For hundreds of years, the dominant culture in America has categorically undervalued the culture and vernacular of Southern Blacks, confusing these segments of American life as largely simple, vulgar and ignorant; Zora Neale Hurston sought to change these perceptions. One of his most significant attempts at this is his first novel, Jonah's Gourd Vine. Here, Hurston often changes the style of her narrative voice, going from a biblical tone one moment to dry, journalistic writing the next. He uses this technique to great effect during John's divorce trial, creating a great sense of tension that is immediately swept away in the eyes of the prejudiced white judge and jury. Furthermore, he is able to use John Pearson as a trickster from African folklore, putting the judge and jury themselves at the center of a joke and making them look like fools for downplaying the complexity and depth of John and Hattie's relationship. In a novel that operates almost entirely within black communities, John's divorce process provides the largest and most significant interaction with white society. With this scene, Hurston uses metaphors, different levels of diction, and the trickster archetype to demonstrate that white society has flatly underestimated the complexity of black life in the South at this time, and that white people have made fools of themselves as a direct consequence. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay In Jonah's Gourd Vine, Hurston exercises his command of language and different levels of diction to promote the value of black culture. John's divorce trial is one of the best examples of his talent; Hurston shifts, in this case, from his understated narrative voice to a prophetic rant about the two-faced members of John's congregation. She proclaims that there is "no fury so hot as that of a flatterer as he stands over a god who has fallen from a shrine," not two paragraphs after talking about potatoes and cornbread dressing (Hurston, 166 ). These words are distinctively biblical, not simply in speaking of a god but in reversing the traditional word order (“no fury so hot”) to give the passage biblical diction. This sharp and sudden change in language is meant to set up John's trial as a crucial point within the story, and it works very effectively. Everything about John and Hattie's divorce is sanctified by Hurston's words; it becomes a terrible and sacred matter. Even Hattie, the antagonist of the scene, “was a goddess for a moment” (Hurston, 167). However, the tension and anguish that Hurston weaves in the trial's preliminary moments are immediately dissolved once the white judge takes his seat, "as a walrus would in a bed of clams" (167). Because of his own racism, the judge is blind to the intense personal drama unfolding before his eyes; Hurston herself says that “the waves of pain…in the room did not reach as far as [her] bench” (167). This reality is further reinforced by the abrupt change in language once the process begins. The prophetic voice is gone, and Hurston eschews almost any descriptive language. It is as if the text itself becomes blind to John and Hattie's complex emotional struggle just as the white jurors do. Through the divorce process, Hurston is able to demonstrate that the black culture that white society sees as mundane is actually full of emotionality and drama on a biblical scale. By having John Pearson remain silent during the trial, Hurston prepares him to.