What Is The Theme Of Nany In Their Eyes Were Watching God

Zora Neale Hurston Nanny character in the novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” places non-feministic values into the character Janie at a young age. In the story, the readers follow a young girl named Janie through her life. Nanny is introduced as Janie’s Grandmother and caretaker. She pushes Janie to get married and in doing so instills values that Janie will have to overcome throughout the story. Nanny forces Janie to get married before she passes away. This is to insure she is set up to live a good life after she dies. Janie marries an older man named Logan Killicks. Nanny believed that Janie would need “protection” (Hurston, 2006, p.15). She wanted to be sure that Janie would have a set life and told Janie that could not do that on her

Just before Janie meets Joe Stark or her second husband, Logan tells Janie he is going out to buy a mule that is so “even uh woman kin handle ‘im”(Hurston, 2006, p.27). Soon after Logan sets out on his trip, Joe Starks goes walking by Janie. Once they get to know each other he promises that if she leaves with him then he would buy “her the best things”(Hurston, 2006, p.34). He even talked about “a town all outta colored folks”(Hurston, 2006, p.28). This idea was something that Janie’s grandmother talked about as well. A place where the “black man is in power” (Hurston, 2006, p.14), she talked about this place as if it was a dream. This was another factor that caused Janie to leave with Joe Starks. He promised her a new life where she would be well taken care of and have some kind of power. Just as her grandmother stated the only way she would get this kind of power was from a man. Though after years of being together, Janie starts to learn what she does not like about Joe and the power he

Janie was not happy about the work she had to do because Joe would not allow her to do much of anything else. She was not allowed to converse with people on the porch of the store or, go to celebrations the town was having. So when Janie decided to “fight back with her tongue as best she could”(Hurston, 2006, p.71) this just called Joe to hit her and fight for “her submission”(Hurston, 2006, p.71) to him and his will. She fought back when he was on his deathbed and after she died she lived alone for a few months. Since Joe had left the store and all his money to her she could stand by herself. She lived on her own for a while and did things she wanted to. This was the first time she did something her grandmother did not instill in her. Then she meets her third Husband Tea Cakes and, feels for him. He was different from her other husbands, he allowed her to do things the others did not. Though there were still some common traits in Tea Cake. Such as him paying for most of their dates, having fun with her, and working as a team with her. She had a real love for him and finally got to marry for