ipl-logo

Critical Analysis Of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

258 Words2 Pages
Critical analysis article titled “Sex, Violence, and Organic Consciousness in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Donald R. Marks dissected how organic and mechanistic ideology impact in the following areas of life: relationships, social, personal. The main character, Janie, has a romantic history with four men, each unfolding different experiences and lessons. Unfortunately, as two of the four men develop a controlling manner towards her during their relationships, all of Janie’s lovers sexually violate her. Defining what is disgusting and what is passion become blurry to the character due to her perception of each man. EVALUATE HOW Reading through Marks’s analysis, I visualize the main character physically splitting two
Show More
Related
145 Words | 1 Pages

A character whom I admire and can relate to is Tea Cake from Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neal Hurston. After Janie experiences years of suffering, Tea Cake enters her broken life to begin the healing process. Although Tea Cake's madness caused by rabies tragically forces Janie to kill him to save her life, its significance is that Tea Cake's love transformed her enough to make her learn to love and value her own life. Like me, I believe that Tea Cake wanted to love and show kindness to someone who needed healing without reserve. It was an imperfect journey, but with sincerity and genuine care, Tea Cake closed the wounds in Janie's life.

Read More
351 Words | 2 Pages

In the novel How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Thomas Foster discusses the importance of Geography in literature, particularly the idea that “ when writers send characters south, it’s so they could run amok” (Foster 179). This idea emerges in Zora Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God as Janie travels to discover her identity. Janie feels tied down by the people in her life, particularly her husband Joe in Eatonville. She comments that he “wanted me tuh sit wid folded hands and sit dere.

Read More
736 Words | 3 Pages

3. Janie wears an apron, a head rag, and overalls at the most significant points in her life. Analyze the way in which the clothing reflects her inner self and how Hurston's use of clothing is symbolic of Janie's development throughout the novel. The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, written by Zora Neale Hurston is a novel about a woman named Janie, an african american in the 1920’s.

Read More
1030 Words | 5 Pages

In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, we follow our protagonist, Janie, through a journey of self-discovery. We watch Janie from when she was a child to her adulthood, slowly watching her ideals change while other dreams of hers unfortunately die. This is shown when Jane first formulates her idea of love, marriage, and intimacy by comparing it to a pear tree; erotic, beautiful, and full of life. After Janie gets married to her first spouse, Logan Killicks, she doesn’t see her love fantasy happening, but she waits because her Nanny tells her that love comes after marriage. Janie, thinking that Nanny is wise beyond her years, decides to wait.

Read More
484 Words | 2 Pages

In the novel “ Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Hurston their are a few key points in the main character’s life, Janie were after that moment her life either takes a turn for the best or for the worst. This is something people can all relate to because it happens to all of us whether we realize it or not. There are some decisions people make without thinking that change our whole lives forever. All of her key decisions seem to correlate with her being happy or trying to be a better version of herself.

Read More
452 Words | 2 Pages

Foster develops the concept that an illness is never just an illness in How to Read Literature Like a Professor. This is evident in Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God through the symbolism of the illnesses that impact Janie’s life. Foster explains that a prime literary disease “should have strong symbolic or metaphorical possibilities” (Foster 224). Hurston utilizes this concept in her novel, the characters developing illnesses that represent Janie’s freedom and independence.

Read More
1490 Words | 6 Pages

From a young age, many people are told that they have free will to do what they want and that their actions are what define them as a person; however, what people are told isn’t always the complete truth. In the realms of reality, individuals are always influenced by the people they spend the most time around to such an extent that it can change who they are as a person. Zora Neale Hurston 's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, epitomizes such truth through the development of Janie, a women who grows from not knowing her own race or what love even means to someone that has gained and lost countless relationships with people. Initially, she marries a wealthy man named Logan Killicks for financial security, but then runs away with a man named

Read More
633 Words | 3 Pages

The United States Constitution states that the country values liberty, life, and happiness for all of its citizens. These three values shape the ideal American experience. Most view it as living freely, where all men, women, and races are created equal, and where oppression of genders and races does not exist. In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, however, Zora Neale Hurston challenges the traditional view of this experience by illustrating how gender roles and racism change it, manifesting that it is not close to what the average citizen goes through, especially if he or she is black.

Read More
824 Words | 4 Pages

The pursuit of dreams has played a big role in self-fulfillment and internal development and in many ways, an individual 's reactions to the perceived and real obstacles blocking the path to a dream define the very character of that person. This theme is evident in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, which is about the search for identity. A woman of a mixed ethnicity resides in several communities, each playing an important role and serve as crucial influences on her life. During the story, she endures two failed relationships and one good relationship, dealing with disappointment, death, the wrath of nature and life’s unpredictability.

Read More
1171 Words | 5 Pages

One of the universal themes of literature is the idea that children suffer because of the mistakes of an earlier generation. The novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God" follows the story of Janie Mae Crawford through her childhood, her turbulent and passionate relationships, and her rejection of the status quo and through correlation of Nanny 's life and Janie 's problems, Hurston develops the theme of children 's tribulations stemming from the teachings and thoughts of an earlier generation. Nanny made a fatal mistake in forcibly pushing her own conclusions about life, based primarily on her own experiences, onto her granddaughter Janie and the cost of the mistake was negatively affecting her relationship with Janie. Nanny lived a hard life and she made a rough conclusion about how to survive in the world for her granddaughter, provoked by fear. " Ah can’t die easy thinkin’ maybe de menfolks white or black is makin’ a spit cup outa you: Have some sympathy fuh me.

Read More
586 Words | 3 Pages

Love has a different meaning to everyone in the whole world and everyone has their own expectations about love. People’s perception of love isn’t always right because love can also be as people say, “love can be blind.” In Their Eyes Were Watching God, a novel by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie, the main character, is impacted by the people she is surrounded with about what love means to you. Influences throughout the novel,  made her expectations about love come to reality. Nanny, her grandmother, recommended that Janie to get married, because Janie should be ashamed if she got pregnant if she is not married.

Read More
1446 Words | 6 Pages

The use of symbolism and imagery is a prominent technique used by many authors in their novels in order to convey complex ideas and create a unique experience for readers. Zora Neale Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God is filled with images of nature that play an important role in the progression of the story. In the novel, the imagery and symbolism related to nature represents Janie’s hopes as a young woman, her hopes as she is more mature, and her growth by the end of her journey. This essay will demonstrate this by examining her hopes involving love and her sexuality when she first discovers them as a young woman.

Read More
1012 Words | 5 Pages

In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the long-lasting effects of slavery have taken a toll on Janie Crawford. Janie’s grandmother was raped by her master and had a child named Leafy. Leafy, although not born into slavery, endured a similar fate, which led her to run away, leaving her mother to raise her child, Janie. Janie’s appearance, showing strong European features, was both praised and shamed by society. This double standard was created by racism and was able to remain present due to segregation.

Read More
957 Words | 4 Pages

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston wrote in a way that conveyed a message through her characters, using a storytelling "frame" to express her ideas. Hurston did not stop by means to get her point across. Hurston uses Janie’s thoughts and actions to represents how during Reconstruction, African Americans were trying to find their identities and achieve their dreams of independence. At the start of the novel Hurston begins to illustrate how African Americans in Eatonville feel about their lives.

Read More
1187 Words | 5 Pages

Historical criticism strives to cognize a literary work by examining the social, cultural, and intellectual context that essentially includes the artist’s biography and milieu. Historical critics are more concerned with guiding readers through the use of identical connotation rather than analyzing the work’s literary significance. (Brizee and Tompkins). The journey of a historical reading begins with the assessment of how the meaning of a text has altered over time. In many cases, when the historical context of a text is not fully comprehended, the work literature cannot be accurately interpreted.

Read More

More about Critical Analysis Of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God

Related Topics

Open Document