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Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is a profound novel, which shows the journey of what a strong beautiful woman went through to find her happiness. This novel starts off with Janie coming back from burying the dead. Her journey starts of from her grandmother’s house to a huge farm land then Eatonville to the Everglades. It isn’t until the Everglades when Janie found true happiness in the love she had for Tea Cake. The central theme of this novel is love and happiness. This theme is portrayed when Janie shows love to her grandma by doing what would make her happy. The theme is also shown when Janie still comforts Joe in his deathbed even after all the stuff he did to her she still showed him love till the end. Another way this theme is showed is when Janie seeks her happiness with Tea Cake without caring what anyone thought of her.
When Janie starts telling us her journey she starts off by saying how she used to live in a plantation with her grandmother. Janie was a young girl when her grandmother caught
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her kissing a young man and got furious because she knew Janie deserved to be married off with a nice decent man. When the grandmother realized that it was time for Janie to get married of to a nice man she sent her to an old man named Logan Killicks. Janie didn’t want to be with this man, he was old and unattractive. However she knew that it was what her grandmother wanted for her. Her grandmother knew that Logan would take care of Janie, and she just wanted Janie to be well of before she died. So she gave her away to a decent man who owned 60 acres of land and a nice looking house. The only reason Janie married him was because she didn’t want her grandma to worry for her when she had passed away. Janie was willing to sacrifice her own happiness for the love she had for her grandma. It wasn’t a long time that Janie was with Logan because she had met this new interesting good looking guy who’s name was Joe. Janie left Logan for Joe because he promised her adventure and that was really what Janie wanted. However as time passed Joe had built a whole town, Eatonville, for Janie. He had become the mayor and owned a really nice house. Janie loved Joe, but Joe focused more on his town than he did on Janie. After many years with him Janie felt alone and miserable; she wasn’t happy with Joe, and she hadn’t been for a long time. Joe ended up getting really sick and died. However in his death bed Janie still was there. She tried to comfort him and he still was ugly to her. This shows that even to the end Janie still tried, even though all Joe did to her was mistreat her she still showed him love by being beside him in his last moments. Janie is a strong woman, because even though all she had gone through she still went out in search of the happiness she was looking for. It wasn’t until she met Tea Cake that Janie felt true happiness. Janie was also experiencing what love really was with him. When she was with Joe, Janie loved him; however Janie was not in love with him, but she was with Tea Cake. Tea Cake gave her the adventure that she always wanted. He took her to a place that she had only dreamed of which was the Everglades. Janie falls deeply in love with Tea Cake, she would’ve done anything for him and she did. When Tea Cake was suffering and was sick in the head Janie ended it by killing him. Although it seems harsh, Janie did it out of love for him, and even though he was dead he was still alive in her. This novel shows us that Janie’s journey to happiness was though, but through it all she never lost sight in who she was. When Janie lost Tea Cake and decided to come back to Eatonville, she came back and everyone was talking and looking at her. They all thought that Tea Cake had left her like the predicted he would. Janie didn’t care what they said about her or Tea Cake, she defended him when people talked bad about him and they didn’t understand why that was. Once she told the story to her friend Janie had inspired her to go out and find her happiness. Even after Janie lost Tea Cake her true love she was still happy because she knew that she still had more living to do. Janie strives to be happy and she does whatever it takes without caring would others would say. Janie is represented by the long curly hair she had, which in the novel was a symbol of strength.
Her hair is one of the main things that represented Janie. She always wore her hair loose and she liked it down, she liked it free. And that’s exactly how Janie was; she loved being free and wild she didn’t like to be tied down. Another symbol in this story is the horizon always mentioned in the novel of the pear tree and a sundown. She was on a journey to find her horizon. The horizon symbolizes hope and beauty for Janie. Another symbol in this novel is the pear tree that was on her grandmother’s plantation. The tree represented how Janie had become a woman and it also encouraged her to start he free-spirited journey on love.
Love and happiness are seen in this novel in many ways. That was what Janie’s journey was all about and what always kept her going. He journey thought Janie to be independent and showed her freedom and true love and
happiness.
Janie is a woman who has overcome the rules and restrictions she was given. Janie was nothing but "a rut in the road. Plenty of life beneath the surface but it was kept beaten down by the wheels" (Hurston 72). Eventually, Janie made it her purpose to rebel against this mold.
Zora Neale Hurston’s, Their Eyes Were Watching God tells about the life of Janie Crawford. Janie’s mother, who suffers a tragic moment in her life, resulting in a mental breakdown, is left for her grandmother to take care of her. Throughout Janie’s life, she comes across several different men, all of which end in a horrible way. All the men that Janie married had a different perception of marriage. After the third husband, Janie finally returns to her home. It is at a belief that Janie is seeking someone who she can truly love, and not someone her grandmother chooses for her. Although Janie eventually lives a humble life, Janie’s quest is questionable.
Zora Hurston’s novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” depicts the journey of a young woman named Janie Crawford’s journey to finding real love. Her life begins with a romantic and ideal view on love. After Janie’s grandmother, Nanny, soon grows fearful of Janie’s newfound sexuality and quickly marries Janie off to Logan Killicks, an older land owner with his own farm. Janie quickly grows tired of Logan and how he works her like a slave instead of treating her as a wife and runs away with Joe Starks. Joe is older than Janie but younger than Logan and sweet talks Janie into marring him and soon Joe becomes the mayor of an all African American town called Eatonville. Soon Joe begins to force Janie to hide not only her
The book, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is about Janie Crawford and her quest for self-independence and real love. She finds herself in three marriages, one she escapes from, and the other two end tragically. And throughout her journey, she learns a lot about love, and herself. Janie’s three marriages were all different, each one brought her in for a different reason, and each one had something different to teach her, she was forced into marrying Logan Killicks and hated it. So, she left him for Joe Starks who promised to treat her the way a lady should be treated, but he also made her the way he thought a lady should be. After Joe died she found Tea Cake, a romantic man who loved Janie the way she was, and worked hard to provide for her.
In, Their Eyes Were Watching God, the author takes you on the journey of a woman, Janie, and her search for love, independence, and the pursuit of happiness. This pursuit seems to constantly be disregarded, yet Janie continues to hold on to the potential of grasping all that she desires. In, Their Eyes Were Watching God, the author, Zora Hurston illustrates the ambiguity of Janie’s voice; the submissiveness of her silence and the independence she reclaims when regaining her voice. The reclaiming of Janie's independence, in the novel, correlates with the development and maturation Janie undergoes during her self discovery.
Janie’s character undergoes a major change after Joe’s death. She has freedom. While the town goes to watch a ball game Janie meets Tea Cake. Tea Cake teaches Janie how to play checkers, hunt, and fish. That made Janie happy. “Somebody wanted her to play. Somebody thought it natural for her to play. That was even nice. She looked him over and got little thrills from every one of his good points” (Hurston 96). Tea Cake gave her the comfort of feeling wanted. Janie realizes Tea Cake’s difference from her prior relationships because he wants her to become happy and cares about what she likes to do. Janie tells Pheoby about moving away with Tea Cake and Pheoby tells her that people disapprove of the way she behaves right after the death of her husband. Janie says she controls her life and it has become time for her to live it her way. “Dis ain’t no business proposition, and no race after property and titles. Dis is uh love game. Ah done lived Grandma’s way, now Ah means tuh live mine” (Hurston 114). Janie becomes stronger as she dates Tea Cake because she no longer does for everyone else. Janie and Tea Cake decided to move to the Everglades, the muck. One afternoon, a hurricane came. The hurricane symbolizes disaster and another change in Janie’s life. “Capricious but impersonal, it is a concrete example of the destructive power found in nature. Janie, Tea Cake, and their friends can only look on in terror as the hurricane destroys the
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.
In Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and “Sweat,” Hurston uses the characters Janie Crawford and Delia Jones to symbolize African-American women as the mules of the world and their only alternative were through their words, in order to illustrate the conditions women suffered and the actions they had to take to maintain or establish their self-esteem.
Their Eyes Were Watching God is a novel that presents a happy ending through the moral development of Janie, the protagonist. The novel divulges Janie’s reflection on her life’s adventures, by narrating the novel in flashback form. Her story is disclosed to Janie’s best friend Phoebe who comes to learn the motive for Janie’s return to Eatonville. By writing the novel in this style they witness Janie’s childhood, marriages, and present life, to observe Janie’s growth into a dynamic character and achievement of her quest to discover identity and spirit.
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.
Over time Janie begins to develop her own ideas and ideals. In Their Eyes Watching God. Each principle character has their own perceptions. towards the end of marriage. & nbsp;
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...
In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston portrays the journey of Janie Crawford as an African American woman who grows and matures through the hardships and struggles of three different marriages. Although Janie is an African American, the main themes of the novel discusses the oppression of women by men, disregarding race. Janie gets married to three different men, aging from a young and naive girl to a mature and hardened women near the age of 40. Throughout the novel, Janie suffers through these relationships and learns to cope with life by blaming others and escaping her past by running away from it. These relationships are a result of Janie chasing her dreams of finding and experiencing true love, which she ultimately does in the end. Even through the suffering and happiness, Janie’s journey is a mixture of ups and downs, and at the end, she is ultimately content. Zora Neale Hurston utilizes Janie’s metaphorical thoughts and responses of blame and escape, as well as her actions towards success and fulfillment with her relationship with Tea Cake, to suggest that her journey
In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie had a defining moment that helped shape her future. In the second chapter, she saw a pear tree and ever since she became obsessed with the idea of love. She spent every bit of free time she had to be with the tree. Many people have these defining moments which lead them on through life. For example, it could be an art set that one received at a young age that made them want to be an artist. Whatever the case may be, we all have our own passions. In this passage, the author uses personification and imagery to show how Janie’s curiosity for love affects her future relationships by giving them something to live up to.
In the novel, "Their Eyes Were Watching God" Janie discovers much about herself and the people around her. She learns about the people around her with her marriages, her moving with Joe, and her being wife of a mayor. Janie's major self-discovery is when she is young sitting out in her yard looking at the tree, thinking about how she is changing.