Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter Summary

“Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed. Things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches”(pg 8). At the beginning of the book, the main character(Janie) is greeted by her best friend at her house. Her curious friend asked Janie what did she do while she was away. Instead of just telling Phoebe what happened, Janie decides to tell Pheoby her life story. Janie’s main focus on her storytelling is about her three marriages. She starts off with her first marriage with Logan. Janie was forced by her grandmother to marry Logan. After marrying Logan, Janie tries to love him but she can’t show affection towards him. Unpleased by this, she talks to her grandmother about her struggles who just laughs

Janie now being a wife of a mayor is starting to like this. But, after a while, her husband(Jody) gets sick and starts to put down Janie, talking bad about her. Jody gets ill and dies. Janie got comfortable with the idea of being a widow until she met Tea Cake. Although Tea Cake was about ten years younger than Janie, he was like no other man she'd met. They eventually get married and Janie knows that he's the one. After hearing about a hurricane coming near their town the town evacuates but Tea Cake and Janie decide to ride out the storm. After the storm, they met a rabid dog who tries to attack Janie. Jody quickly saves Janie from the dog but gets bitten in the process. Jody now with rabies is becoming mentally ill. He becomes paranoid and tries to attack Janie so she shots her husband to protect herself. At the end of the book, Janie finishes telling her tragic love story to her best friend. Zora Neale Hurston uses figurative language to explain to the readers Janie's search for love and her struggles through her life in doing so. She gives us an image of Janie being a woman who has been through marriage three times already and has lost love through either death or