Janie in Their Eyes Were Watching God and Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye

Janie recollects her image on love when she leaves with Joe which signifies that she values love over the stable life that she had already possessed.

She ended up living a life full of manipulation and mediocrity. While living with Joe, she had to tend to many different tasks as his wife.  She wasn't independent with him either.  She was Joe's tag-a-long.  'She went through many silent rebellions over things like that.  Such a waste of life and time.  But Joe kept saying that she could do it if she wanted to and he wanted her to use her privileges.  That was the rock she was battered against.' (Hurston, 51)  Janie always had to wear her hair a certain way, always up in a head rag, in order not to attract attention to other men and women. She was always in a state of loneliness with herself.  While married to Janie, he would not allow her to attend the people's gatherings believing that she does not belong to such a group of lower class people.  Joe was depriving Janie of her independence and sanity.  "Naw, Ah ain't no young gal no mo' but den Ah ain't no old woman either.  Ah reckon Ah looks mah age too.  But Ah'm us woman every inch of me, and Ah know it.  Dat's uh whole lot more'n you kin say.  You big-bellies round here and put out a lot of brag, but 'tain't nothin' to it but yo' big voice.  Humph!  Talkin' 'bout me lookin' old!  When you pull down yo' britches, you look lak de change uh life." (Hurston, 75)  This quote spoken by Janie proves that she was getting sick and tired of being pushed around by Joe and his stuck-up ways.  This was a slow

The pear tree experience, along with her Grandmother’s words to her, help Janie determine her expectations for her future relationships. The pear tree experience establishes the feeling she seeks for the rest of her life, as she wants just as intimate of a relationship as the bee and the flower. Janie’s grandmother’s initial goals for Janie are inscribed in Janie’s original ideals, even though she denies it. Her grandmother’s original intent by marrying her off to Logan, besides for her safety, was to find her a way out of the working life, and into one where she would be allowed to relax, and escape the life of toil that both Leafy and Nanny suffered through. While Janie

janie is going through her teen years and how she sees the world differently.zora Neale Hurston's novel "their eyes were watching God".when zora uses the rhetorical devices, she is showing how Janie has "woken up" and is curious to see the world. at the outset of the passage,"it had called her to come and gaze on a mystery". Zora uses personification to say that the pear tree wanted to get attention from Janie. she is becoming a young woman with a curiosity in the new world. in another sentence,Zora uses simile in "it was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again".

Janie was glad to have married her newly found inconsiderate, idealistic, leader of a husband named Joe Starks, but what she hadn’t noticed early enough was her dying freedom. Joe Stark’s is the Mayor of a small town, This would make Janie the Mayor’s wife, which is correct, and that is all Joe wants her to be known for. Janie is expected to sit behind a store’s counter all day, not sharing her own thoughts to anyone, instead only giving her breath to the dialogue coinciding with running the store. She is also expected to be omnisciently “obedient” to her leash wielding husband (58). Janie wishes to converse with the people around her, but is consistently stopped short by Joe. All of these coalescing struggles have caused the naive young woman that was introduced at the beginning of the story to grow cold,

Throughout the book, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie the main character has taken upon many different types of persona’s. She was a girl with Nanny; Next she was a married girl with many responsibilities she didn’t know how to handle. After running away with Joe she was free-spirited and fun, but that changed over time and she became shut in and obedient. But in the end she became the person she always wanted to be. Janie always tried to do what she thought was right, but in the standards of others.

Tea Cake treats Janie fairly and allows Janie to see her full potential instead of stifling her natural talents and abilities. Other than the scene where Janie was forced to kill Tea Cake, Tea Cake had been a positive influence towards Janie’s self actualization, and he allowed her to experience skills she had never knew existed such as her shooting ability. Janie keeps Tea Cakes memory alive in her mind and other and feels as though her life has been full and

When Joe dies Janie is hardly sad considering how much time they spent together. “She tore off the kerchief from her had and let down her plentiful hair…Then she starched and ironed her face, forming it into just what people wanted to see”. (87) A part of Janie still is still acting differently than she feels, because she transforms into what people wanted to see. But she is also doing this to pay some respect to Joe. When she is at Joe’s funeral her face is there but “[she] went rollicking with the springtime across the world”. (88) Her husband has just died, but Janie does not seem the least bit bothered. She finally feels free because for such a long time she was unable to grow, and now with Joe gone there is no one to get in the way of her finding herself. This relationship really hurt Janie’s self-discovery because before she was completely trapped and now she seems happier than she was before she met Joe. The final step Janie takes to be free of Joe’s influence is when “she burnt up every one of her head rags and went about the house next morning with her hair in one thick braid swinging well below her waist”. (89) Making her wear the rags was a big part of what Joe did to have control over Janie, and by burning the rags Janie is now completely free from his control. Also, by wearing her long hair out in a braid Janie is back to herself and has a brand new start to go about her journey of finding

“Why must Joe be so mad with her for making him look small when he did it to her all the time?” (101). In chapter eight, Janie recognizes the unfair double standards set by men, especially her husband. Men can sometimes be quite hypocritical, and when the woman goes to stand up to him, he will publicly humiliate her and expect her to stand there and take it. Unlike most women, Janie decides to take a stand on this unnecessary abuse, confronting Jody.

She's blinded to his faults by her own visions of love and by his entrepreneurial charisma. Ultimately, Joe values ambition and material wealth more than he values Janie. He sees her as an accessory rather than as an equal. Janie was rebellious with Logan’s relationship, she would tell him no often. On the other hand, Janie goes through silence rebellions with Joe. Janie was not an independant with him either, she was his tag-a-long. Joe says “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 41-42). As a result of being the town mayor, Joe got a lot of compliments on having such a charming young woman on his side. He stated that her place in inside the home, and she is not capable of making speeches for the town. Janie was silent with that remark. As a result of them living together for many years, Joe started to belittle Janie’s self confidence. He

For Joe, she was an object to look at. However, there was one particular part of Janie that Joe did not want to share. “That night he ordered Janie to tie up her hair around the store. That was all. She was there in the store for him to look at, not those others.”(Hurston 65). Joe was a very jealous man. He feels the need to guard her from others as if she was a prized possession or object of some sort. He felt that allowing her hair to show was a challenge to his authority. Jody dumps his burdens on Janie then mistreats her for not fitting his image of a proper woman. On numerous occasions he shows how he is selfish and abusive. Similar to Logan, Joe abuses Janie for making simple mistakes. “So when the bread didn’t rise, and the fish wasn’t quite done at the bone, and the rice was scorched, he slapped Janie until she had a ringing sound in her ears and told her about her brains before he stalked on back to the store.” (Hurston 85-86) Logan did not physically abuse Janie like Joe did and his authority was so overwhelming she would keep quiet. No matter how controlling, abusive, and shallow he was, Janie said nothing. After this incident, Janie looses faith in her illusion of love for

When the marriage of Jody and Janie began to fall apart, Janie’s views were changed and she was no longer able to see the positive sides of marriage and love. After leaving her first marriage and running off with Jody to the town of Eatonville, Janie spent a large part of her life serving him. When Jody hit her, Janie had noticed the fierce intentions

Love was not the reason for Joe to marry Janie, he married her because of her value and treated her like an object in front of the world which would serve him some useful purpose. There was a lot of male dominance portrayed in Joe's character as he always forced her to tie up her hair, and also worries a lot about losing her due to the immense beauty of her hair. From keeping the other men attracted to her, he used to yell at her to cover her hair properly by using the hair rags, to wear a simple dress, and also to stop socializing with any man other than him (Hurston 55). And when Joe died, Janie had said "To my thinkin' mourning oughtn't tuh last no longer'n grief" ( Hurston 89). This quote explains that after Joe is dead, Janie has gained freedom from her second husband, and can now loosen up her hair by getting rid of all the head rags that she was given by

Janie only married Joe to get away from her first marriage. “With him on it, it sat like some high, ruling chair. From now on until death she was going to have flower dust and springtime sprinkled over everything. A bee to her bloom… So they were married there before sundown, just like Joe had said. With new clothes of silk and wool.” (32). Janie makes a very rash decision without thinking about the consequences. Janie is blinded by the happiness of leaving Logan that she mistakes the situation for love. She sees Joe as a quick way to the love she has always dreamed about. Joe really only wants Janie as a beautiful trophy wife. “Her hair was NOT going to show in the store. It didn’t seem sensible at all. That was because Joe never told Janie how jealous he was. He never told her how often he had seen the other men figuratively wallowing in it as she went about the things in ther store… She was there in the store for him to look at, not those others. But he never said things like that.” (55). This showed he only wanted Janie so he would have someone to admire. He did not love Janie so she wasn’t capable of loving

Any tribulation she has gone through, the author has always related back to the pear tree. Serving as a reminder of her purpose perhaps? As the story progresses, the author reveals more of Janie’s idiosyncratic features; which ultimately unravels a deeper meaning within. Hurston has the extended metaphor of the pear tree symbolize a beginning and an initiation for Janie’s search for that pursuit of love, happiness, and peace. The author’s description of how Joe would repeatedly mention the flaws of her age, threatens yet revives the imagery of this pear tree. The author here emphasizes her resilience to her