In the beginning of the story, Janie is stifled and does not truly reveal her identity. When caught kissing Johnny Taylor her nanny marries her off to Logan Killicks.While married to Killicks Janie didn’t make any decisions for herself and displays no personality. She always followed Killicks rules to being a good house wife. After getting tired of living life without love Janie took a brave leap and ran away form Killicks for Jody Starks. . When Joe came down the road, She saw things were different than what she had with Killicks. Jody stood for things she found fascinating. “…He spoke for far horizon. He spoke for change and chance.” ;(29). And although Jody did not represent the Pear tree which symbolized Janie’s ideal complementary man, He was more than what Killicks offered. Starks is a smooth talking power hungry man who also never allowed Janie express her real self. He made it sound as if she would have been living the life she always wanted and the love she wanted so badly. Eatonville community looked at Janie as the typical woman who tends to her husband and their house. She tried her best not to be the woman she was in her last marriage but when she started to fight back Killicks would hit her.”Ah thought you would ‘preciate good treatment. Thought Ah’d take and make somethin’ outa yuh. You think youse white folks by de way you act." (4.42) logan thinks that black woman aren’t supposed to demand any respect or good treatment and ought to be happy as her husband’s work and demands anything better. Janie does not want to be accepted into the society as the average wife, but she quietly continued to be who she was not and ok killicks his death bed right before he dies, Janie expressed her suppressed anger. All this an...
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... of herself. Her grandmother had told her that her mother had been raped by the towns school teacher who was a white man. Even though she was black she had beautiful hair which sometimes gave her an advantage over other village women. The novel mentioned Janie’s beautiful hair repeatedly having it become a symbol in the novel but expressing different meanings most times .Her encounter with Mrs Turner . "You’se different from me. Ah can’t stand black niggers. Ah don’t blame de white folks from hatin’ ‘em ‘cause Ah can’t stand ‘em mahself. ‘Nother thing, Ah hates tuh see folks lak me and you mixed up wid ‘em. Us oughta class off." .Mrs Turner was the racial character in the novel but althought Janie looked like them but had a different texture of hair Mrs Turner didn’t not consider her as a “black nigger.”
Works Cited
http://www.sparknotes.com/lit/eyes/themes.html
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...
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, ...
Janie’s first relationship was with Logan Killicks. She married him only because she wanted to appease her grandmother. Logan did not truly love Janie, but saw her as an asset to increase his own power. Logan expressed this through several actions. He first tries to use her to "increase his profits" rather than treating her as a wife when he travels to Lake City to buy a second mule so Janie can use it to plow in the potato field because potatoes were "bringin' big prices”. When Janie later refused to work at his command, stating that it was not her place to do so, Logan told her, "You ain't got no particular place. It's wherever Ah need yuh". After Logan told her this, Janie decided she had to either escape or face becoming her husband's mule for life. Janie stood up to her husband. This is a feminist action because Janie is willing to leave a husband who makes her unhappy, which was rare act of independence and defiance for women living in the 1930’s. To free herself from her marriage with Logan Killicks, she only needed to invalidate the elements of his symbolic vision. She recognized that for Killicks marriage was primarily a financial arrangement, and his sixty acres acted both as a sign and guarantee of matrimonial un...
Of least significance to Janie is her first husband, Logan Killicks. Hurston uses pathos to show that Janie and her first husband are not meant to be even though society thinks otherwise. Nanny thinks that Logan is really made for Janie, but Janie doesn’t love Logan. Janie tells Nanny, “Cause you told me Ah
The beginning of Janie’s marriage to Joe shows promise and adventure, something that young Janie is quickly attracted to. She longs to get out of her loveless marriage to Logan Killicks and Joe’s big dreams captivate Janie. Once again she hopes to find the true love she’s always dreamed of. Joe and Janie’s life is first blissful. He gives her whatever she wants and after he becomes the mayor of a small African American town called Eatonville, they are the most respected couple in town. Joe uses his newfound power to control Janie. When she is asked to make a speech at a town event, she can’t even get out a word before Joe denies her the privilege. He starts making her work in the store he opens and punishes her for any mistakes she makes. He enjoys the power and respect her gets when o...
The first time Janie had noticed this was when he was appointed mayor by the town’s people and she was asked to give a few words on his behalf, but she did not answer, because before she could even accept or decline he had promptly cut her off, “ ‘Thank yuh fuh yo’ compliments, but mah wife don’t know nothin’ ’bout no speech-makin’/Janie made her face laugh after a short pause, but it wasn’t too easy/…the way Joe spoke out without giving her a chance to say anything on way or another that took the bloom off things” (43). This would happen many times during the course of their marriage. He told her that a woman of her class and caliber was not to hang around the low class citizens of Eatonville. In such cases when he would usher her off the front porch of the store when the men sat around talking and laughing, or when Matt Boner’s mule had died and he told her she could not attend its dragging-out, and when he demanded that she tie up her hair in head rags while working in the store, “This business of the head-rag irked her endlessly. But Jody was set on it. Her hair was NOT to show in the store” (55). He had cast Janie off from the rest of the community and put her on a pedestal, which made Janie feel as though she was trapped in an emotional prison. Over course of their marriage, he had silenced her so much that she found it better to not talk back when got this way. His voice continuously oppresses Janie and her voice. She retreats within herself, where still dreams of her bloom time, which had ended with Joe, “This moment lead Janie to ‘grows out of her identity, but out of her division into inside and outside. Knowing not mix them is knowing that articulate language requires the co-presence of two distinct poles, not their collapse into oneness’ ” (Clarke 608). The marriage carries on like this until; Joe lies sick and dying in his death bed.
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.
Janie’s first attempt at love does not turn out quite like she hopes. Her grandmother forces her into marrying Logan Killicks. As the year passes, Janie grows unhappy and miserable. By pure fate, Janie meets Joe Starks and immediately lusts after him. With the knowledge of being wrong and expecting to be ridiculed, she leaves Logan and runs off with Joe to start a new marriage. This is the first time that Janie does what she wants in her search of happiness: “Even if Joe was not waiting for her, the change was bound to do her good…From now on until death she was going to have flower dust and springtime sprinkled over everything” (32). Janie’s new outlook on life, although somewhat shadowed by blind love, will keep her satisfied momentarily, but soon she will return to the loneliness she is running from.
For many people love comes easily or within a short time, but for Janie it took much longer. Love was always very important to Janie. With Janie’s first husband which Nanny arranged. Feeling unloved and used Janie decided to leave logan and keep going on her search for love. “The morning road air was like a new dress”. This quote is an example of a simile revealing all the hope Janie still had for herself after leaving Logan. Dealing with many restrictions put by people in her life Janie always just dealt with stuff and went on without complaining like most women did in that time. Jody Sparks played a major role in Janie’s quest of finding herself. “To my thinkin’ mourning oughtn’t tuh last no longer’n grief.” After Jody’s death Janie feels a quick feelings of independence. Jody being represented as a character who tries to be dominate of others and is cruel makes Janie understand that in a relationship there has to be equality in order to be happy. Being a man who saw Janie as an object makes Janie speak up and stop muting herself. She rebels against him and destroys his will. Showing women can gain equality for
All her life Janie had lived with her grandmother Nanny, Nanny and Janie were lucky as they had the privilege to live in the yard of white folks. Ever since Janie was growing up she played with white children, It was later that she was confronted with disapproval and was bullied and given many names, so many that everyone started calling her alphabet, "'cause so many people had done named me different names”(68). Shortly she started putting together what she knew of her abnormal individuality. One day she saw herself in a photograph and noticed that she looked distinctive, That she had dark skin, and said, "before Ah seen de picture Ah thought Ah wuz just like de rest”(9). Ever since that day, Janie tumbled into somewhat of a descending spiral, setting her off of the path regarding her for own identity. Finally when she had grownup Nanny witnessed her doing something under the pear tree which she believed was distasteful, Nanny hastily prepared a marriage between Janie and a wealthy local man, Logan Killicks. Janie was against her grandmother’s decision. She felt as if she was losing her independence as well as her individuality, she wasn't Janie anymore she would now be ...
& nbsp;   ; Second, Janie sees Logan Killicks' perception of marriage. In the beginning it appears to Janie that Logan is a very nice gentleman, who is. constantly treating her well. However, as time goes on, Janie sees Logan's the "true colors" of the.
Janie’s first discovery about herself comes when she is a child. She is around the age of six when she realizes that she is colored. Janie’s confusion about her race is based on the reasoning that all her peers and the kids she grows up with are white. Janie and her Nanny live in the backyard of the white people that her Nanny works for. When Janie does not recognize herself on the picture that is taken by a photographer, the others find it funny and laughs, leaving Janie feeling humiliated. This racial discovery is not “social prejudice or personal meanness but affection” (Cooke 140). Janie is often teased at school because she lives with the white people and dresses better than the other colored kids. Even though the kids that tease her were all colored, this begins Janie’s experience to racial discrimination.
Janie's first marriage is to Logan Killicks. Logan enters the marriage with a large portion of land. However, Janie enters the marriage with practically nothing. This ends up becoming a relationship based on inequality because Logan starts to use his ownership of the land to control Janie. He tries to make her feel that she owes him for part of the land, which he is sharing with her. What begins as a relationship in which Logan struggles to make Janie happy, turns into a relationship in which Janie is expected to make Logan happy. She is often reprimanded for not doing enough work or for not working in certain areas such as the fields.
Janie and Jody, as she calls him, travel to all-black Eatonville, where Jody hopes to have a "big voice." A consummate politician, Jody soon succeeds in becoming the mayor, postmaster, storekeeper, and the biggest landlord in town. But Janie seeks something more than a man with a big voice. She soon becomes disenchanted with the monotonous, stifling life that she shares with Jody. She wishes that she could be a part of the rich social life in town, but Jody doesn't allow her to interact with "common" people. Jody sees Janie as the fitting ornament to his wealth and power, and he tries to shape her into his vision of what a mayor's wife should be. On the surface, Janie silently submits to Jody; inside, however, she remains passionate and full of dreams.
Everyone in this world now has an identity marker known as race. The race of a particular person refers to a relation to a specific group of people who tend to share similar physical and cultural characteristics. This creates an idea of a physical and cultural divide between different types of people. Race focuses on the division of people based on social standpoints and not biological ones, even though race itself is defined as both cultural and physical components. Race has been used to validate inhuman behavior in many historical periods such as slavery and genocide (Golash-Boza 2015, p.6-7).