Theme Many times the love that a person is looking for is the one that a person doesn’t realize.

Setting The author begins and ends the book on a porch where Janie is telling her story to her friend Pheobe Watson.  The book begins in the morning on the porch and then ends at night, symbolic of beginning and end.   In between these two times Janie is telling her story which travels through the state of Florida.

Style In this book, Hurston writes in the dielect of the black community of the time.  Many of the words are slang.  Hurston begins the story with Janie telling it, but then it becomes a third person narrative throughout most of the story.

Theme Many times the love that a person is looking for is the one that a person doesn’t realize.

Characters Lee Coker – Lee Coker lives in Eatonville. He was one of the first people to meet Jody and Janie.

Coodemay and Dick Sterrett – Coodemay and Sterrett were friends of Tea Cake and Janie in the Everglades. One night they went to Mrs. Turner’s restaurant while they were drunk. When they started causing trouble, Tea Cake made a big show of throwing them out. The crowd began to take sides, so a great deal of property damage took place in the process. Coodemay survives the hurricane; Sterett does not.

Janie Crawford – Janie Crawford is the protagonist of the novel. She was raised by her grandmother, Nanny. She wanted to define her identity on her own terms, but Nanny coerced her into marrying Logan Killicks. She valued financial security over love. However, Janie was miserable in her first marriage. She left Logan to marry Jody Starks. Jody refused to allow Janie to make her own decisions, so their marriage turns out unhappily as well. After Jody’s death, Janie married Tea Cake. Through Tea Cake, Janie enjoyed her first real love. She grew beyond what other people wanted her to be and experienced her first taste of real freedom.

Leafy Crawford – Leafy Crawford was Janie’s mother. She was born shortly before the end of the Civil War. Master Roberts, the white slave owner who owned Nanny, was her father. When Master Roberts’ wife threatened to sell Leafy and punish Nanny for her relationship with Master Roberts, Nanny fled to the swamps. She hid there with her child until the slaves were declared free. Nanny dreamed that her child would have respectability and financial security. That dream ended when Leafy was raped by her schoolteacher at age seventeen. She became pregnant with Janie and ran away.

Nanny Crawford – Nanny Crawford was Janie’s grandmother. She raised Janie from infancy. Because she was a former slave, Nanny believed in the value of financial security and respectibality. Therefore, she coerced Janie into marrying Logan Killicks when she was still in her teens.

Captain Eaton – Captain Eaton was one of the donors of Eatonville’s original fifty acres of land. When Jody first arrived in Eatonville, he made a big show paying cash to him for an additional two hundred acres.

Amos Hicks – Amos Hicks lives in Eatonville, Florida. He was one of the first people to meet Janie and Jody. He tried to lure Janie away from Jody with no success.

Logan Killicks – Logan Killicks was Janie’s first husband. Nanny coerced Janie into marrying him because she valued financial security and respectability over love. Logan pampered Janie for a year before he tried to make her help him with the farming work. Janie left him for Jody Starks.

Lias – Lias was one of Tea Cake and Janie’s friends in the Everglades. When he fled an on-coming hurricane, he offered to drive Janie and Tea Cake to Palm Beach, but Tea Cake turned him down. He survived the hurricane.

Master Roberts – Master Roberts owned Nanny before slavery was abolished. He was Leafy’s father.

Motor Boat – Motor Boat was one of Tea Cake and Janie’s friends in the Everglades. He fled the Everglades with them during a terrible hurricane. They took refuge in an abandoned house. Motor Boat stayed in the house while Janie and Tea Cake fled east to escape the rising waters. The house was ripped from its foundations and carried for several miles by the water, but Motor Boat slept through the entire thing.

Doctor Simmons – Doctor Simmons diagnosed Tea Cake with rabies. He testified on Janie’s behalf during her murder trial for killing Tea Cake.

Jody Starks – Jody Starks was Janie’s second husband. He traveled to Eatonville because he wanted to have a “big voice.” Jody was a consummate politician, so he grew wealthy and powerful over the years. He was the Post Master, Mayor, storekeeper, and biggest landlord in Eatonville. He regarded Janie as a reflection of his wealth and status, so he dictated her every move.

Johnny Taylor – When Janie was sixteen, she embarked on a sexual awakening. Johnny Taylor was a poor young man who lived in the area. Janie allowed him to kiss her over the fence. Unfortunately, Nanny saw everything. She coerced Janie into marrying Logan Killicks for fear that some shiftless man would ruin Janie’s chances at wealth and respectability.

Tea Cake – Tea Cake was Janie’s third husband, and her first real love. His real name was Vergible Woods and he was twelve years younger than her. He did not try to make her be anything other than herself, and took a romantic approach to courting her. People congregated at their home in the everglades for music and company. Two years after they were married, Tea Cake was bitten by a rabid dog during their flight from a terrible hurricane. Three weeks later, he fell ill with rabies. During one of his diseased fits, he became convinced Janie was cheating on him, and threatened to shoot her. She was forced to kill him to save her own life.

Mrs. Tony – Mrs. Tony lives in Eatonville. For some reason, she had a grudge against her husband. She embarassed him by begging for food from Jody, claiming that she and her children were starving. The other men on the porch declared that they would kill any wife that embarrassed them like that.

Mr. and Mrs. Turner – Mr. and Mrs. Turner lived in the Everglades where Mrs. Turner ran an eating place. She prided herself on her Caucasian features and disdained anyone who was darker than she. She became friends with Janie because Janie had light skin and long hair. She couldn’t understand why a woman like Janie would marry a man as dark as Tea Cake. She wanted to introduce Janie to her brother. Tea Cake was furious that she insulted him behind her back.

He was afraid that Mrs. Turner would turn Janie against him and succeed in marrying Janie to her brother. He resolved to tell Mr. Turner to keep his wife away from Janie. However, when he saw how cowed and meek Mr. Turner was, he chose to remain silent. When Dick Sterrett and Coodemay later came to Mrs. Turner’s restaurant, they were drunk. They started to make trouble, so Tea Cake made a big show out of throwing them out. The crowd began to take sides, so Mrs. Turner’s establishment was badly damaged. She chose to move where people were more “civilized.”

Annie Tyler and Who Flung – Annie Tyler was a wealthy widow who lived in Eatonville. She became engaged to Who Flung, a much younger man. Who Flung took her money and fled at the first opportunity. Early in her marriage to Tea Cake, Janie feared that he would turn out to be like Who Flung..

Mr. and Mrs. Washburn – Mr. and Mrs. Washburn were Nanny’s employers after she became a free woman. She lived in a house in their backyard.

Pheoby Watson – Pheoby Watson is Janie’s best friend in Eatonville. When Janie returns alone from the Everglades, the crowd of people on her porch begin to speculate that Tea Cake left her and took her money the way Who Flung conned Annie Tyler. Pheoby admonishes them for their mean-spirited gossip. She takes a plate of food to Janie and listens as Janie narrates the story of her life. After Janie finishes her story, Pheoby wants her husband, Sam, to treat her like Tea Cake treated Janie.

Sam Watson – Sam Watson is Pheoby’s husband. He acknowledged that Jody was overbearing and commanding when some of the Eatonville residents began to express their resentment against him. However, he pointed out that Jody had also instigated a lot of improvements in the town.

The novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston tells the inspiring story of Janie Crawford. Janie is an African-American woman raised in rural west Florida by her ex-slave grandmother. Throughout the novel, Zora Hurston transforms the reader into a participant in Janies life. She brings the harsh realities and joys that Janie experiences to life by telling the stories of Janies three marriages, and then the ultimate realization that she discovers at the end of the novel. I feel that Janie matures into a complete being through her three marriages.

Her first marriage to Logan Killicks demonstrates her immaturity as a sixteen year old when she marries because everyone else believes that the time and partner are right. Her second marriage results from Jody Starkss insistence and from the hope that her second marriage will lead to the love that she desires. The third marriage develops because Janie knows in her heart that she loves Tea Cake, and that she wants to be his wife. Through each marriage I believe that Janie learns valuable lessons, moves on to progressively better relationship, and then ultimately realizes that a person has to live their own life to feel truly fulfilled.

Janies first marriage is to the desecrating vision of the pear tree, Logan Killicks (13). Logan is a landowner, respected by most in Janies small town. Nanny arranges the marriage so that Janie has the stability in life that Nanny never possessed. Yet, I think that Janie, being given stability at the young age of sixteen, feels stifled. She learns that marriage did not make love. (24) For Janie to be a proper wife,” she would have to learn that Logan will treat her like a mule in the fields, and that he would never mention nothin pretty (23).

I feel that as Janie realizes that her relationship with Logan will never bring her ship into the port. After deciding not to accept crushed dreams, Janie shows that she will continue a quest for true love by escaping with Joe Starks and his ideals of prosperity. Janies second marriage to Joe Starks is one based upon materialism and status. From the start of the relationship, I think Janie knows Joe is not concerned with her emotional happiness as much he is with his ability to show his love for her through material items.

This need to show this is first seen on the train when Joe didnt make many speeches with rhymes to her, but he bought her the best things the butcher had. (32). Joe is concerned greatly with his status in town as a mayor. The best thing that Joe feels that he can give to Janie is the privilege of allowing her to be called, Mrs. Mayor (43). However, Janie needs someone who will treat her as an equal, allow her to speak with people in the community, and treat her as a human being. After being widowed by Joe Starks, Janie meets the man who would exemplify what she was dreaming about as she sat under the pear tree.

Tea Cake has neither the financial stability nor the high social status that Janies first two husbands possessed, yet the gifts that he gives to Janie are worth so much more. He possesses an open mind that allows Janie to escape from peoples expectations for her. I think that Tea Cake is an essential part of Janies mission to find herself. He allows her to decide what she truly wants out of life and helps her to break through the limitations of stability and security that Nanny had originally imposed.

As Janie removes suppression of her ability to express herself, she allows herself to have fun with Tea Cake in their relationship. However, Tea Cake is only a temporary existence in Janies life. Although Tea Cake’s death is upsetting for Janie, she comes out of it a stronger woman. Although Janie ends the novel with no man in her life, through her experiences with her three husbands, she develops enough strength to be secure. She discovers that she does not need a man to help bring her ship in with the tide. She has gained enough strength to walk past the people of Eatonville, not caring what they think of her.

At the conclusion of the novel, Janie shares two important values she has learned through her life. They are that people have got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about living fuh theysleves (183). At this point, it is evident to the reader that Janie has done those things for herself, and she is a stronger woman because of it. Their Eyes Were Watching God leaves the reader with an understanding that of humanitys need to escape emptiness. From the moment that Janie sits under the pear tree at the beginning of the novel, she embarks on a quest to fill a void.

That void is recognized when She was seeking confirmation of the voice and vision, and everywhere she found and acknowledged answers. A personal answer for all other creations except herself (11). I believe that Janie does fill the void within herself through the tragedy she experiences and her reactions to those tragedies. Through her own road of life, I think Janie gains a better understanding of the world in which she lives. She expresses to Tea Cake her satisfaction with her life when she states, If you kin see de light at daybreak, you dont keer if you die at dusk. Its so many people never seen de light at all.