The Horizon of Possibility in Their Eyes Were Watching God by Hurston

In this part of the book, as soon as Janie reaches one horizon, she is already looking towards her next ambition to chase. This is evident when Janie was first seeing Joe. “He (Joe Starks) did not represent sun-up and pollen and blooming trees, but he spoke for a far horizon.” (Hurston, 28) It is evident that Janie eventually decided that these far horizons were in fact what she wanted, as she married Joe Starks. Another spot in the book that symbolically highlights the ever-morphing nature of Janie’s ambitions was the scene that occurs right after Tea Cake leaves Janie for the night.. “He (Tea Cake) tipped his hat at the door and was off with the briefest good night. So she sat on the porch and watched the moon rise. Soon its amber fluid was drenching the earth, and quenching the thirst of the day.” (Hurston, 95) Zora Neale Hurston’s quote “Thirst of the day” is symbolic of Janie’s consistent thirst to move on to something new and greater. The moon represents a horizon because it is a far off light, quenching this thirst. This quote was not thrown coincidentally into Their Eyes Were Watching God, it was intentionally crafted as yet another way to hint the reader into Janie’s constantly moving horizons. This period of ever-expanding horizons in the middle of the book comes to an end after the Janie shoots and kills Tea

Similarly, Janie makes another great sacrifice when she decides to leave her life of ease and luxury in Eatonville, so she can start a new life with Tea Cake. In Eatonville, she had authority as the store owner and as the former mayor’s wife, but she decides to follow her heart which ultimately leads to her fulfillment of self-actualization with the help of Tea Cake. Without Tea Cake, Janie could not have found herself, and his impact on her remains even after his death. Janie recounts her life lesson to Phoeby saying, “Love is lak da sea. It’s uh movin’ thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore...Two things everybody’s got tuh do for theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves” (191-92). Through Janie’s words, the effect of Tea Cake on her is eminent through how Janie learn about life and herself and leads her to becoming independent. Because Janie sacrifices her luxurious life in Eatonville, through Tea Cake, she fulfills her need of self-actualization, a recurring idea in the book. Janie’s values concerning her life and of Tea Cake are also illuminated in her conversation with Phoeby before she leaves Eatonville. She and Tea Cake “‘...[had] done made up [their] minds tuh

Zora Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God is, among other things, a creation story. For creation stories are not simply myths about the historical origins of the universe and humankind but metaphors for individual maturation. Individual perception is, to a large extent, what constitutes the world. Hence, the individual is the source and embodiment of the world; Janie is, the narrator tells us, “the world and the heavens boiled down to a drop” (72). And Janie’s awakening, or maturation, represents not only a personal transformation, but the creation of a universe. As a child seeking meaning, Janie does not look forward to merely “growing up” but waits “for the world to

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 of life?s two most precious gifts: love and the truth. Janie is raised by her suppressive grandmother who diminishes her view of life. Janie?s quest for true identity emerges from her paths in life and ultimatly ends when her mind is freed from mistaken reality.

Very rarely do we take time out of our busy lives to look at the world around us. However, when we do look in depth, it is astonishing what you can see. Every little part of nature is constantly at work; bees are busy pollinating, leaves are rustling in the wind, rain melts into the soil. Nature is made up of many different features which all come together to create the beautiful scenery around us. Our lives are much like nature, made of many different aspects such as people and experiences, which come together to create your being. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston uses examples of nature such as the hurricane, the pear tree, and the horizon to symbolize important aspects of Janie’s life.

From the beginning, Janie’s goal was to feel real love. When she is sixteen, she “[beholds] a revelation” (Hurston 11) as she witnesses bees interact. After this realization, Jane comes to terms with her sexuality and kisses Johnny Taylor. This is the start of Janie’s internal growth because she acknowledges her attraction to boys and realizes what it is like to feel amorous. Nanny watches through the window and decides that Janie is now a woman and wants to see her married right away. Janie is then forced to marry “some old skullhead in the graveyard”(13) - Logan Killicks. Janie and Logan have marriage that lacks love. Janie

Janie is finally able to step foot into the very same place where she was mistreated and wrongfully done by her second husband and have a sense of pride and self-worth. The new strength she has is only possible because of Tea Cake and her adapting to being by herself. Tea CAkes has lifted the normative restraints placed on Janie’s mind by the society in which she lived, allowing her own actions and thoughts to flourish freely. She is finally at ease with her choices, her life, and most importantly herself. Even though Janie returned home alone, she is satisfied with her new life, which is full because of her choose to live it with Tea

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston presents a story of self-love as Janie goes from one love to the next in hopes of finding someone to value her. Initially Janie sees that she is more than just a possession and being mistreated. She knows that she can find better. Later she finds Joe and believes that she is valuable because of her looks, and he just sees her as a possession and not his wife but this does not last. Eventually Joe dies, and Janie is single again and must decide on what to do for love. This time around, Janie finds her own voice, and she finds love with Vergible “ Tea Cake” Woods who embraces her as a full person. Vergible “Tea Cake” Woods wanted to talk to Janie to and listen to her whatever she has to say. Vergible “ Tea Cake” did not force Janie to do anything that she did not want to do. In her other relationships, they were dominate and want to control or use her for their own image. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie’s journey from one marriage to another reveals her discovery of her own value. How does each man view Janie? What does she learn in each marriage? How is she different in the end of the book from the beginning? How does Janie feel about herself and each of her husband 's? Does Janie value herself?

Janie reaches far to gain this horizon she seeks, enduring bad marriages and suppression via her Nanny and first two husbands all to reach her end goal. Janie finds true love in Teacake, her final husband and realizes love means knowing when to let go of your beloved. When Janie sees it necessary to shoot her husband to relieve him of his agony, she readily pulls the trigger, knowing her husband’s best interests. In the concluding paragraphs Janie “pulled in her horizons like a great fish-net…and draped it over her shoulders,” (Hurston 193) able to rest peacefully knowing she lived her life to its fullest capacity. This metaphor paints the reader a picture of brightly colored horizons stretching just beyond reach, and how Janie, through perseverance and her strong spirit could pull in her horizons, just as every person in society strives to do.

She only started to feel love after meeting Joe, her second husband. Throughout that second marriage she did feel love for Joe but she was also frequently angered and embarrassed by him, he was not the man that she had thought him to be. However those two earlier marriages somewhat changed her when it came to men, her third husband Tea Cake, Janie fell for him slowly at first and then as time grew between them, nothing could stop them from marrying. Most of her town had thought it was shameful to be with a man who had nothing to his name and believe he was only with her for his money, “you better sense her intuh things then ‘cause Tea Cake can’t do nothin’ but help her spend whut she got. Ah reckon dat’s whut he’s after.”(Hurston, 111) Sam Watson said this to Pheoby and show that this was the only thing that the town thought of him, not that they might be in love. Many residents of the town even voiced such things to Janie, which only prompted her to leave town and marry Tea

Her hair was possibly the last hope of freedom she had that Joe hadn’t taken from her. Janie’s hair symbolized her self and freedom, and since it was taken away from her, it portrays how Janie has no control of her life and her identity with Joe in her life. A second example of symbolism used in the novel was the horizon mentioned at the beginning and the end of the novel. The horizon was mentioned in the first paragraph of the novel as. “For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away…”(Hurston 1). And in the final paragraph of the novel it’s shown as, “Here was peace. [Janie] pulled in her horizon like a great fish-net. Pulled it from around the waist of the world and draped it over her shoulder.”(Hurston 193). This horizon, in a sense, symbolizes one’s identity, specially Janie’s, and how it was once out of reach, being observed, and now it can be wrapped around and worn as a badge of pride. Janie had struggled through so many hardships between those two quotes that ultimately lead to her finding her identity. With the horizon itself symbolizing Janie’s identity, it helps argue the major theme of identity within this

One of Zora Hurston’s greatest accomplishment in regards to ‘Their Eyes were Watching God’ is making Janie a character that is relatable despite race, gender, or religion. As a part of being human, we grow older and begin to wonder - begin to question. What does life have to offer? What is life meant to be? Where am I meant to go? Janie like most people believed that her life’s canvas would be painted by receiving the feeling of true love from a significant other. She yearned for the love like that between a bee and a pear tree. A love that she believed would be the key to having a happy fulfilled life. As Janie goes through life searching for love and through the losses that she suffers, she, in turn, finds the keys to actual self-awareness:

Janie goes through many phases of her life. Hurston does an extraordinary job of putting the reader in the time period of this novel. The book becomes alive and understandable as it progresses. The relationship of Tea Cake and Janie is crucial in the understanding of this story. In Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Hurston expresses that Tea Cake does not love Janie when he first started seeing her, but his love and intentions change over time.

She experienced no love connection with her first husband Logan. Then tries again with Joe but that ends with him dieting and her feeling no remorse. Like they say “third luck is the charm”, her marriage with Tea Cake was successful. They loved each other very much and it was obvious to see from the reader's perspective. Once Janie had all she wanted in her love life, she had to let it go. Janie knew that killing Tea Cake was the only way he would be at peace. She dreaded seeing him sick and weak so she killed him in spite of true love. The reader can then ponder on the thought of ‘What sacrifices do people take in order to find true

In the first and second chapters of Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes were Watching God, it starts off by showing a woman grieving the loss of a sudden death. Which leads to her going back to a place she never thought she would go back to, walking past dozens of judging eyes. Then mutters of Tea Cake leaving the women for a younger women, and taking all of her money overwhelm the women’s friend, Pheoby, and she stands up for her. Janie Starks is the women that these people are so interested in, and when Phoeby goes to join her friend the gossip does not come to an end. When the two friends meet again, questions about where Janie has been for the past year and a half arise, and startling answers are given. Janie vaguely explain that Tea