Their Eyes Were Watching God

I posted this blog last week when it was due, but my firefox crashed that day also. I guess when it crashed it didn't post the blog entry, so when I just went on to post for Howl I saw that it didn't work. I'll repost it now, I hope that's ok!

Throughout “Their Eyes Were Watching God,” Janie’s character goes through many periods of personal growth, and changes completely. The book is a tale of self- actualization, and Janie goes through noticeable changes in the stages of her life.
In the beginning of her story, she is a young girl living with her grandmother. The reader is shown her maturation into a young woman. After gazing at a pear tree, Janie realizes she wants to see the world. “She was 16. She had glossy leaves and bursting buds and she wanted to struggle with life but it seemed to elude her. (Page 11)”
When her grandmother marries her off to Logan Killicks, she has a naïve idea that she will fall in love with him. Her grandmother only envisioned financial security, and Janie realized on her own that love wouldn’t happen if it wasn’t meant to be. “Janie’s first dream was dead, so she became a woman. (Page 25)”
When Janie meets Jody she begins to think more for herself. “A feeling of sudden newness and change came over her… Even if Jody was not there waiting for her, the change was bound to do her good. (Page 32)” She realizes that she has to take some control over her life.
Over the years living with Jody, he has basically beat her spirit down until there was nothing left. She began to hide inside of herself, only showing an obedient wife to the public. She finally stands up for herself to Joe, once in the store, and finally on his deathbed. She lectures him saying, “Naw, you gointuh listen tuh me one time befo’ you die. (Page 86)” She found her voice to stand up for herself.
The biggest character change we see is during her time with Tea Cake. Janie is finally happy with herself, and feels both independent, and needed. She realizes how much her life has changed and “Sometimes Janie would think of the old days in the big white house and the store and laugh to herself. (Page 134)” Her life with Tea Cake is the first time she has been able to be her own person.
The evidence of her maturation over the story comes full circle at the end of the book. She has finished telling Phoebe the history of her love life, and there is an apparent change in her attitude, visible to the reader, Phoebe, and most of all, herself. Her most recent love affair was the one she had been searching for since she was a girl, and she finally realized that she was the only one who could make the right choices for herself. She has come to trust her own opinion, and not live by the feelings and judgments of those around her. Basically, Janie has finally become her own person. She summarizes to Phoebe her own thoughts on the whole experience. “So Ah done been tuh de horizon and back now and now Ah kin set heah in my house and live by comparisons. Dis house ain’t so absent of things lak it used tuh be befo’ Tea Cake came along. Its full uh thoughts… (Page 191)”

Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. J.B. Lippincott, Inc., 1937.