I love this book and this writer. Despite the fact that she lived in a different time, her writing struck a familiar note. The protagonist’s grandmother explains her view of the world.

Honey, de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able tuh find out. Maybe it’s some place off in de ocean where de black man is in power, but we don’t know nothin’ but we see. So de white man throw down de load and tell de nigger man tuh pick it up. He pick it up because he have to, but he don’t tote it. He hand it to his womenfolks. De nigger woman is de mule uh de world so far as Ah can see.

-Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God