"Living the Dream"

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie desires certain ideals from her life like love and camaraderie. However, what Janie wants from her own life differs from what other people think she needs, and Nanny and Joe Stark’s ideas of the “perfect life” for Janie are deeply unsatisfying for her. Only when Janie follows her own wishes does she truly reach fulfillment, happiness and independence in her life.

Nanny wants Janie to settle down with Logan Killicks, because Logan “got a house bought and paid for and sixty acres uh land right on de big road [..] and dat’s de very prong all us black women gits hung on.” Dis love!” Her idea of love and contentment for Janie is what she never got to experience as a young woman, which is being provided for by a well-off husband. Both Nanny and her daughter had their children as the result of being raped, so Nanny didn’t initially have a support system and lacked the feeling of stability. As a result, she sets up Janie with Logan Killicks in order to give Janie the life she never experienced. Janie feels no attraction towards Logan, but Nanny brushes off her aversion, saying it's unimportant in a marriage. While Janie ends up with Logan Killicks and Nanny’s dream for Janie is met, Janie is still deeply unhappy, even if she has the life Nanny wanted for her.


Later, when Janie marries Joe Starks, he determines how she behaves and what activities she can partake in to make sure she is respected as the “mayor’s wife.” He thinks that it’s best for her to be removed from common society, because she should exist above it all. However, just like with Nanny’s dream for her, Janie is left deeply unsatisfied with the life Joe thinks she requires. Janie wants to be involved in the town gossip, and she wants to speak her mind, play and engage with her peers. She doesn’t want to be put up on a high pedestal, and she doesn’t care about having a rich husband. While she achieves the surface level dreams Nanny and Joe think are best for her, she’s deeply unhappy.


However, when she meets Tea Cake and marries for love, (something she’s wanted to do since she was a teenager), she finally is satisfied with her life. She begins to enjoy herself, playing games, gossiping with the neighbors, and letting her hair down. When Janie leaves town with Tea Cake, many of the townsfolk disapprove, since they think she’s throwing her “good high society life” away for a lowdown gambler like Tea Cake. However, when Janie leaves her life and role as the mayor’s wife and stops doing what other people want for her, she finally finds satisfaction in her life.


Comments

  1. RyanNovember 21, 2021 at 5:41 PM

    It seems like Janie has lived most of her life for other people--Nanny, her first two husbands, and the townspeople--and that changes when she meets Tea Cake. Even though Janie and Tea Cake have a very flawed relationship and Tea Cake ultimately is not a good partner, I think Janie loves him as much as she does because she can be herself around him and he (for the most part) wants her to be happy and be able to do what she wants. She can live with him and not for him, which is surely very freeing for her.

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  2. Lukas PerdekampNovember 23, 2021 at 7:37 PM

    Hey Clara, great post! I agree that she doesn't seem happy until she partakes in a relationship from her own desires. Like Ryan said, until she was with Tea Cake, Janie was living her life for other people. As the book progressed, even Tea Cake did not seem like the most optimal person for Janie though.

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  3. Ilana C.November 23, 2021 at 8:39 PM

    This is an excellent blog post and I really like how you directly compare Janie’s three relationships and more specifically, how they affect Janie on a personal level and her growth and how the relationships change and reflect her specifically. I definitely agree that Janie is so much happier after she makes her own choice with Tea Cake (feeling, perhaps, particularly “rebellious” after the disapproval of the townspeople), leaves her past life, and as you say, stops doing what other people want for her; I think this is a very powerful idea and Hurston does an amazing job at illustrating this and Janie’s overall process (“showing” readers rather than “telling” about Janie’s growth). Additionally, I find it interesting that Janie made the choice to leave with Joe Starks and was initially very excited. Here, she seems to be defining her own future, but as we see, she quickly simply turns into the “mayor’s wife.” I feel like here, Janie learns specifically that she has to be careful and critical, even when making her own choices. She becomes more independent, perhaps, by making this mistake herself and trusting Joe Starks, and is able to learn for the future, both on how to find a healthier partner in life (Tea Cake) but also better learn her personal life priorities and wishes in order to “live the dream.”
    Thanks so much! An awesome blog post again!

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  4. Emma D.November 28, 2021 at 2:42 PM

    I think this was a really well-written, nuanced discussion of how Janie’s worldview conflicts with the circumstances she’s placed into, and how her adventures with Tea Cake allow her to at last live the fulfilling life she envisions. Highlighting the connection between the way Janie sees Nanny and Joe makes a lot of sense—even though their intentions with regard to Janie and the contexts that shape their treatment of her are markedly different, Janie feels similarly stifled by both of them. One topic we discussed a little bit in class was why Janie stays with Joe so much longer than with Logan, and I think a big part of her decision to do so is that she feels like she’s trapped herself in her marriage to Joe, rather than being places there by the outside force of Nanny and being able to flee without guilt once she's gone.

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