a hotel bellman. Despite his frustra-496 “Spunk”