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To kill a mockingbird examples of symbolism
To kill a mockingbird examples of symbolism
To kill a mockingbird examples of symbolism
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In Their Eyes Were Watching God Janie goes through several marriages in her journey to seek love. As Janie's husbands change so does her wardrobe. Janie's different marriages are symbolized by her very different wardrobes.
Janie's first marriage was to Logan Killicks when she was just a young girl at the age of seventeen. Janie?s wardrobe mainly consisted of aprons and work clothes. Logan was very demanding and controlling over Janie, he made her work in the field and cook all day. Most of her time was spent cooking and she almost always wore her apron. ?That made her feel the apron tied around her waist. She untied it and flung it on a low bush beside the road an walked on??(page 32). Janie threw off her apron while she was leaving Logan, symbolizing how she was no longer under his control and she was now back on her journey for love.
Jody Starks was Janie?s second husband and was even more controlling over Janie than Logan. Janie usually wore very nice designer dresses because Joe was the mayor of Eatonville and felt that the mayor?s wife had to wear the best. The dresses symbolize the control and arrogance of Joe, because he forced Janie to wear things she was not comfortable in just to show off their money. Joe also made Janie wear head rags to cover her hair after an incident in the store. ?This business of the head-rag irked her endlessly. But Jody was set on it. Her hair was NOT going to show in the store.? (page 55). The head rags symbolize not only the control of Janie like in her first marriage but it also shows the jealousy Jody has towards his wife and other men.
Once Janie was an older woman in her forties she finally found the love of her life Tea Cakes. Tea Cakes soon became her third husband and has no comparison with the other two marriages. While married to Tea cakes Janie wore whatever she wanted because he was not controlling over her like in either of her other two marriages. Janie usually would wear overalls like Tea Cakes symbolizing how free and not under control she was. ?They don?t need to worry about me and my overhalls long as Ah still got nine hundred dollars in de bank. Tea Cake got me into wearing?
Janie’s first marriage was to Logan Killicks, an accomplished middle aged farmer. Her grandmother wanted Janie to be financially set and be protected, so she pretty much forced Janie into marrying Logan. With her grandmothers rough past of being a slave and all she did not wa...
"Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches" (8). When Janie was a teenager, she used to sit under the pear tree and dream about being a tree in bloom. She longs for something more. When she is 16, she kisses Johnny Taylor to see if this is what she looks for. Nanny sees her kiss him, and says that Janie is now a woman. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie, the main character, is involved in three very different relationships. Zora Neale Hurston, the author, explains how Janie learns some valuable lessons about marriage, integrity, and love and happiness from her relationships with Logan Killicks, Joe Starks, and Tea Cake.
that they can spend more time together because she missed him when he was at work and he missed her when he was away from home.
Though Janie had three marriages in total, each one drew her in for a different reason. She was married off to Logan Killicks by her Grandmother who wanted her to have protection and security. “Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have baby, its protection.” (Hurston 15) says Janie’s grandmother when Janie said she did not want to marry Logan. Though Janie did not agree with her grandmother, she knew that she just wanted what’s best for her. Next, she married Joe Starks, Janie was unsatisfied with her marriage to Logan so Joe came in and swept her off her feet. Janie did not like the fact that Logan was trying to make her work, so Joe’s proposition, “You ain’t never knowed what it was to be treated like a lady and ah want to be de one tuh show yuh.” (Hurston 29) was too good to pass up, so she left Logan and married Joe. Janie’s last marriage was to Tea Cake. Fed up after having been treated poorly by Joe, Janie finally found someone who liked her for who she was. “Naw, ...
Jody requires that Janie hold her hair in a head rag because it didn’t make sense for her to have it down. In reality, Jody was jealous about how the other men looked at Janie when she had her hair down. In fact, “one night he had caught Walter standing behind and brushing the back of his hand back and forth across the loose end of her braid ever so lightly so as to enjoy the feel of it without Janie knowing what he was doing” (Hurston 55). This infuriated Jody and he ordered Janie to always have her hair tied up when she was in the store because, “she was there in the store for him to look at, not those others” (Hurston 55). Janie’s hair can be seen as a symbol of her independence, but with Jody’s demands, her independence is lost. This inequality only exists for Janie, because she is a woman. She could not make similar demands from Jody, or else she would be punished. However, in her relationship with Tea Cake, Janie is allowed to be somewhat free of gender bias. Tea Cake was the only person that treated her as an equal. It begins with the game of checkers, which Tea Cake sets up himself, a sign that he wanted to play with her and saw her as an
By doing this, she has shown the community that a person can not always be happy with material things when she or he is not in love. Janie says, "Ah want things sweet wid mah marriage lak when you sit under a pear tree and think." She shows her grandma that she is not happy with her Janie's next husband, Joe Starks was very nice to her and gave her everything she wanted. When it came to Janie wanting to talk or speak her mind, he would not let her, and that made her feel like she was less of a person than he.
Janie were pretty well off and had the privilege to live in the yard of white
In the book, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the main character, Janie’s past actions affects her development throughout the novel. There are also positive and negative effects that impacted her life. Janie is influenced through the development of her relationships such as her Nanny’s advice to her as a child, Joe tries to control her, and before and after the hurricane causes Tea Cake and Janie’s relationship to become more tense, causing the outcome for her to free herself from the restrictions and make her own personal decisions. She becomes more confident, more self-aware , and discovers her capabilities .
Her marriage to Logan was partially arranged by her grandmother, Nanny. Nanny felt the need to find someone for Janie to depend on before she died, knowing that Janie would no longer be able to depend on her. This is the only time that Janie is relying
In the beginning of the story, Janie is stifled and does not truly reveal her identity. When caught kissing Johnny Taylor, a local boy, her nanny marries her off to Logan Killicks. While with Killicks, the reader never learns who the real Janie is. Janie does not make any decisions for herself and displays no personality. Janie takes a brave leap by leaving Killicks for Jody Starks. Starks is a smooth talking power hungry man who never allows Janie express her real self. The Eatonville community views Janie as the typical woman who tends to her husband and their house. Janie does not want to be accepted into the society as the average wife. Before Jody dies, Janie is able to let her suppressed anger out.
In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Lora Neale Hurston, the main character engages in three marriages that lead her towards a development of self. Through each endeavor, Janie learns the truths of life, love, and the path to finding her identity. Though suppressed because of her race and gender, Janie has a strong will to live her life the way she wills. But throughout her life, she encounters many people who attempt to change the way that she is and her beliefs. Each marriage that she undertakes, she finds a new realization and is on a never-ending quest to find her identity and true love. Logan Killicks, Joe Starks, and Tea Cake each help Janie progress to womanhood and find her identity.
Through her use of southern black language Zora Neale Hurston illustrates how to live and learn from life’s experiences. Janie, the main character in Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, is a woman who defies what people expect of her and lives her life searching to become a better person. Not easily satisfied with material gain, Janie quickly jumps into a search to find true happiness and love in life. She finally achieves what she has searched for with her third marriage.
As the novel begins, Janie walks into her former hometown quietly and bravely. She is not the same woman who left; she is not afraid of judgment or envy. Full of “self-revelation”, she begins telling her tale to her best friend, Phoeby, by looking back at her former self with the kind of wistfulness everyone expresses when they remember a time of childlike naïveté. She tries to express her wonderment and innocence by describing a blossoming peach tree that she loved, and in doing so also reveals her blossoming sexuality. To deter Janie from any trouble she might find herself in, she was made to marry an older man named Logan Killicks at the age of 16. In her naïveté, she expected to feel love eventually for this man. Instead, however, his love for her fades and she beco...
herself. Janie, all her life, had been pushed around and told what to do and how to live her life. She searched and searched high and low to find a peace that makes her whole and makes her feel like a complete person. To make her feel like she is in fact an individual and that she’s not like everyone else around her. During the time of ‘Their Eyes’, the correct way to treat women was to show them who was in charge and who was inferior. Men were looked to as the superior being, the one who women were supposed to look up to and serve. Especially in the fact that Janie was an African American women during these oppressed times. Throughout this book, it looks as though Janie makes many mistakes in trying to find who she really is, and achieving the respect that she deserves.
In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, the character of Janie Crawford experiences severe ideological conflicts with her grandmother, and the effects of these conflicts are far-reaching indeed. Hurston’s novel of manners, noted for its exploration of the black female experience, fully shows how a conflict with one’s elders can alter one’s self image. In the case of Janie and Nanny, it is Janie’s perception of men that is altered, as well as her perception of self. The conflict between the two women is largely generational in nature, and appears heart-breakingly inevitable.