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Their Eyes Were Watching God By Zora Neale Hurston: Character Analysis

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“To be brave is to love someone unconditionally, without expecting anything in return." Their Eyes Were Watching God is a 1937 novel by African-American writer Zora Neale Hurston. The novel is about the main character Janie Crawford's ripening from a vibrant, but voiceless, teenage girl into a woman with her finger on the trigger of her own destiny. Throughout Janie's life she searches for true, unconditional love. In her search she experiences different types of love which include a love that is protective by her grandmother and Logan while Joe Starks provides a possessive love.The love that has the most impact on Janie's life is her love of Tea Cake Woods because he is the love of her life. True love allows Janie to slowly gain independence and strength because of the relationships she has been in. …show more content…

This protective love that Nanny bestows on Janie serves as the driving force behind Nanny's plot to arrange Janie's marriage to Logan. Logan has attained a similarly protective love, like the love provided by Nanny. Logan represents security for Janie, as he owns a 60-acre potato farm.Joe provides a possessive love towards Janie. Joe views Janie as his possession, his trophy wife. He expects Janie to follow his orders. These types of love are not what Janie

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Her internal struggles are like her being baited like the mule and feeling its pain but not being able to fight back for herself. Her will to be independent is echoed by Nanny when she states that “ Ah been prayin’ fuh it [women only being extensions of men, as mules are extensions of their masters] tuh be different wid you” (pg. 17). However, Nanny believes that this is a fickle dream whereas Janie has the fight and willpower to try to make it a reality. It is extremely ironic as well that Jodie is the one that buys the mule off of Matt Bonner but is truly the once keeping Janie as a metaphorical slave to his

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Personal experiences often shape how people see the world. This can be said for people’s views of love and what love means to the individual. In Zora Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the main character Janie searches for love and what true love is to her ever since she first got married. As Janie lives her life, she experiences marriage with three men: Logan Killicks, Jody starks, and Tea Cake, each of whom she initially believes she loves. However, as the story continues, she realizes that she does not truly love any of them except for Tea Cake.

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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.

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When Tea Cake and Janie first met, he would do things with her. The book says, “It was so crazy digging worms by the lamp light and setting out for Lake Sabelia after midnight that she felt like a child breaking rules” (102). Janie’s first two husbands, Logan and Joe would not do anything fun with Janie. Logan would have Janie working in the kitchen or the field and Joe would have her working in the store and have her as a “trophy wife” to look at. But Tea Cake was not like that.

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Nanny is successfully able to convince her granddaughter through her own traumatic experiences and make her feel “sympathy” as she tells Janie she doesn’t want her life to be spoiled like her own life was. At first, Janie refuses to marry Logan Killicks. Nanny being the older one, defends herself by saying “put me down easy” since she can no longer care for Janie and only her wish is for Janie to get married and be protected from the dangers she and her own daughter faced. By calling herself a “cracked plate” Nanny further elucidates that she went through many hardships in her own life and wants to do the right thing for her granddaughter by

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Janie thought that she would get the type of love that she had dreamed of for years. She thought she’d have “a bee for her bloom”. Unfortunately, this is not what she had gotten when she married Joe. She found change, and chance, and maybe a little adventure, but still she didn’t find the love she was hoping to have found. What Jody had with Janie was more of a type of lust than a type of love.

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(Hurston 24). Logan does not show any love for Janie. Janie’s unhappiness taught her that love can not be forced upon anyone. Joe prevails as the first man to show, Janie attention and affection. Both, Janie and Joe run off to Eatonville to start a life together.

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The plot of Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, is very interesting because it gave you insight on how marriage worked in the 1930’s. The book also allows you a look into the life of people during the Harlem Renaissance. During this time period, many African Americans were migrating south and looking for a better life, than in the north where there was still a high level of segregation between blacks and whites. The plot continues to keep you compelled throughout the book because of the many different plot twists from the difference in love interests from the truth behind a man and woman’s relationship back in the 19th century. Throughout the book the author Hurston, shows her outlook on men and women and how they are different

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Janie has many encounters with men where she felt love but she couldn’t maintain them. Her first husband held no love but rather only respect for Janie. The first husband was a gateway to her second lover, Jody. Jody loved Janie and she to him but as time progressed his ambitions destroyed what they had previously cherished.

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This is seen through Jacob Jankowski when he is faced with desires that he can not immediately attain such as having Marlena to himself, caring and protecting Rosie, and sustaining a

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Janie is the symbol of feminism and independence for women in the novel and shows her heroism in many instances. Some of her heroic qualities include determination, empathy, and

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Later that day, his mother died. Being so young, he gets confused into believing his mother is a fish and that he killed her. Jewel on the other hand, sees his mother as a horse. Out of all the children, Addie only truly loves Jewel. Addie hates her husband, Anse, therefore hating every child he had given her.

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Maddie Kelsey Ms. Zamora English 3 P. 3 5 December 2014 I will neither give nor receive unauthorized aid. In what ways do Logan, Jody and Tea Cake help or hinder Janie’s self-determination for change/chance/ and new horizons? * Their Eyes Were Watching God

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She occupies his every thought. This obsession is what allows Scottie to remake Judy into Madeleine and eventually attempt to save her so he can forget the guilt Madeleine’s death left him

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At the end of the book Jeanette reflects about what she has learned about love and says, “ As it is, I can’t settle, I want someone who is fierce and will love me until death and know that love is as strong as death, and be on my side forever and ever. I want someone who will destroy and be destroyed by me. There are many forms of love and affection..” (Winterson 175) Even when talking about what she wants in love Jeanette uses negative or dark language such as death or destroying each other, because Jeanette has learned how hard love is to deal with throughout her

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