Janie’s marriage to Joe Starks is clearly unsuccessful because she is second in his life. In addition, Joe even downgraded his wife for being asked to make a speech, when he responded for her, “Thank you fuh yo’ compliments but mah wife don’t know nothin’ ‘bout no speech makin’. Ah never married her for nothin’ lak dat” (Hurston 43). As a result of this, Janie was pushed farther out of the social circles. Also, by this statement Joe told everyone that Janie was his accessory, and she was only there to look pretty. Janie is this way because as “[t]he wife of the Mayor [she] was not just another woman as she had supposed. She slept with authority and so she was a part of it in the town mind” (Hurston 46). Thus showing she is an addition to Joe,
