Analysis of Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston - Book Report/Review Example

Analysis of “Their Eyes Were Watching God “Their eyes were watching God” the story of Janie Crawford, a mixed race girl of black and white heritage in her quest for true love and happiness; the story is framed around a conversation she has with her friend narrating the events of her life. Her grandmother who raised her after her mother ran away forced her to marry an older man Logan Killik under the impression that what the girl needed was security. He was however unromantic and unkind, she left him for Jody Stark an ambitious man who rose to become; mayor postman and the biggest property owner in their town. She however got tired of him too because he repressed her independence and treated her more like a trophy than a person. Although she submits to him, deep down she resents her life and feels being married to him was just like being a servant. After 20 years of marriage, he dies and she marries Tea Cake, a poor but fun loving and adventurers’ man in whom she finds all the love she had been looking for. They move to the everglades where they work as laborers, this relationship is however brutally ended when during the Hurricane Tea Cake is bitten by a rabid dog (“From their Eyes…” 7). Two weeks later she is forced to kill him to defend herself from his psychotic delusional self. After being acquitted for his murder, she finally goes home and the book begins and ends as she retells her story, an act that finally puts her at peace with herself and her late husband. The book touches on several themes that are or relevance to the lives of women of color and the black community in general in the backdrop of recently ended slavery. One of the dominant themes is, Love vs. independence, since the quest for both is the content of most of Janie’s life; she leaves home to search for love but evidently fails to find it in her first husband. She leaves him believing she has found true love in Stark and although in the start it looked like the perfect romance she soon realizes his ambition is far greater than his love for her. It is only with Tea Cake that she finally gets both love and independence since he treats her tenderly and respects her individuality unlike the former husband who repressed her. The theme of gender roles is also explored in the book through the events that shape Janie’s life. He grandmother holds that men are providers and women should be taken care of by them and so married Janie off to an older man. Stark, on the other hand, assumes that being the man in a relationship gives him rights over the woman whom he treasures more so because of her long attractive hair. She is little more than an object to symbolize his achievements that ultimately results in their conflict when she insists on expressing herself. Then there is the covert theme of racial inequality, although not directly addressed, the legacy of slavery can be felt throughout the book. The fact that the blacks are living lowlands nearest to the sea and most vulnerable to hurricane while the white are safe above them is proof of this. Additionally, Jane’s trial which was conducted by an all-white Jury and judge and the covert implication that she may have been acquitted since she was mixed race person who killed a black man. Janie embodies the strength of a woman in a society where women have little power by virtue of both their gender and race. Although the book is primarily about her life and relationships with other people, the central issue is her quest to achieve independence and find love and happiness, all which she does albeit after going through many hardships. Her role in the story is to present to the reader a world in which woman has to struggle to acquire independence and love and shows the suffering that encumbers those who dare to rise above the place picked for them by their racial and gender orientation. It is through her that the reader encounters the reality of chauvinism and the bittersweet quest to find love even if means going against the societal norms. Tea Cake on the other hand acts as a catalyst to Janie’s Growth; he challenges her perceptions of romance and offers new boundaries for her to break such as the fact that he is over a decade younger. Unlike the other men in her life Tea Cake, helps her become independent both directly and indirectly. Ironically, he is the one who taught her to shoot a gun, which she uses to kill him and defend herself. It is however worth noting that although he was critical to her growth; he is not indispensable as is evinced by the fact that his death does not in any way hinder her ultimate realization of independence and happiness. The other characters such as Logan and Jody Stark are important in that they unknowingly spurred her on her journey to independence since they represented everything she disliked about romance and marriage. The book is a profound expression of the injustices and prejudices that women have had to contend with since time immemorial. It evoked a barrage of emotions in me ranging from outrage, sympathy anger, and disappointment and eventually relief after Janie realized her much sought after freedom albeit without a man. I felt I could relate to her struggle to force the world to acknowledge her not through her race or even gender but the strength of her character and her attributes as a person. I am a firm believer of the notion that we are defined by out traits and issues of race and gender are simply biological differences that should never be used to judge someone’s worth. In the “Hurricane”, the book, their eyes were watching God is examined from a variety of perspectives, the most dominant one being racial injustice and inequalities. The essay draws comparisons between how the Hurricane in Hurston’s book and the New Orleans Hurricane Katrina were addressed in the context of the racial factors. In both cases, the Hurricane affected predominantly black communities and the authorities who were predominantly white largely neglected the populace resulting in what the writer feels were preventable deaths (“From their Eyes…” 8). Zora Neale Hurston wrote this book as a commentary of the challenges that encumbers women of color in her time (Bloom 229). She seeks to examine the fate of the few who dare to rise above the stereotypes and shows the reader how society chooses to alienate and even slander them for their effort. This book provides an insight into the way struggle black women have had to undergo in their efforts to realize their independence. A fact engendered by the fact that the main character is slandered and gossiped about by society for simply seeking trying to look for happiness and freedom. (Bloom 230) Examines how the novel seeks to demonstrate how people collectively and as individuals recreate their lives resisting the categorization of societal expectation. They characterize Janie as the embodiment of someone who achieved a rebirth by resisting the definitions of her that society had constructed from their perception of her race and gender. Black women writers like Zora Hurston and Alice walker were profoundly influenced by the social cultural realities of their time and in their writings, they sought to inspire women to break the barriers to their intellectual, personal sexual and economic growth by the society (Bloom 232). These women lived in times when society openly discriminated their gender and their writings are their way or lashing out at the injustice and inspiring women to rise above where society had relegated them. "'Thank yuh fuh yo' compliments, but mah wife don't know nothin' 'bout no speech- makin'.. Ah never married her for nothin' lak dat. She's uh woman and her place is in de home.'" (Hurston 40). These are the words of Jody about his wife and they are evidence of the low esteem to which a woman’s intellectual abilities were held. The quotation bespeak a culture of chauvinism and sexism and elucidate the inequality that pervaded the society, which is why Janie with her intelligence could not ever have happiness with such a man. Works Cited Bloom, Harold, ed. Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York City: Infobase Publishing, 2008. “From their Eyes were Watching God By Zora Neale Hurston”. The Hurricane. n.d. Hurston, Zora, Neale. Dust tracks on a road: An autobiography. Ed. Robert E. Hemenway. University of Illinois Press, 1984. Read More