Seraph on the Suwanee

Seraph on the Suwanee is the last novel by the acclaimed novelist, Zora Neale Hurston. Published in 1948, it tells the story of a poor rural white family in Florida and their complicated relationships. The book was never well received by critics or scholars who believed it to depart too much from Hurston’s usual style and subject matter. However, it’s popular with general readers. Hurston was a leading American folklorist during the Harlem Renaissance and her work typically involved African American characters and settings. However, in Seraph on the Suwanee, Hurston tries to show the similarities between the blacks and whites in the South.

The book centres around Arvay Henson Meserve. She’s a poor white woman in the South. She lives in Sawley, a sawmill town which sits beside the Suwanee River. Her community believes she’s odd and not very bright. She’s reclusive and prone to bouts of “hysteria,” and she has little confidence. She feels extremely unattractive because the townsfolk always prefer her sister, ‘Raine.

‘Raine happens to be married to Carl Middleton, the local preacher. Arvay loves him, although her feelings shame her. She knows she can never have him, and she resents even fantasising about him. She spends most of her time comparing herself to ‘Raine and wondering if she’ll ever find happiness. She cannot see her own self-worth which contributes to her alienation—and her growing religious obsession.



Everything changes for Arvay when a newcomer, Jim Meserve, arrives in town unexpectedly. He’s the only man in the town who isn’t put off by her shyness and lack of confidence. Instead, he reinforces her feelings and feels it’s natural for women to lack intelligence and spirit. Other women in Sawley go after him, but he doesn’t care for them.

At first, Arvay’s reluctant to get close to Jim. She doesn’t understand why he’s attracted to her, out of everyone in town, and she doesn’t believe she’s fit to be his wife—especially since she fantasises about a married man. Jim, however, courts her and tells her she’s beautiful, and that she’s his idea of a perfect woman. When he tells her that he wants to marry her, she doesn’t believe him.

One day, he gets Arvay to put on her nicest dress and they go outside to sit under a mulberry tree. He proposes to her but rapes her because he doesn’t want to wait until they’re married. After the rape, he takes her to the local justice of the peace, and they’re wed. This all happens without any of her family knowing. Arvay is nevertheless happy to marry Jim, but she spends most of her married life worrying whether he’ll leave her. She spends more time fretting over Jim ever leaving her than loving him.



When Jim decides working in a sawmill town isn’t ambitious enough, he wants to move elsewhere, but Arvay gets pregnant and wants to stay close to her family. However, when their son, Earl, is born, he’s disabled. Arvay worries that Jim will be disappointed, and so this is another way she frets over her worth.

The narrative moves forward a few years, and we meet Earl as a teenager. He sexually assaults a local girl, and when Jim chases after him, they fight beside the swamp. Jim shoots Earl, who dies, and Arvay’s devastated. She never recovers from this pain, although she does thrive as a married woman. Hurston shows how she grows into her role as a wife and sees it as her duty to be a good one. Although this is not typical feminism, there is a raw sense of empowerment as Arvay grows in confidence and surety. While she begins the novel with no self-worth or confidence, marriage makes her feel equal to another person and worthy of a partnership.

Jim and Arvay never fully resolve their differences over what happened to Earl. However, Jim has ambition and makes them wealthy and prosperous. Although they’re married, it’s more akin to two people living together but having separate lives. In the end, it’s Jim who ends up unhappy with himself and the marriage he’s in.



Arvay fails to save Jim from a rattlesnake attack because she stands there and doesn’t do anything. Jim’s angry that she doesn’t love him with any conviction, the way he loves her. Arvay, however, is content to know she’s in a marriage with someone who dotes on her. The couple live their lives in comfortable companionship, and their wealth grows.

By the novel’s end, Arvay stops worrying that Jim will leave her, because she’s confident in herself and her own role in their marriage. She finally feels like she fits in with the rest of Sawley, and she stops obsessing over a man she can’t have. With how wealthy Arvay and Jim become, it’s the rest of the town who end up jealous of them.