Their Eyes Were Watching God Conflict Essay
Problems often arise between two people when one is a parental figure and the other a daughter figure. Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God expresses a conflict between the main character, Janie, and her grandmother which she called Nanny. The conflict arises because of their disagreement on marriage and love. Nanny believes love is not the most important aspect of marriage, but Janie “means tuh live [her way]” (Hurston 114). The struggle between Janie and Nanny highlights hopes and the deeper emotions which Janie desires. Throughout the novel Nanny’s idea of marriage differs from Janie’s. Nanny wants Janie to marry Logan Killicks because he can provide for her and protect her. She does not think that love is a necessity in fact she calls it “de very prong all us black women gits hung on” (23). It reveals that Nanny thinks love is what makes black women unhappy with what they have.
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The horizon and the pear tree are both symbols of Janie’s deeper longing to connect. Janie expects to find the love with Joe, but he takes away her voice and classes her off which causes her “to have no more blossomy openings dusting pollen over her man” (72). When Joe dies Janie starts to “lie awake in bed asking lonesomeness some questions” (89). She contemplates going back to where she came from to tend to her grandmother’s grave. Janie digs around inside herself and realizes that “[s]he hated her grandmother and had hidden it from herself all these years under a cloak of pity” (89). This is the moment when Janie really grasps how conflicted she is with Nanny’s wishes for her life. She believes that “Nanny had taken the biggest thing God ever made, the horizon…and pinched it in to such a little bit of a thing that she could tie it about her granddaughter’s neck tight enough to choke her” (89). Janie “done lived Grandma’s way,” but she decides to go to the horizon and find that the love she
The horizon and the pear tree are both symbols of Janie’s deeper longing to connect. Janie expects to find the love with Joe, but he takes away her voice and classes her off which causes her “to have no more blossomy openings dusting pollen over her man” (72). When Joe dies Janie starts to “lie awake in bed asking lonesomeness some questions” (89). She contemplates going back to where she came from to tend to her grandmother’s grave. Janie digs around inside herself and realizes that “[s]he hated her grandmother and had hidden it from herself all these years under a cloak of pity” (89). This is the moment when Janie really grasps how conflicted she is with Nanny’s wishes for her life. She believes that “Nanny had taken the biggest thing God ever made, the horizon…and pinched it in to such a little bit of a thing that she could tie it about her granddaughter’s neck tight enough to choke her” (89). Janie “done lived Grandma’s way,” but she decides to go to the horizon and find that the love she