Leo Rosten once said, "Money can't buy happiness." Janie from Zora Neale Hurston's, Their Eyes Were Watching God, would agree with this famous quote. Janie's first husband is financially stable and her second husband is powerful; but it is with her third marriage where she finally experiences happiness and receives respect. Through the first two marriages, we see how worldly desires and pride can ruin a relationship. Ultimately, Hurston portrays that equality in a relationship truly nourishes a bond far more valuable that materialistic possessions or reputations. Janie in her first marriage is her far from mesmerized with her husband's 60 acre land. The incompatibility between her and Logan ultimately cause the marriage to fail. Logan being described as old and ugly is in contrast to the beautiful young Janie. With the age difference comes the difference in perspectives. Logan's first wife obviously held her own weight: "Mah fust wife never bothered me 'bout choppin' no wood nohow. She'd grab dat ax and sling chaps lak uh man" (Hurston 26). He implies that Janie should be more like his first wife and that she needs to be more helpful around the house. Janie thinks otherwise: "You don't need mah help out dere, Logan. Youse in yo' place and Ah'm in mine" (Hurston 31). Janie thinks this way because that is the way she was taught. At this point, she starts realizing that he is seeing her more as an object rather than a person. Granny really took care of her and so Logan implying that she needs to work harder is something that bothers her. Janie fails to experience the love that she expects comes with marriage especially when Logan stops "talking in rhymes" (Hurston, 26 ) to her not far into the relationship. As a young woman, feeling... ... middle of paper ... ...he difference is that is that Logan wants her to work because he sees her as an object who should be grateful and Joe wants her to work in the store so that he can display her. Tea Cake wants her to work alongside him because he genuinely wants to be with her: "Ah gits lonesome out dere all day 'thout yuh" (Hurston 133). Instead of demanding her to work, he asks her. This gives her a chance to actually do something of her own free will; which is a huge thing for Janie. Hurston uses Janie and Tea Cake's relationship to establish the message that respect can do wonders in a marriage. When there is understanding and equality, a healthy relationship will surely form. Money and power will provide temporary happiness; whereas, Tea Cake makes Janie feel the type of happiness only true love can bring. She's finally getting to feel the idealized love she has always wanted.
In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie Crawford the main character goes through some big changes. Throughout this book Janie struggles to find her inner voice and purpose of love. She looks high and low for a sign of what love really is and she finds it as being the pear tree. The pear tree is very symbolic and ultimately shows Janie what love is and how it should be in a healthy relationship. This tree, with the bees pollinating the blossoms, helps Janie realize that love should be very mutual and each person needs to provide for the other equally. Janie tries to find this special kind of love through her three husbands, but she comes to realize it is going to be much harder then she expected. Each one of Janie’s husbands are a stepping stone for her finding her voice.
TeaCake makes no promises to Janie and has nothing to offer her except his love, making him different from his previous counterparts who promised to meet her every want and need but fails extremely short of their goal. Janie has low expectations for the relationship, and is proven mistaken when he gives her what she truly desires. TeaCake 's loving fidelity and simple but true love for her is a relief to Janie after her previous marriage confinements. She feels completely free to do as she pleases without losing her feelings of love as she did in her relationships with Joe and Logan. As Janie and Tea Cake bond, Janie sees that TeaCake, a younger man with no richness, knows, accepts, and values her as no one else has ever done. Tea Cake is the only man Janie marries who cannot does not claim or insist to protect or solely provide for her. But Joe still takes a great deal of responsibility in the relationship. Janie also rightfully believes that who a person is, is more important than what he has. Only after Janie starts to trust Tea Cake, does Janie begin to free herself, and in fact feel eager, to tell her friend Pheoby all that has happened since she left Eatonville. Tea Cake 's love, acceptance, and understanding frees Janie to reveal her uniqueness, through non restricted language, and with a mature, confident, real presence. Janie easily leaves her elevated position in the community to start a new life with TeaCake. Hurston hints that the pursuit of individual aspirations can bring mental freedom, much more valuable than wealth. Regardless of obvious differences in age and social status Janie finally seems to have found true love in
Hurston uses ethos to show that Tea Cake was Janie’s best husband even though society thinks other wise. Tea Cake thinks that he will treat and show Janie a better time in life than any man has ever did. “Ah tell you lak you told me--you’se mighty hard tuh satisfy. Ah betcha dem lips don't satisfy yuh neither(page.103).” Tea Cake was telling Janie that she put on the show that she is hard to please but truly it only takes the right things to make her pleased. He felt that most of the things that Janie was doing was a show. Society felt that Tea Cake was playing Janie and Janie was taking chances falling in love with Tea Cake. “You doin right not tuh talk it, but Janie, you’se takin’ uuh mighty big chance(page.115).” Janie was having a discussion and they were telling her that she was taking a chance running off with Tea Cake. Phoebe feels as if Tea Cake is just a bomb ready to explode in Janie face. Janie felt that Tea Cake was the true love that she was always looking for in her life. “He done showed me where it’s de thought dat makes de difference in age(page.115).” Tea Cake changes janie’s whole train of thought around , so there had to be some love somewhere to make someone change their mind. Janie was really in love with Tea Cake.
As a husband, He treated her with respect and love, unlike Joe Sparks. Also, he did not see her as one of his possessions to be seen and never heard, instead he saw her a person capable to learning and understanding. He taught her how to play checkers, handle guns and listened to her opinions. Tea Cakes also had a much different personality from Joe Starks. He was just as hardworking as Joe Starks, but his ambition is not channeled to acquiring more possessions and power. He was content with what he has and strove to provide for him and his wife. While married to Tea Cakes, Janie was able to express herself be free and independent. She was treated with respect and not inferiority hence she is able to make her own decisions for herself and grow as an
Zora Neale Hurston was a very prestigious and effective writer who wrote a controversial novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God. Janie whom is the dynamic character, faces many hardships throughout her life. Janie’s Nanny always told Janie who she should be with. Janie was never truly contented because she felt she was being constricted from her wants and dreams. Janie’s first two marriages were a failure. Throughout the novel, Janie mentions that her dreams have been killed. Janie is saying that men that have been involved and a part of her life have mistreated and underappreciated her doings. The death of her dreams factor Janie’s perception on men and her feelings of the future. Logan and Jody were the men who gave her such a negative attitude towards marriage. Once Tea Cake came along, Janie realized that there are men out there that will appreciate her for who she is. Janie throughout the novel, comes into contact with many obstacles that alter her perspective on men and life overall.
While conversing with the naive Janie, Nanny declares, “Tain’t Logan Killicks Ah wants you to have, baby, it’s protection” (15). By referring to Janie as “baby,” Hurston utilizes a childish connotation to exaggerate Janie’s ignorance of marriage. Preparing for the potentially disastrous future, Nanny impregnates security as a top priority for Janie instilling that a prudent marriage will lead to love. Accommodating to her grandmother’s desires, Janie marries Logan. Through this union, Janie assumes an emotional attraction will coincide; however, Janie’s perception of love depreciates as Nanny equates affection to material wealth explaining how Logan “got a house bought and paid for and sixty acres uh land right on de big road... Dis
Throughout the novel Janie must discover what she thinks is important in regards to love such as innocence, understanding and openness, which she associates with the actual meaning of true love. Through the various marriages in Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the novel suggests that stability is irrelevant in comparison to true love.
Zora Hurston's character, Janie has already had two husbands. After being widowed by Joe, her second husband, Janie is content to be alone and says, “This freedom feeling is fine. These men didn't represent a thing she wanted to know about. She had already experienced them through Logan and Joe.” (Hurston 90). Janie is content being single and she does not plan on entering into another relationship. She finally achieves independence and is enjoying all the freedom that it encompasses. All of the appreciation that Janie has for her liberty is quickly abandoned for love when Janie meets Tea Cake, who is twelve years her junior. Now, Janie is married for the third time and her relationship with Tea Cake is the only marriage is actually if full of true love. The novel describes, “He drifted off into sl...
The pair love each other unconditionally and continuously prove the depth of their connection. Through unfortunate circumstances, Tea Cake teaches Janie about sacrifice:
Janie’s first relationship was with Logan Killicks. She married him only because she wanted to appease her grandmother. Logan did not truly love Janie, but saw her as an asset to increase his own power. Logan expressed this through several actions. He first tries to use her to "increase his profits" rather than treating her as a wife when he travels to Lake City to buy a second mule so Janie can use it to plow in the potato field because potatoes were "bringin' big prices”. When Janie later refused to work at his command, stating that it was not her place to do so, Logan told her, "You ain't got no particular place. It's wherever Ah need yuh". After Logan told her this, Janie decided she had to either escape or face becoming her husband's mule for life. Janie stood up to her husband. This is a feminist action because Janie is willing to leave a husband who makes her unhappy, which was rare act of independence and defiance for women living in the 1930’s. To free herself from her marriage with Logan Killicks, she only needed to invalidate the elements of his symbolic vision. She recognized that for Killicks marriage was primarily a financial arrangement, and his sixty acres acted both as a sign and guarantee of matrimonial un...
First, Janie married Logan Killicks. Janie never wanted to marry Logan she only did it to keep nanny satisfied. Janie believes, “Some folks never were meant to be loved and he’s one of them” (Hurston 24). Janie felt as that Logan just wasn’t the person that she wanted to love. Logan was old and not attractive enough for Janie. When Nanny was still alive, Logan tried to treat Janie the best way he could, but, right after Nanny died, the pampering stopped and the emotional and mental abuse started. Later, he started expecting more from her. Logan cared about Janie but in his own abusive way. He saw Janie as someone who was to work for him on the farm. Logan always wanted Janie to help him with everything he was supposed to do and then he still wanted her to make dinner for
Janie’s first marriage, to farmer Logan Killicks, is planned and executed by Janie’s well-intentioned grandmother, Nanny. Unfortunately, Nanny's plan doesn't go so well. In this marriage, Janie chafes under the uninspired but reliable Logan. The author Zora shows feminist by saying, "Janie!" Logan called harshly. "Come help me move dis manure pile befo’ de sun gits hot. You don’t take a bit of interest in dis place. ‘Tain’t no use in foolin’ round in dat kitchen all day long…" (chapter 5). Despite her chafing under Logan’s rule, Janie does indeed want boundaries. She likes to think of her I"place" in the house, reigning over a domestic sphere. This is her comfort zone. However, Logan’s definition of her place is, ironically, far more confining. He says that her place is wherever he needs her. So, in effect, he wants to strip her identity and freedom.
Janie’s three marriages were all different, each one brought her in for a different reason, and each one had something different to teach her. In summary, she married Logan because of her grandmother, Jody because she wanted to escape from Logan, and Tea Cake because they had true love. The marriages were different in that Logan treated Janie like a Slave, Joe was moulding her into what he wanted her to be, and Tea Cake just wanted to be with her. As a result, Janie learned many things from each marriage Tea Cake taught her to be herself and do what she wanted to, her marriage with Logan taught her to make changes in her life, and her marriage with Joe taught her to stand up for herself. In conclusion, her experiences in her marriages shaped her into the person she became, and were an important part of her life.
In the beginning, she does not know of this mystic beauty. “She marveled when she saw a bee in the center of bloom to extract pollen in her grandmother’s backyard where she [found] the concept of love and marriage” (Sutirah). Even here, before she experiences true love, the idea of it impacts her as to create her ultimate pursuit. The worry and dissatisfaction she suffers through in her first marriage come as a result of her inability to love him. “Janie went on inside to wait for love begin. The new moon had been up and down three times before she got worried in her mind… Cause you told me Ah mus gointer love him, and, and Ah don’t” (Hurston, 25 & 27). In anticipation of finding love, she leaves him for her second husband Joe Starks. However, their marriage is one of image, not love. When Joe dies, she resists the temptations of other men pursuing her because she knows they cannot give her true love. However, from the moment she meets Tea Cake, her relationship with him is different than any other relationship she knew. Her reward is that mystic beauty she strives for her entire life. The impacts of her quest last from before she knew marriage to beyond her true love’s death. Her first two marriages prove fruitless, but fade away after she finds the man of her dreams. Tea Cake is her true love; he is the bee to her blossom; he is the man who changes her life. He
Janie was married to three unlike husband wish all of them were not the same and but in one way or another help Janie to find her own needs and objectives in life. Hurston state that Janie was only sixteen when she married her first husband Logan Killicks. Janie’s grandmother tucks Janie in believing that love will come in time. Janie was not interested in Mr. Killicks. “an ain’t gointuh do it no mo’ Nanny. Please don’t ‘make me marry Mr. Killicks. She begs her grandmother not to marry her with Mr. Killicks but, her request was in vein Nanny did not listen to Janie. Janie spoke with disgust about Mr. Killicks when her grandmother mentions his name this is one of those not admired by Janie, his appearance did not call Janie’s attention and his huge age difference and because “He look like som ole skullhead inde grave yard.” (Hurston 13) Despite the fact that Janie didn’t wanted that marriage Hurston stated that Janie “finally out of Nanny’s talk and her own conjectures she made a sort of comfort for herself. Yes, she would love Logan after they were married.” (Hurston 21) Janie convinces with the story her grandmother told her give in to getting married to Mr. Killicks. The marriage was arranged and Janie and Logon got married in Nanny’s parlor. Janie was not receiving the love that a married couple would have but she did receive verbal and treats from her first husband.