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Internal Structure Of Their Eyes Were Watching God

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Joe Starks, Janie’s second husband, is the symbol of jealousy. He makes Janie wear head rags everywhere she goes because her hair’s beauty attracts men. Wearing the head rags constricted Janie and made it hard to tell who she was. Suppressing Janie’s identity pushed her away further and further until she was completely gone and just living with Joe for nothing. When Joe dies, Janie burns all the head rags. “Before she slept that night she burnt up every one of her head rags and went about the house next morning with her hair in one thick braid swinging well below her waist” (Hurston 89). Here, the rag symbolizes the restrictions inflicted among women by men more powerful than them. The hurricane represents the catastrophic ability of nature. …show more content…

Speaker The Speaker of Their Eyes Were Watching God is the same throughout the story even though the set up is changed. The speaker is an uninvolved narrator who is third person omniscient. VII. Structure The internal structure of Their Eyes Were Watching God is told in a logical order. Janie begins the story and then a flashback (frame) continues on to the end. There are several motifs, community, race and racism, and religion are a few. The external structure is comprised of a paperback cover, twenty chapters, and 193 pages. It also includes a foreword and an afterword and a selected bibliography. Selected extras are the about the author, about the book, and a read on. VIII. Imagery “Hurston uses many types of imagery to describe everything Janie goes through during the story. Some of the imagery used repeats throughout the story, to reiterate its importance regarding Janie. The use of a simile is utilized when Janie runs off to begin a new chapter in her life. “The morning road air was like a new dress” (Hurston 32). Her new freedom felt like a new beginning to her …show more content…

Turner, an extended metaphor is used. “Once having set up her idols and built altars to them it was inevitable that she would worship there” (Hurston 145). This compares her submission to the white race’s characteristics to that of someone worshipping a God/idol. She considers Caucasians as a ‘divine being’, just as some people consider God. One page before that, an antithesis is used to differentiate Negroes and Caucasians. Mrs. Turner is reported as having a favor to white characteristics, and those fit the stereotype of white more than she did were considered better. Those who didn’t were treated harshly by her and the rest of the white community. “Insensate cruelty to those you can whip, and groveling submission to those you can’t” (Hurston 144). Personification is used to describe the hurricane descending upon them, and bringing the lake along with it. The storm meant fury and destruction of things that were loved and needed. “De lake is comin’!” (Hurston

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In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston Janie is held back from growing to her full potential. Janie is married three times and in each marriage there is one item that restrains her. In her marriage with Joe she was forced to wear a head rag to cover her hair because it is so long and beautiful. The red rag resembled the restraint Joe put on Janie.

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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.

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Figurative language is a technique used commonly among authors in literature, yet still something readers have a difficult time figuring out due to the deeper meaning that is hidden in the piece of work. In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, a minor yet significant character named Mrs. Turner is compared to a pious worshipper, portraying her as someone who is obsessed of one race over another, showing her want of power in society. This ultimately suggests the invisible power in a race and how the color of one’s skin can make differences. Mrs. Turner is an interesting character in this novel. Mrs. Turner is compared to “believers [who] had built an altar to the unattainable -- Caucasian characteristics for all” (Hurston

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People come into our lives for different reasons. Some leave a positive impact, while others bring negativity. Readers and critics alike have treasured Zora Neale Hurston’s 20th century novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, for generations particularly for its complex portrayal of the different main characters. The people a person meet and the experiences that person many go through in their lifetime can alter a person significantly. Through the tyrannical words of Joe Starks and the inconsiderate actions of Nanny, Janie in the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God is negatively influenced as her actions and thoughts alter her life.

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In Janie’s third marriage with Tea Cake, they encounter a white racist woman named Mrs. Turner. She is comfortable talking to Janie because she is part white and wants to bring her from the dark side to that of the light. One of her beliefs is that “it’s too may black folks already. We oughta lighten up the race” (Hurston 140).

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Thus, Zora Neale Hurston uses community as a motif to help prove her theme, using specific details such as Janie’s disallowance to go to the funeral and the community scorning her. In conclusion, the novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” presents the theme of love and that being in a relationship hinders independence but in an unique way. Hurston uses symbolism like Janie’s head rag which stifled her independence and when burned, made her feel free. She also uses the motif of communities, which are ever present throughout the book, using specific examples such as when Janie isn't allowed to go to the funeral, which hinders her independence because she isn't making choices for herself and isn't doing

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Hurston tells the story of Janie, a black woman who because of her grandmother experiences and beliefs was forced to marry into a loveless marriage with Logan Killicks, a hard-working farmer who had 60 acres of land and could provide for Janie. This marriage ended when Janie ran away with Joe Stark, a man that she fell in love with and thought could give her the love absent between her and Logan. But Janie soon realized that her second marriage wouldn’t turn out better than her first. Joe was just as controlling and degrading as Logan. He hardly expressed his love for Janie and spoke to her like an incompetent child.

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In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, the main character, Janie, often focuses her attention on nature and makes many comparisons of situations in her life to things, such as pollen and a pear tree, in nature; the nature comparisons reveal her love-centered nature and her hopeful visions in the future for a love-filled life. During the early years of Janie’s life, she often sees situations in a way related to nature, as a child this reveals her love-centered nature. One day while her grandmother is sleeping, she goes outside to lie “beneath the pear tree[,] soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees”(Hurston 13), and while she was out there, her mind drifted to thoughts of love. Although the pear tree is mentioned

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Zora Neale Hurston used symbolism throughout the novel to express the influences that molded Janie’s emotional life. There were three moments when Hurston’s use of symbolism was used to demonstrate the forces that had an impact on Janie’s emotional life stood out, which are the vision of the pear tree, Nanny’s horizon rope, and Joe Starks’ head rag. One of the most referred and used symbolism throughout the novel is Janie’s pear tree vision. The vision occurs in chapter 2, but it continues to shape Janie’s decisions throughout her life from deciding to leave Logan Killicks to live with Joe Starks and then deciding to live with Vergible Woods after Joe’s death.

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Racism is portrayed in an interesting way in Their Eyes Were Watching God. For example, Janie and Tea Cake encounter Mrs Turner, a black lady who is racist towards other blacks. Whether white or black, everyone in this book seems to have been affected by racism in some way; many different perspectives of racism are investigated in this book. Naturally, this is intriguing because the reader discovers a three-dimensional aspect to a topic that has always seemed very black and white. Zora Neale Hurston paints a picture of racism in an odd manor, bringing a different perspective to a global conflict at the time.

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Hurston views ‘being colored’ as something that does not truly connect with her racial identity, but as something forced on her by society (Hurston 784). When she later on moves to Jacksonville, she describes how her race became the central feature of her theoretical

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Porch. A covered shelter projecting in front of the entrance of a building. This inanimate object served to develop various themes throughout the book, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. She reveals the theme of jealousy and envy, gender inequality and a sense of community with the help of the porch.

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Racism can be defined as prejudice, discrimination, or contributions to a system that perpetuates the idea that one race is inferior to another. Racism was heavily enforced throughout American history, specifically in the early 1900’s. Coincidentally, this was the same time feminists, or women’s-rights activists, were in the in the midst of their fight for equality. Feminism is the theory that women should be treated equally to men in terms of social, political, and economic matters. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston uses the protagonist, Janie, to convey both concepts through her journey to self-love and acceptance.

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