SO MANY SYMBOLS

Their Eyes Were Watching God is filled with symbols of all kinds, illustrating the different aspects, accomplishments, and relationships of the novel's main character, Janie.

• pear tree: This represents Janie's blossoming womanhood.
• roots of trees: These represent the African American people during Janie's time that did not have any family roots.
• mule: This represents the black African American women at the time.  They were treated very badly.  During the time in which the novel takes place, women in general did not have the rights they have today; being an African American women meant even worse treatment.
• gate and road: The gate and road represent Janie's search for new opportunity.  Also, it represents the waves and shore; this connects to the metaphor with the ships in the beginning of the novel.
• new horizon: The new horizon, like the gate and road, represent Janie's search for a new start in her life.
• Eatonville general store: The general store represents the center of Eatonville, as well as the "face lift" that Joe Starks gave the town.  The store shows the significance of this newly incorporated black town, which was also the first incorporated black town in the United States.
• lamp post:  The lamp post represents the illumination of Eatonville, African American people, and their culture.
• Joe and Janie's house:  Joe and Janie's house represents their wealth as a couple, as well as Joe's power and significance in Eatonville.
• tobacco spittoon:  The tobacco spittoon also represents Joe's wealth.
• guitar:  The guitar represents the playful side of people, specifically Tea Cake.  He plays the guitar for her, which just creates such a relaxed, playful atmosphere.
• overalls:  The overalls represents the working class, of which Janie became a part during her marriages to Logan and Tea Cake; however, this differed in her marriage to Joe, as he wanted her to stay in the house all the time and not take part in that sort of work.
• headrag:  Janie's head rag represents Janie's bondage to Joe.  He forced her to wear this head rag, as she hated it and did not want to wear it at all.
• long braid:  Janie's long, black, braid represents her freedom as a person, and and as a woman.  It shows that she no longer cares about what people around her think about her.
• packet of seeds:  The packet of seeds represents new life in Janie's life.  Tea Cake has died; however, Janie takes these seeds as a memory with her to Eatonville and moves on with her life.
• checkers: The checkers represent Janie's equality to Tea Cake, as she was not allowed to play them when Joe was alive.
• muck dirt: The dirt of the muck represents also represents the working class, as virtually everyone living in the muck works everyday in the fields.  The dirt also represents the richness and growth in the muck.
• hurricane: The hurricane represents God's almighty power.
• rabid dog: The rabid dog represents the pattern that seems to continue in Janie's life.  Whenever something good comes along for her, something terrible happens.  She was so happy with Tea Cake; however, his dog bite gave him rabies and unfortunately forced Janie to kill him.

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A Perspective on Hurston's Novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God

Zora Neale Hurston is revered today as one of the Harlem Renaissance's most talented writers.  One of her extremely well known novels, Their Eyes Were Watching God, is looked upon today as a literary masterpiece.  It combines the realistic dialect of the southern town in which she lived with the beautiful metaphorical and symbolic language for which Hurston is widely known.  Despite such positive thoughts on the novel today, there were some very harsh reviews of the novel at the time it was written.  These reviews ultimately forced Hurston to stop writing altogether.

Of the harsh African American reviewers is Richard Wright.  Wright, in his 1937 review, said, “The sensory sweep of her novel carries no theme, no message, no thought. In the main, her novel is not addressed to the Negro, but to a white audience whose chauvinistic tastes she knows how to satisfy. She exploits that phase of Negro life which is ‘quaint,’ the phase which evokes a piteous smile on the lips of the ‘superior’ race.”  Wright describes the lack of theme, message, and thought in Hurston’s novel.  He says how Hurston specifically catered to the white race in the writing of this novel.  Perhaps he was looking for an accurate political and social account of African American life at the time, and that was simply not what he got from this novel.

In my opinion, I strongly disagree with Wright’s, as well as other similar reviewers’, account of Their Eyes Were Watching God.  Wright says the novel strongly lacks theme, message, and thought; however, I find it hard to not notice Hurston’s use of beautifully crafted metaphorical and symbolic language, as well as her vivid use of imagery.  I do not think that Hurston goal in writing this novel was to give a politically and socially accurate account of African American life at the time, but rather a story about growing up, love, and coming of age.  Hurston was telling Janie’s story, which was filled with the aforementioned themes, rather than the real-life aspect for which Wright longed.  Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God  is a literary masterpiece in my mind, as well as the minds of so many other people in the literary world.

Richard Wright review: http://people.virginia.edu/~sfr/enam358/wrightrev.html

Image: http://www.answers.com/topic/richard-wright-large-image

"You got to jump at da sun."

Who is Zora Neale Hurston? I'll Tell You! Just Kidding - You're Going to Have to Read On to Find Out.

Zora Neale Hurston

• Zora Neale Hurston was born in 1891 in Notasulga, Alabama.  She was raised in Eatonville, Florida.
• Hurston received an education from Howard University, Bernard College, and Columbia University.
• As a writer of fiction, Hurston is praised for her story telling abilities, her metaphorical language, and her "interest in and celebration of Southern black culture in the United States" (Microsoft Student Encarta).
• One of her best known works is Their Eyes Were Watching God, which was published in 1937.  This novel tells the story of a woman searching for her true identity and a community where she can develop and further explore that identity.
• Hurston also wrote many other novels including Jonah's Gourd Vine, published in 1934; and Seraph on the Suwanee, published in 1948.  She also wrote plays, journal articles, and short stories.  Her autobiograpy, Dust Tracks on a Road, was published in 1942
• Recurring themes of Hurston's work include race and gender.  She related these themes to the search for freedom within the African American community.
• Hurston died in 1960 from miscellaneous health problems.  She died unnoticed and unrecognized by the literary community.
• In the 1970s, the new generation of writers discovered Hurston's work.  One of the most famous writers to take interest in Hurston's work was Alice Walker.
• Becuase of writers like Alice Walker and the newfound of many people in Hurston's writings, many of her writings were rereleased.
• Hurston's work had a great influence on future writers including Ralph Ellison, Alice Walker, and Toni Morrison.

Wasn't that just some wonderful information?  Do you feel enriched?  I sure do.  Anyway, below are some pictures of Zora Neale Hurston.

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/collections/hurston/photo1.html

http://channel2.typepad.com/channel_2/2008/04/zora-neale-hurs.html

http://weallbe.blogspot.com/2008/09/their-eyes-were-watching-god-how-zora.html



**All information was acquired from Microsoft Student Encarta.**