Their Eyes Were Watching God Tree Analysis

Words: 945
Pages: 4
Open Document
In the novel, Their Eyes were Watching God, tree symbolize a number of things. For example, certain types of trees represent different feelings to Janie, such as the pear tree which symbolizes love and opportunity and reflects the qualities Janie finds ideal in a romantic partner. In addition, different parts of a tree represent different aspects of Janie's life, such as roots being her family ties, branches symbolizing her various life experiences, and buds representing her loss of childhood innocence. Hurston makes clever use of trees in this story, utilizing it as a trope to reflects Janie’s situation as various points in the novel.
One of the more obvious ways Hurston makes use of this trope is with the pear tree. As Janie witnesses a …show more content…
Dawn and doom was in the branches, ” (Hurston 8). This is a fitting comparison, as Janie spends her life seeking the emotions she experiences under the pear tree. However, the tree of Janie;s memories is very different from the pear tree. It is not romanticized, nor does it contain blossom, which the best things in life: opportunity, hope, love. This tree, however, is made of more than just the good things, as it contains Janie's memories and life experiences. This tree presents a more accurate depiction of life, as it is filled with both suffering and joy. The transformation of the pear tree in Janie's youth to the memory tree presented later in Janie’s life displays the development of this trope. While originally thee tree symbolized what Janie hoped her life to be, the memory tree is representative of how her life actually turns out to be. Additionally, Janie’s Nanny inserts that colored folks are like “branches without roots.” Though on the surface this quote compares colored people to trees, a symbol of hope and opportunity in the novel, there is a much darker meaning to this particular quote. Historically, black women such as Janie’s grandmother were kept as slaves, and their parents, siblings, and children could be sold and the will of their owners. Because of this, it was difficult for them to develop “roots.” This being said, Janie does not have many family ties or influences, therefore she has the opportunity to write her own destiny. Though Nanny assumes this will be accomplished by Janie’s marriage to Logan Killiks, in actuality Janie finds this freedom and opportunity through Tea
Show More

Related Documents: Their Eyes Were Watching God Tree Analysis

Their Eyes Were Watching God Pear Tree Analysis

butterflies consumer her stomach and fireworks go off in her head, but often that isn’t more than a fairytale, and sometimes reality isn’t so magical. In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie Mae Crawford has her own visions of love and marriage and uses a pear tree to symbolize it. Her experience under the pear tree was magical and that experience of seeing and feeling nature’s harmonious relationship is a sensation she holds onto. Janie represents the struggle that woman go…

Words 2234 - Pages 9

Their Eyes Were Watching God Pear-Tree Analysis

In the novel, Hurston utilizes a pear-tree as symbol for the female protagonist of Their Eyes Were Watching God to recast the pastoral relation of women and nature as one of the active empowerment rather than passive subjugation. While this tree metaphorically reflects the growth and liveliness of Hurston’s heroine Janie, the natural environment also has a material effect on the development of vigorous, independent female identities. For Janie Starks, the repressive limitations of man-made buildings…

Words 133 - Pages 1

Their Eyes Were Watching God Theme Essay

Zora Neale Hurston once wrote that “love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.” Their Eyes Were Watching God, one of her well-known works, illustrates this theme. Love is what drives the characters, between one’s possessiveness, another’s bitter jealousy, and the protagonist’s ideal adolescent romance. This classic work is about a woman’s journey through life and the dream of romance she wished for since her youth. Her story is one of overcoming every hardship in her relationships, and…

Words 1567 - Pages 7

Paradise Lost Vs Genesis

criticism that the most difficult problem Milton faced in Paradise Lost involved the portrayal of God. Milton indeed undertook to “justify the ways of God to men,” but the problem for many readers—from his day to ours—has been to justify Milton's ways with God. Early to late, readers have questioned the theological appropriateness and literary success of Milton's anthropomorphic presentation of God as epic character. For Addison he is simply dull, a school divine delivering long sermons; for Shelley…

Words 2640 - Pages 11

Novel and Summer Reading Essay

skills that you already have begun to refine. The summer reading assignment will help prepare you for success in the course. Our class motto: Fluency—Insight—Evidence Summer Assignment Get a copy of both 1984 by George Orwell and Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and read them carefully, making many notes in the margins as you read – in other words, annotate the text with copious commentary. It is preferable to have your own copy, but if you must use a library book, use Post-It…

Words 2075 - Pages 9

Essay on Themes in To KIll a Mockingbird

under the courthouse. Though their homes were different and they learned different lessons, they all learned what they lived. Scout lives with her father, Atticus; her brother, Jem; her African American cook, Calpurnia; and her Aunt Alexandra. These people all influenced her as friends, mothers, and role models. Scouts mother died at a time that was far back even in Jem’s memory. Because of this, Scout spent most of her time with Atticus, Jem, and later in life, Dill, all of whom were men. She was more of a tomboy than a lady…

Words 3374 - Pages 14

Essay on A Horse and Two Goats: Detailed Summary

What he wanted to be was a writer. At first, most of his stories were rejected. For three or four years he lived at home and earned less than five dollars a year, worrying and embarrassing his family. In 1933 he married a woman named Rajam, who encouraged him in his writing. To help support his wife and daughter, he…

Words 7463 - Pages 30

LITERATURE REVISION BOOKLET 1 Essay

pittance, because a pittance was better than nothing. Bad farming, combined with severe weather conditions resulted in much of the fertile farming land being destroyed. Those workers, who had already struggled to find work when leaving the city, were forced to uproot again and leave the so-called ‘Dustbowl Plains’ of Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas in favour of California – the golden state. The American Dream – the US government, to try and combat the Depression of the 1930s created a ‘New Deal’ for…

Words 6597 - Pages 27