Their Eyes Were Watching God Theme Essay

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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 blossoming into a mature and independent person.
The book opens with Janie Crawford coming home to Eatonville and becoming the subject of hushed gossip throughout the entire town. Ignoring them, she meets up with her friend Phoebe who is surprised …show more content…
While trying to save Janie from drowning, Tea cake is bitten by a rabid dog and pridefully refuses any care on his injury. He loses his mind and later attempts to kill Janie is a jealousy-fueled rage, in which she has to defend herself and kill her husband. Janie mourns her lost love and returns back to Eatonville away from Tea Cake’s distrustful friends.
That ends her story to Phoebe, who offers her condolences and expresses her amazement to Janie. She accepts those feelings, but rather than staying in one place, Janie marvels at how Tea Cake has impacted her life and moves forward.
While the main theme of the story is love and the complicated emotions that come with it, Deborah James’ critical analysis Resistance, Rebirth, and Renewal in Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God explores the secondary theme of Janie’s growth and resistance against the people who attempt to control her. She examines the role both gender and race have on the behavior towards Janie and the general environment of the book.
James begins her analysis with countering against the idea that Janie is defined by her relationships with men. She argues that while they are a necessary part of the story, the most important part is the emotions that Janie is experiencing and what it means to her. Those events do shape her, but it is the lessons they provide that help her become fleshed out and a complete
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