Zora Hurston's “Their Eyes Were Watching God” follows Janie Mae Crawford quest to woman hood and self discovery. Having to go to adulthood from childhood at the early age of sixteen this story helps show Janie’s struggle and the realizations of her dreams going through the hardships of three marriages. And, being a black woman in early 20th century America. The author used nature as symbolism to help guide us through Janie journey to finding herself. One of the most powerful metaphors to nature in this novel would be the blossoming pear tree. So throughout this paper the symbolism of nature and its effects on the characters will be discussed.
Janie mesmerized by the beautiful tree growing in Nanny’s backyard. Climbs the tree to sit in the branches soon realizes what true love means when witnessing of the bees to the blossoms of the pear tree. “She was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the
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Zora depicts this in an interaction between Motor Boat, Janie, and Tea Cake. where Motor Boat says to them during the hurricane "Ah’m safe here, man. Go ahead if yuh wants to. Ah’m sleepy."(18.75). After this moment Motor Boat goes on to sleep through the rest of the storm peacefully and untouched. While Tea Cake and Janie have very different experience Tea Cake eventually dies of rabies and Janie has to suffer the loss of her husband because of this. The different outcomes between Motor Boat and Tea Cake/Janie make it seem as if Janie and Tea Cake made the wrong decisions. By putting fate in their own hands and going against God