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Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God: Criticism

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The novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God written by Zora Neale Hurston, opens with some snide remarks from the porch sitters. Janie is criticised for her beautiful looks and her past involving a younger man. The behavior of the porch sitters, however, are a contrast to Pheoby, Janie’s loyal best friend. Despite all the criticism Janie gets, it seems to be overshadowed by the way Pheoby treats her friend, giving her a plate of mulatto rice and listening to what she has to say. The moment Janie had spend under a blossoming pear tree is when she comes to the realization of the meaning of love and marriage. The tree is a female that waits for bees, the male, to come and “sink into the sanctum of a bloom” (10). She becomes acknowledged with the
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- Zora Neale Hurston, born January 7th, 1891, was an African-American author, widely known for her classic novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God. Being raised in Eatonville, Florida, the first black township of the United States, Hurston was indulged in black culture at a very early age. Zora was described to have a fiery, yet bubbly spirit, befriending very influential people, one being American poet, Langston Hughes. With heavy influence from her hometown, along with the achievement of the black women around her, an abundance of motivation came when Hurston wrote Their Eyes Were Watching God. The novel promotes black power, all while rejecting the stereotypes held against women.

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“I hate to hear you talk about all women as if they were fine ladies instead of rational creatures. None of us want to be in calm waters all our lives.” Jane Austen. Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston depicted the travels of Janie Crawford and her understanding of womanhood and freedom through her several marriages. Throughout the book, Hurston portrays the growth of Janie and her ideals, her hair being a major recurring symbol.

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Maria Leonard AP English Literature & Composition Their Eyes Were Watching God Essay March 13, 2023 A Journey Through Janie’s Eyes The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, is a self-realization psychological-fiction book about a young woman named Janie Crawford and her lessons through life and love. Throughout the novel, Zora Neale Hurston employs various literary devices to guide the reader through Janie's journey of self-discovery. Hurston uses literary devices such as dramatic irony, symbolism, imagery, and syntax to depict the downfall of Janie's inner damage, marriage to Joe Starks, and discovery of different types of romantic relationships.

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In the novel “Their eyes were watching god” the author, Zora Hurston does a good job of showing how Janie was able to learn how to balance a relationship and keeping her independence as well and everything that led up to that. Janie basically went on a “love” search but was looking in all the wrong areas. As an infant Janie was abandoned by her mother who was raped and got pregnant so she was brought up by her grandmother who was also raped. Her Nanny only wanted the best for her. She wanted Janie to have a life of purpose.

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Although Janie’s life is already partially determined at birth due to her race, bloodline, and gender, her actions and personality reveal her true identity. The time period in which Hurston wrote Their Eyes Were Watching God was not one of complete racial equality. That being said, in the novel, Janie faces belittlement for being biracial. Mrs. Turner, a biracial woman much like Janie, acts as a

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The Harlem Renaissance was a period of time in history where African Americans revived their cultural and intellectual self. Key ways African Americans achieved this was through self determination, destroying outdated racial stereotypes, being racially conscious, group expression, modern ideas, and through political and civil rights. In literature there has been a major debate about books marked as Harlem Renaissance reads and whether or not the book meets the criteria of the Harlem Renaissance. One book in particular that has been criticized for not meeting the Harlem Renaissance Ideals is “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston. After reading this book, I determined that it should still be considered a Harlem Renaissance book.

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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

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During the early decades of the twentieth century, opportunities for women to speak up and share their voices were extremely limited. A defying woman of the era, Zora Neale Hurston, found an opportunity for her voice to be heard through her writing. At the Literary Awards Dinner in 1925, Hurston made a flamboyant entrance when she walked into a room of crowded people and shouted the title of her famous play: “Coooolor Struckkkk!” Clearly, Hurston proved she was not afraid to speak out and let her voice be heard. In her book Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston demonstrates many factors can influence a person’s decision to speak up or not by charting Janie’s relationships with those around her.

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All-Natural In a society defined by artificial hierarchies and man-made laws, Janie, in the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, struggles to identify the true God amidst many impersonators. Janie first discovers her God in the pear tree blossoming in her backyard. She learns of the bliss of nature; a nature unburdened with societal hierarchies and without a script from which to read. The pear tree is the first glimpse of the all natural, raw God that Janie embraces.

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Their Eyes were watching God, a novel written by African-American female author Zora Neale Hurston in 1937. In the early 20th century in central Florida, The main character is Janie Crawford an African-American woman now in her early forties telling the story of her life to Pheoby Watson on 3 major periods in her life since she last been to Eatonville. Throughout the book, and she is forced into constant movement down roads after being abandoned by her grandmother and her three husbands. This movement allows her the opportunity to explore and form her ideas and voice in solitude. After her experiences, she stops running away from her problems and being silent and notices that her voice can be heard regardless.

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Zora N. Hurston’s 1973 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God wraps up the story of the beautiful, confident, and independent Janie Crawford. The author manages to direct the novel with a circular plot by having the main character, Janie, telling the story of her life to her best friend Pheoby. As it is explained throughout the novel, Janie’s most desired dream is to find true and unconditional love. Throughout the novel, and before finding her real love, Janie experiences love in many ways, but it’s never as fulfilling as she wants it to be. First, Janie’s grandmother’s overprotective and suffocating love blinds her to ignorantly arrange Janie to marry a rich man in order to be economically protected, but this love falls more than short on what

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1014 Words | 5 Pages

She is searching for that special type of love that is symbolized by the coming together of a bee and a blossom on the tree that

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Although their lives were full of challenges and hardships, they had positive aspects as well. Hurston describes Janie in the following quote, "Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches." (Hurston, 8). She uses a metaphor again, and she implies that Janie has different “branches”, some containing good moments in her life and some with bad.

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Zora Neale Hurston as a woman and a writer in Harlem Renaissance Hurston published a surplus of literary works in her lifetime, including “essays, folklore, short stories, novels, plays, articles on anthropology and autobiography”(Aberjhani163), Their Eyes Were Watching God being one of the most widely read. Hurston did not write for the greater political good but rather just for the sake of writing. Many argue her place in the Harlem Renaissance, referring “her flat refusal to politicize her early writings by adopting the prevailing notions driving African-American social reform” (Dawson, Aberjhani, 165). Nevertheless, Hurston wrote influential and powerful works that were broadly read by both races alike.

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In this story “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston I think this story is not a feminist novel. The females/ Women doesn 't have a say so of what they do. The men don 't treat the women with respect but see them as a object to get. Joe does not treat janie right.

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