Like in Invisible Man, the opening chapter in Their Eyes Were Watching God is a glimpse of the end of the story. Janie begins telling her story and it launches us into the rest of the novel. The novel recounts Janie's life and the relationships that she has been in. She was married three times, with at least two of them ending very unhappily. Janie leaves her first husband, Logan, because she never wanted to marry him anyway. She was forced to marry him because her grandmother thought it would be a good, safe match. One day she meets Jody, who promises her attention as the wife of a wealthy mayor. She runs off with him but soon realizes that not everything is as great as it seemed. Jody is very concerned about his image as a mayor and uses Janie as more of an accessory than a wife. He refuses to let her speak to other people and hides her away when she isn't convenient to him. By the time Jody dies, Janie is very lonely and resents him tremendously. That's why when Tea Cake comes along she is so drawn to him. He asks her to play checkers with him, he teaches her to shoot, and in general treats her like an actual person. Even the other people of Eatonville comment on how different a person Janie becomes with Tea Cake.
Dialogue is very important in Hurston's novel. She depicts the Southern African American dialect of her characters, making the novel come to life. There is also symbolism in the way she uses dialogue to tell Janie's story. When Janie is married to Jody, she had very little agency because Jody was so controlling. The way those chapters are narrated reflect the imbalance of their relationship. There is very little back-and-forth dialogue between Janie and Jody. Most of the dialogue is Jody giving instructions or commands to Janie. When Hurston finally gives Janie a voice, it is when Janie is standing up to Jody. Janie has dialogue in the scene in the store where she calls Jody out on his hypocrisy and vanity. The next time she speaks to Jody is on his deathbed. In that scene she is also defiant and apologetic.
The first scene where we meet Tea Cake contrasts starkly with the scenes between Jody and Janie. They have a long and drawn-out conversation with even banter. Hurston gives the reader pages of just dialogue between Tea Cake and Janie. The other members of Eatonville are jealous of how Tea Cake and Janie are always laughing and having a good time. Hurston uses dialogue to show how much happier Janie is with Tea Cake than with Jody. In this relationship, Janie literally has a voice that she didn't have before. These back-and-forth conversations are a lot closer to her ideal relationship of the pear tree and the bees that are mutually beneficial.With Tea Cake, Janie has found her voice and the same confidence that she has when she returns to Eatonville wearing those overalls.
You make a good point about the contrasting ways Hurston narrates the scenes between Janie and Jody and Janie and Tea Cake. There are a few key dialogues between Jody and Janie, but mostly we do get summaries of various rules and restrictions he's imposed (from both his and her point of view, through free indirect discourse), and in these chapters Hurston spends a good deal of time narrating stuff that's going on in the town more generally (out on the porch, in the road), which Janie is cut off from. There's a sense of daily life being "overheard" rather than experienced directly.
ReplyDeleteJanie is finally in a relationship she enjoys after meeting Tea Cake but there are still incidents between them, such as when he takes her money and when he becomes paranoid of her seeing Mrs. Turner's brother. These aspects of their relationship are troubling, yet Janie doesn't want to leave Tea Cake. Perhaps she sees these problems as just being part of living life fully (as opposed to being constrained as she was with Jody).
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree that dialogue played a huge part throughout the story. The emphasis on dialogue and the Southern dialect that different characters use really put you into the setting of the book. As the book progressed, I did not notice the changes in how Janie speaks and interacts with each husband. At the end of the book, she seems to be at her most independent and comfortable with herself. This made me think of another comparison to Invisible Man, in that that narrator's mindset and voice evolves as the story progresses, until we are left with the narrator from the prologue.
ReplyDeleteI also agree with a lot of the points you are making, especially the significance of the dialogue Hurston includes and what it does for the story. There is definitely the contrast as you pointed out, between the narrator speaking and Janie but I didn't tie it to the fact that her freedom was largely due to her new relationship with a much different character than we had seen before. Your post reminded me of Emma's post in that both of you make an argument saying that she isn't really living life and being herself until she breaks free from Jody and marries Tea Cake. I agree with both of you in that it seems Janie is a much more independent and confident character as she makes this separation.
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