Their Eyes Were Watching God Quotes and Explanations

“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men. Now, … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God Symbols and Key Facts

Symbols Hair As is the case in many novels with strong African-American characters, hair plays an important role in Their Eyes Were Watching God. To Janie, her hair is a symbol of power and identity. It is representative of her individuality and strength in three ways. Initially, her hair is representative of her independence and refusal to … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God Characters and Analysis

Janie Mae Crawford Janie is the central character of the novel, and she seeks to defy stereotypes. And, while a strong and independent black female, she has strikingly ‘Caucasian-like straight hair’; a trait she has inherited as a result of her mixed ancestry. She further asserts herself by wearing overalls in an era where all … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God Summary

Written by Zora Neale Hurston, the novel and later turned movie Their Eyes Were Watching God is regarded as an important piece of history. While fictitious in nature, the novel is viewed as one of the first major publications ever written by a black woman. It follows the life of attractive and confident African-American woman Janie Crawford … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God: Personal Relationships

Zora Neale Hurston, in keeping with themes dealing with personal relationships and the female search for self-awareness in Their Eyes Were Watching God , has created a heroine in Janie Crawford. In fact, the female perspective is introduced immediately. “Now, women forget all those things they don’t want to remember, and remember everything they don’t … Read more

Pushed, Chosen, And Choosing

Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, was a novel about one womans self-revelation. It began when she was a very young girl, first being pushed, then chosen, and finally choosing. Born a victim of circumstance, Janie was subject to her position in life. She was raised to uphold the standards of the … Read more

New Historicism and Their eyes were Watching God

New Historicism has developed from the “New” Criticism’s inclination to treat works of literature in a historical void, as if a poem or novel had no association to its historical context whatsoever. Political developments in the 1960s, especially a desire on the part of literature professors to figure out how understanding literature might help in … Read more

Zora Neale Hurstons Their Eyes Were Watching God

How is love to influence our lives? Love-struck people do crazy things to express how they care for that particular person yet it is a long and windy road to these actions. It is down this path that experience spawns and trouble and happiness are felt. Janie Crawford of Zora Neale Hurstons Their Eyes Were … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God: Janie Crawford

Janie Crawford, the main character of Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, strives to find her own voice throughout the novel and, in my opinion, she succeeds even though it takes her over thirty years to do it. Each one of her husbands has a different effect on her ability to find that … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God: The Use of Clothing

In the novel Their Eyes were watching God Zora Neale Hurston portrays a woman named Janie’s search for love and freedom. Janie, throughout the novel, bounces through three different marriages, with a brief stint at being a widow in between. Throughout these episodes, Hurston uses Janie`s clothing as a visual bookmark of where Janie is … Read more

Native Son by Wright and Their Eves Were Watching God by Hurston – Compare

This paper examines the drastic differences in literary themes and styles of Richard Wright and Zora Neale Hurston, two African–American writers from the early 1900’s. The portrayals of African-American women by each author are contrasted based on specific examples from their two most prominent novels, Native Son by Wright, and Their Eves Were Watching God … Read more

Searching for an Inner Self

In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston a young girl named Janie begins her life unknown to herself. She searches for the horizon as it illustrates the distance one must travel in order to distinguish between illusion and reality, dream and truth, role and self” (Hemenway 75). She is unaware … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God

In life, we all struggle to understand not only human nature, but ourselves. Its an innate part of human nature, not only to inquire, but to have an instinctive thirst for knowledge. We all wish to determine exactly where our personal horizons end. There are tribes in Africa that do exactly that for three months. … Read more

The Struggle for the Perfect Man

When we find a love interest and have an opportunity to commit to him or her, we usually do, not noting the consequences we may face by doing so. The first few times around, however, the outcome is usually not the one we had expected and hoped for. Theodore Dreiser’s Sister Carrie and Zora Neale … Read more

Repression of Nanny’s Death in Their Eyes Were Watching God

Why did Zora Neale Hurston choose to move away from the subject of Nanny’s death so quickly in Their Eyes Were Watching God? For one, she did it to refrain from revealing any weaknesses in Janie’s character. The book as a whole seems to empower women, especially Janie, the main character. Portraying Janie in mourning, … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God: The Use of Clothing

In the novel Their Eyes were watching God Zora Neale Hurston portrays a woman named Janie’s search for love and freedom. Janie, throughout the novel, bounces through three different marriages, with a brief stint at being a widow in between. Throughout these episodes, Hurston uses Janie’s clothing as a visual bookmark of where Janie is … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God – Finding the Woman in Janie

People grow and develop at different rates. The factors that heavily influence a person’s development seem like heredity and environment. Genetics can play a key role in what kind of person one becomes. Environment seems like the factor that most often and influentially affects a person’s development. The people one meets and the experiences one … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God Essay

Neale Hurston’s work provides the African-American community with a one of the first literary symbols of racial health – a sense of black people as complete, complex, undiminished human beings. Appropriately, Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, published in 1937, provides an enlightening look at the journey of one of these undiminished human beings, Janie … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God

Unlike The Odyssey or any other epic tales, Their Eyes Were Watching God has a different perspective of what a hero is. In this novel, Hurston writes a story about an African-American woman named Janie Crawford whose quest is to find her identity and desire as a human being to be loved and appreciated for … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God Analysis

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie battles to find Individualism within herself. Janie, all her life, had been pushed around and told what to do and how to live her life. She searched and searched high and low to find a peace that makes her whole and makes her feel like a complete person. … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God

In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie Crawford goes on a journey of self-discovery. What does she learn or achieve or fail to learn or fail to achieve on this journey? How do the stylistic devices or choices Hurston makes help the reader better understand Janie’s journey? Establish a central theme … Read more

“Their Eyes Were Watching God”-Analyzed

Janie is the novel’s hero. The story is told in first person as she narrates the story of her life to her friend Pheoby Watson. This is a story of one woman’s search for love in the world. From the beginning of Janies story under the pear tree, she tries desperately to find who she … Read more

Janie’s relationship with Teacake as a central time

Often in stories of self-realization and self-love, there is an incident that is often overlooked. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, such is the case. While many people tend to believe that Janie’s relationship with Teacake was the central time when she realized who she was, Her marriage with Joe Starks is often ignored in … Read more

Janie’s Great Identity Search

In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, there are many lessons on a person’s search for identity. Janie’s search for identity throughout this book is very visible. It has to do with her search for a name, and freedom for herself. As she goes through life her search takes many … Read more

Their Eyes Were Watching God: Personal Relationships

Zora Neale Hurston, in keeping with themes dealing with personal relationships and the female search for self-awareness in Their Eyes Were Watching God , has created a heroine in Janie Crawford. In fact, the female perspective is introduced immediately. “Now, women forget all those things they don’t want to remember, and remember everything they don’t … Read more