Zora Neale Hurston presents unique relationships and themes in her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, which assist in the transformation of the main character, Janie, from a naïve adolescent girl into a strong and independent woman. Janie yearned for her freedom and voice, thus she had to adapt and fight to reach that position. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston presents a transformation with the main character Janie through her three marriages to Logan, Joe, and Tea Cake. Janie desired an
In Their Eyes were Watching God, the themes in this novel are plentiful and are very complex. The themes in the novel that are based off of the context are reading are love, innocence, gender, race, and dreams. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, the novel gave off a feminist impression where the common man & woman are equal. The whole idea of a feminist is to not be reliant on the satisfaction and will power of a man. Janie, the main character, throughout the novel she constantly searches for a man
in two works of fiction- Clotel; or, The President’s Daughter: A Narrative of Slave Life in the United States, by William Wells Brown, and Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston. Brown, in his book, presents the life of nineteenth-century slave women and shows the impact of slavery on their love and marriage life. Their Eyes Were Watching God which was written a decade after Brown’s novel, shows how the change in political scenario with the ending of slavery affects the love and marriage
The movie and the book of Their Eyes Were Watching God both tell the story of a young woman’s journey to finding love; however, the movie lacks the depth and meaning behind the importance of Janie’s desire for self-fulfillment. Oprah Winfrey’s version alters the idea from the book Zora Neale Hurston wrote, into a despairing love story for the movie. Winfrey changes Hurston’s story in various ways by omitting significant events and characters, which leads to a different theme than what the novel
“It’s uh known fact, Pheoby, you got tuh go there tuh know there…” (Hurston 192). The theme of identity can be seen throughout Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, of a story of a women’s journey for self-identification. Through symbolic imagery, such as the pear tree, Janie’s hair, and the horizon, Hurston ultimately shows a women’s quest for her identity. As a young teenager, Janie becomes infatuated with the idea of an idealistic romance: “She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the
Their Eyes Are Watching God is written by Zora Neal Hurston. The novel is written during the period known as the Harlem Renaissance. During the Harlem Renaissance African American culture began the flourish. People were beginning to recognize and support African American; however, there were still laws against African Americans and people were still prejudice towards them. Their Eyes Are Watching God is a story about a woman, Janie Crawford, who was divorced two times before she fell madly in love
Use of the Southern Black Vernacular in Their Eyes Were Watching God "The monstropolous beast had left his bed. The two hundred miles an hour wind had loosed his chains. He seized hold of his dikes and ran forward until he met the quarters; uprooted them like grass and rushed on after his supposed-to-be conquerors, rolling the dikes, rolling the houses, rolling the people in the houses along with other timbers. The sea was walking the earth with a heavy heel. ‘De’ lake is comin’!’ Tea Cake gasped
's Their Eyes Were Watching God). Nanny forced Janie into a hasty marriage with Mr. Logan Killicks, who Nanny believed would be the most decent option for Janie, as he was financially stable and owned sixty acres of farmland (Haurykiewicz). However, Janie did not wish to be in a loveless marriage and pleaded, “Ah ain’t gointuh do it no mo’, Nanny. Please don’t make me marry Mr. Killicks” (Hurston, 14). Janie eventually yielded to Nanny’s request
“Their eyes were watching god” is a poetic novel, and it is the first black literature, which is showing the black women’s feminine consciousness awakening work, and as a milestone significance in black female literature creation. The novel describes the revolt against the bondage of traditional customs, and Janie also tries for human rights of her own life. Traditionally, the black women as a group of society, women’s social status are much lower than any others group. In the “Their eyes were watching
Zora Neale Hurston, author of Their Eyes Were Watching God, presents many different symbols that all relatively revolve around two things; love and the fulfillment of Janie’s life. Janie frequently refers back to many things to guide her life, but her grandmother, “Nanny”, was the most prevalent of them all. As a child Janie spent almost all her time with Nanny who set guidelines for her. Nanny attempted to mold Janie’s mind to teach her to fend for herself, but to also find a man who could provide