Their Eyes Were Watching God Literary Analysis

Improved Essays
As an author of the time in being, was a time many writers wrote about their opinions or ideas into their stories about the society. In the story of Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, the main character, Janie, is trying to find herself as one whole person and what she truly wants to be. She is awaking as a women but stumbles over the men that try to silence her. When she was young she married a man named Logan Killicks, who treats her poorly as if she was a mule. Soon she leaves Killicks and runs away with a man named Jody (Joe) Starks. Joe turns out to be an ambitious person but very controlling. When Joe dies after a long twenty year marriage, Janie meets Tea Cake. Tea Cake was a natural man and does whatever he please to …show more content…
Janie’s metaphor of her grandmother took the “biggest thing God ever made” and twisted it enough for her not being able to handle things the way she wanted for herself. As time goes by and learning from experience and life lessons, Janie was able to say “been horizon and back”. Showing she has completed her finding of her horizon: “So Ah’m back home agin and Ah’m satisfied tuh be heah. Ah done been tuh de horizon and back and now Ah kin set heah in mah house and live by comparisons” (191). She has found herself as a whole and lived to the fullest of her life without any regrets. From learning with experience during her lifetime and meeting her goal. Towards the end of the story, Janie shows that she is accepting her natural self after finishing her long adventure to the horizon: “Here was peace. She pulled in her horizon like a great fish-net. Pulled it from around the waist of the world and draped it over her shoulder. So much of life in its meshes! She called in her soul to come and see” (193). Being able to be in her horizon, she is once again one with nature. Found out her true identity with her natural voice. She has completed her life because she found the true meaning in life and is no longer in need of searching …show more content…
After Tea Cake’s death, Janie decides to come home but does not act or dress traditional like a women should but she does not show in any care: “What she doin coming back here in dem overhalls? Can’t she find no dress to put on?--Where’s dat blue satin dress she left in?...Betcha he off wid some gal so young she ain’t even got no hairs- why she don’t stay in her class?--” (2). Judging what she is wearing and has done with her life previously, she is now confident and knows who she is and what she wants, which is being a natural women. Being completely herself and does not care what the society thinks. Janie begins to talk to her grandmother about how she does not love Killicks like she wants to and does not know how to make it any better. She rather relax and enjoy life but knows that is not the proper way in the society and stays married to him:“Ah want things sweet wid mah marriage lak when you sit under a pear tree and think. Ah…” (24). After telling her grandmother how she felt and wants to feel, her grandmother encourage her to stay with him and accept the fact that marriage is not always happy. Janie dreams what she wants and says what she wants but with some lack of confidence, she walks away from the idea and continues her

Related Documents

  • Superior Essays

    In Zora Neale Hurston’s famous novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston explores the life of a southern black woman, Janie Crawford whose three marriages of domineering control of men make her acknowledge her independence and self-satisfaction as an African-American woman. Set in the early 1900s, Hurston reveals the dominant role of men in southern society and one woman’s journey toward finding herself and God. Summary: Janie Crawford is a southern African-American woman who grows up under the care of her grandmother.…

    • 1938 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Janie didn’t know if it was her isolation feeling, or if she was intrigued by this man. They spent most of their days and nights together for a couple weeks. Janie, talking with Pheoby, brings up the idea of selling the store and going off to get married with Tea Cake. Soon enough, the smooth talking Tea Cake is married to Janie. She had a scare after they arrived in Jacksonville though.…

    • 1122 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Yet, manages to steal money from her behind her back and spends it on who knows what because I didn’t believe that whole story he told her. However, he does repay it but the fact is that he stole it that alone would tell me that there is no trust in this man. They do live a nice life for the most part and Tea Cake was very different from the other two men that Janie had been with. In Tea Cake, she finds a creative and vivacious personality who enjoys probing the world around him and respects Janie’s need to develop. Janie had begun to build up her pride towards the end of her relationship with Jody and Tea cake just helps her to continue to find…

    • 1035 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie achieves independence via the development of her voice during the obstacles of her relationship. Janie’s first relationship obstacle arrives in her marriage to Logan Killick’s. Janie realizes that the absence of love in their relationship is causing issues. While tensions begin to run high, Janie provokes Logan about her leaving him, he exclaims “God damn yo’ hide!”…

    • 798 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Janie Christ Figure

    • 1118 Words
    • 5 Pages

    1. Is Janie or Tea Cake a Christ figure? Choose one and argue for or against this, providing details from the novel to support your answer. Overall in my opinion I think Tea Cake was the Christ figure. He portrayed these characteristic by a lot of things.…

    • 1118 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    In Their Eyes were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie, a long-haired beauty, struggled with finding herself in marriages where constant society and personal pressures forced her into certain roles in life she never expected. Throughout the book Janie struggles with being herself versus pleasing the man she is with. When Janie marries Logan she is still an innocent young girl, this innocence is stripped away with the realization of what it means to be married and live under the control of a dominant man. There is a continuation of this within her second marriage when she emotionally detaches herself from the world in order to cope with her dehumanization by Jody. It is not until he dies and she meets Tea Cake that her relationship becomes…

    • 1721 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Superior Essays

    The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston is about a woman who is searching for love and a happy relationship. This novel takes place in West Florida, Eatonville, Florida, and the Everglades during the 1900s. In Their Eyes Were Watching God Janie is a woman who grew up in West Florida and has been in several relationships since her childhood. Her first relationship was with an older man named Logan Killicks but this marriage went sour and she left him for another man around Janie’s age named Joe Starks. Janie and Joe’s relationship lasted a long while however this marriage ended when Joe passed away.…

    • 983 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Great Essays

    The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston revolves around one woman, Janie, on her journey to self-discovery. Janie loses herself amidst the chaos that is society and must struggle through difficult circumstances and through many long years before she finds what she is looking for. Janie is not only searching for herself, she is on that universal quest all people must make in order to understand life. She says, “Two things everybody’s got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves”(Hurston 192).…

    • 2245 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Their Eyes Were Watching God By: Zora Neale Hurston LAP TOPIC #1 Written by: Jason Gutierrez African American are portrayed as the “ignorant” scum of society, the slaves to their own race and the epitome of human suffering. They have the vision of becoming equal to those that had once influenced them. Having that motivation creates the need of pursuing answers through life experiences and the ideals of those that surround the goal of ascending to a new level. In the literary novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston, it is illustrated how the African-Americans are not as simple as once portrayed.…

    • 1315 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    Their Eyes Were Watching God and The Namesake - Compare and Contrast Essay Experiences and overcoming conflicts can either help one achieve self realization or hinder their view of himself. In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake, both Janie and Gogol Ganguli struggle to find their true identity due to a lack of support from their relationships, societal discrimination and negative experiences. Ultimately, both Janie and Gogol are able to overcome these obstacles through determination which helps them achieve self-realization.…

    • 1845 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Great Essays

    A compassionate, loving, and more importantly a caring husband. Janie feels that she has truly found happiness not only within herself, but also within Tea Cake. Although all good things must come to an end. As Tea Cake’s life ends, Janie begins a new one. “Janie buried Tea Cake in Palm Beach……

    • 1055 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    In Zora Neal Hurston’s, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie went through a series of metaphorical stages that transformed the way she viewed life; her journey towards independence required her to depart from Logan, battle for her voice with Jody, and finally to achieve individuality with Teacake. Throughout Janie and Jody’s relationship, Janie was constantly silenced by Jody’s dominating personality. Jody treats Janie as if she were an animal that has no mind. For example, Jody silenced Janie by saying “Thank yuh fuh yo’ compliments, but mah wife don’t know nothin’ ‘bout no speech-makin’.…

    • 461 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As some women are silenced, others preserver to gain an independent and influential voice. Their Eyes Were Watching God is a novel that shows the journey of Janie Crawford from a girl to a woman. In a time of patriarchy women are often silenced of their opinion and are controlled by a man’s fist. Janie Crawford attempts to break the precedent of society that men dominate. Throughout the novel the readers can see Janie’s progression in acquiring a voice and controlling it.…

    • 1035 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The American Dream is a broad supposition in which it varies amongst many particular individuals. Many people conceptualize it as being successful and wealthy, meanwhile others hypothesize it to be content and stable. Most of the times, the cases of which the American dream is portrayed usually is dependant on the race, ethnicity, and age of that certain individual. Some latino US citizens would say that their American dream is to buy a house and be contently stable in a state of alacrity, meanwhile some white US citizens would say it to be prosperous and well-living. It varies on whoever the specific individual is.…

    • 1265 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The very first page of the book “Their eyes were watching God” would be more fitting as the final narrative of the book instead of the introduction because it ties everything together in the book. It can be described as sort of a preluding to the events that are about to take place. In the first paragraph Janie describe the differences in the dreams of Men and women. In which it describes as men always watchers of the horizon over the sea always looking for their boat to take them there. While women always remember what they want to and forget what they don’t want to remember.…

    • 390 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays