Their Eyes Were Watching God Analysis

In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston illustrates the life of a young girl named Janie Crawford; a beautiful mixed girl who was raised by her grandmother around a white family. The events that took place in Janie’s childhood affected who she believed she was. Janie was a stranger to herself and had trouble with her self-identity. The exposition of Janie’s love life started when Janie was sixteen years old and got caught kissing a boy by Nanny. Immediately Nanny married Janie off to an older man named Logan Killicks, he had money and plenty of land for him and Janie to live on.

Zora Neale Hurston’s book Their Eyes Were Watching God explains the journey of Janie Crawford’s life. Janie experiences abuse, sacrifice, and true love throughout different situations in the book. As she goes through each circumstance of life, Janie gains confidence and courage that she does not have in the beginning of the story. Janie’s chief accomplishments in the book are finding freedom and independence despite the situations in which she has to overcome loss and disaster, has to prove her worth to a man, and has to learn to value and accept herself.

Development in people is different for everyone. In order to grow, people need to endure experiences with the people around them and the events that occur, being good or bad. Janie’s three marriages help her mature into a woman. Throughout all of her relationships, Janie learns several important lessons and things about herself, as well as discovering the reality of love. In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie’s marriages to Logan Killicks, Jody Starks, and Tea Cake are essential moments in her life, which play a huge role in her learning experience.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is a novel about an African American woman named Janie, and how her relationships with family and friends affect her life. Two of the most obvious themes throughout the story is Janie’s search for love, and through the process, her finding her independence as a woman.

In many novels, authors have implemented social constructs in order to shape the mood of the books. In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Hurston alludes to social class, especially race, subtly. Hurston’s background of anthropology and growing up as an African-American woman clearly plays a role in the social makeup of the novel. The main character of the novel, Janie, has various experiences in which readers can discover the social structures in her life. Through Janie’s story of self-discovery, Hurston reveals social constructs of the time, especially race and wealth, by including anecdotes, complex characters, and thought-provoking scenes that highlight controversial issues.

Janie’s marriage to Logan Killicks represents the idea that women’s only purpose in society and marriage is doing the work her husband assigns to her. As Logan says, "You ain’t got no particular place. It’s wherever Ah need yuh." (31) In this time period, women,

In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie has allowed the audience to better understand the limitations, and emotional challenges that women had to deal with in a male dominated society. Janie’s relationship with her first husband, Logan Killicks, consisted of tedious, daily routines. Her second husband, Joe Starks, brought her closer to others, than to herself. In her third and final marriage to Tea Cake, she eventually learned how to live her life on her own. Janie suffered through many difficult situations that changed her as a person, and her opinion on love.

From Janie first relationship with Logan Killicks, she only learns a portion of the meaning of marriage. As for many people who end up in their first relationship we don't know what to expect as for Janie she did not know the meaning of love and how it felt. Janie was only 16 years old at the time and is forced to marry logan due to nanny, Janie's grandmother. One day Janie visits her grandmother and says, “Cause you told me Ah mus gointer love him, and, and Ah don't. Maybe of somebody was to tell me how, Ah could do it”(Hurston 23). Janie did not develop the true love until she had met her third husband Tea Cake(Sparknotes). Janie’s and Logan's relationship was more of a financial security rather than love. For a year that Janie and logan were married she was used in the relationship she did not want to be part of. Janie believed

In Zora Neale Hurston’s romantic novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, the heroine Janie, a beautiful mixed white and black woman, is on a journey to find someone who will make her feel love to find her own identity and freedom, away from her spouses. Janie’s marriages and quest for love impede her individual search for freedom, but in doing this she has discovered what exactly she wants for herself. Janie’s search for her identity and freedom is very much evident. Being abused and controlled during her marriages has made it clear how she wants to be treated and how she wants to live her life; as an individual who does not have to listen to anyone. The story opens with Janie’s return to town. Janie tells Phoebe Watson the story of her

At first, Janie thought that loving someone meant you were married to them. Janie believed that she would love Logan because they were married as that was what Nanny had told her. In the few days before she would be with Killicks, Janie thought “Yes, she would love Logan after they were married… Husbands and wives always loved each other” (Hurston 21). Since Nanny had always told her that a marriage would make her happy, that’s what Janie thought. She had no feelings towards Logan, yet she held on to the hope that they appear once they were husband and wife.

But anyhow Janie went on inside to wait for love to begin. The new moon had been up and down three times before she got worried in mind” (22). In a conversation with her grandmother she tells her that she wants to want Logan but she can’t,“ ‘Cause Ah hates de way his head is so long one way and so flat on the sides and dat pone uh fat back uh his neck/ His belly is too big too, now, and his toe-nails look lak mule foot. And ’tain’t nothin’ in de way of him washin’ his feet every night before he come tuh bed’ ” (24). She wants her marriage to work, but she cannot to stand him.

In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie Crawford has an ongoing struggle with how she should live her life: for herself or to please others. The question of “How should I live?” comes up frequently throughout the novel. Through the use of her grandmother and each of her three marriages, Janie gains some insight as to how to live, with her third marriage being the one to fully answer this question. Her mother was young when she had Janie and was not capable of raising a child, so Janie’s grandmother raised her. Her grandmother taught her that the “...white man is de [the] ruler of everything as fur [far] as Ah [I] been able tuh [to] find out” (Hurston 21). This mentality gets passed on to Janie and because of it, Janie has

First, she was married to a man named Logan. This relationship was significant because it first introduced her to thoughts about what love is. Most of her knowledge about what love and marriage was came from her grandma who just wanted the best life for her. All she cared about was the wealth and status Janie’s husband had, but even Janie was so innocent to the meaning of loving someone. “Yes, she would love Logan after they were married” (Hurston 21), This quote is significant because this was her initial thought of what she would feel like because in her mind, she has never loved before, but she’s been taught that husbands and wives love each other no matter what. As that relationship evolved she realized she didn’t genuinely love him. She started to become more of a woman and stood up for herself to Logan. “Janie’s first

In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, a young Janie searches for true love during a time where love is scarce. The story is set around the late 1930’s, where women were expected to dress and act a certain way, while following their husbands every word. At a young age, Janie is exposed to the idea of sex and love, and how they connect to one another. She came to the conclusion that if there was intimacy with a man, then he loved her. Janie has to fight through multiple abusive relationships to find what she truly wants from life, love, and herself. Throughout the story, Janie’s character development is emphasized by the theme of finding one’s identity, and the plot in which she struggles to become an emergent woman.

Zora Neale Hurston’s captivating novel Their Eyes Were Watching God explores the dynamic life of a riveting and challenging protagonist in the post-slavery era Florida. Janie Crawford, a woman with mixed heritage, flaunts her gorgeous caucasian hair and beauty that never seems to age. She defies the cultural norms of the time by marrying on three separate occasions and insisting on her coveted autonomy. Janie amasses many accomplishments throughout the novel which build her intriguing character, and through her many trials and sacrifices, she finally finds herself, independence from the domineering people directing her every move, and true love with Tea Cake. By inserting imagery, figurative language, and diction into the first two paragraphs of Chapter 1 along with the last paragraph of the novel, Hurston creatively introduces and concludes Janie’s enduring journey and precedes and recaps the many sacrifices and accomplishments that Janie experiences.