This was a great book. I was real hesitant about this book because the title sounds dry. As I read I found out that the title had nothing to do with the story. This was different from the rest of the stories. The main character Janie is a powerful character. In the begining of the story she was just a child and her point of view was different from all of the other african american characters in the other stories I read. Instead of complaining of her race she was proud to be black. She was not the type to get mad because someone was being racist she looked at it as them missing out on meeting who she really was. She was strong and independent.
As she got older she married man named Jody and this relationship was different. They were distant. I was really surprised at the fact that it was hard to leave Jody when it was easier to up and leave her last marriage. She didnt even get a valid divorce. But it was harder with Jody. Jody was rude and mean and i was really happy when she embarassed him and destroyed his whole sense of man hold. To me he had it coming, he always embarrased her and it was his turn. Towards the end it was like Jody didnt trust her anymore he was resentful. At his bedside when he was dieng he didnt even want her to feed him he trusted the docters instead.
Then came Tea Cake he was alot younger then Jainie he was in his late twenties and she was in his early forties. I was kind of skeptic about him because he was so young. But he was definetly better than Jody. They had a intimite and passionate relationship. He put her on this petistol and she didnt want to be on the petistol. He was different from Jody because he was the one to make her breakfast after sex. With Jody she was expected to be the one in the kitchen. But Tea Cake treated her like a lady.
I didnt like the ending. It was sad, It must have been hard for Jainie to kill the man she loved, but I see why she wasnt hesitant because she was defending her self. She says in the book that that she didnt see the man she loved. I was happy at the fact that they didnt convict her of murder and they were convinced that it was self defence which it was self defence.
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It is interesting what you said about Janie making fun of Jody in the store. You are right that she was justified in speaking up to him, as he was constantly making disparaging remarks to her when there was not even much to make fun of about her, but I still felt that it was mean when she did it. Jody’s dying process basically commenced right after she stripped him of his manhood, showing how much of a part of his identity his masculinity was. Though Janie is the protagonist in this story and I almost cried at the end when her true love was taken from her at still a relatively young age, I did not really like her as a character. I found her to be rather harsh. She spoke so frankly and did not seem to consider many other people’s feelings. For example, at Jody’s deathbed she decides to reconcile her differences with him, mostly by casting blame on him. She tells him, “You done lived wid me for twenty years and you don’t half know me atall. And you could have but you was so busy worshippin’ de works of yo’ own hands…” (86). While I was glad to see Janie standing up for herself, I felt that doing it while Joe is dying and cannot change his ways was not a big enough victory for herself to make ruining his last few moments on Earth worthwhile.
I think that the reason she never left jody, no matter how hard it go and mean and dehuminizing he became to her. was because this time she had no where to go, she was in place that she wasnt familiar with the surronding to well, and she had no opportunity to go anywhere. when she was with her first husband, jody gave her that opportunity. she new that if she left then she would have had no money, and the way society would have treated her would have been worse than anything. so she decided the best thing to do would be to stick around until he past away before her that was her only way out.
Janie strived all along to find the happiness that she had wanted since she was a child. She didn’t want to be in the situation that her Grandmother had wanted for her, and she continuously set out to achieve her goals. She finally does achieve her goal by finding her true love, Tea Cake. She lives in the lifestyle that she had wanted all along and is completely happy.
I found it really interesting that Janie finally found the happiness that she had been looking for, and then was forced to kill it. It was as if she had achieved everything she had wanted, and wasn’t welcomed to keeping this happiness any longer. I don’t really know what to think of this situation, except that it was very ironic.
I agree that Janie's character was very strong and quite different from any of the other characters we ahve read about. Janie was proud of who she was and didn't feel like she was missing out on anything because she was black. I also found it interesting that it was so hard for Janie to leave Jody when it had been so easy for her to leave Logan because Jody seemed a lot worse than Logan. The way Janie's relationship with Jody was made me really hesitant to like Tea Cake but in the end I really did like him and I liked how free Janie became with him.
I think that the difference in characters played a big part in the book Their Eyes Were Watching God. I think this shows a charachter change in Janie as the story progresses. I didn't like the charachter Jody as well i felt like he was degrating and i was excited when she came across TeaCake. He reminded me of the type of guy that treats you like a princess and is just something to look forward too. I know the decision must have been difficult for her to kill him in the end but it just shows how strong of a charachter she really was.
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