Kayla Ruthenbeck
Contextual
Project
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora
Neale Hurtson was first written in 1937.
The setting of the novel is in Florida. Zora uses the Narrative pattern
out of the pattern of arrangements. The novel is based around Janie telling her
story to her friend, Phoeby. Janie is
the Narrator in the Novel and is the one telling her own story. In the first
chapter, there was foreshadowing and from that we learned that Janie had been out
of her home town for a long time and ran off with a younger man named Tea Cake.
We also know that Tea cake is now “gone” and she is back there by herself, this
was the exposition of the story. There
were many conflicts through out the story; some of them were within her and some
were from other people. Being that she had three husbands, there were conflicts
that arose in each marriage. Logan and Jody both caused her a handful of issues
whether it is her questioning leaving them or them making problems for her. In
the rising action, Janie is realizing that the materialistic ways her
Grandmother wanted her to live isn’t going to make her happy. She later meets Tea Cake and feels that this
might be the love she has always been searching for. The climax of the story is after Tea Cake was
bitten by the dog and given rabies.
Since Tea Cake had rabies from getting bit by the dog, he started acting
differently and irrational. He got so
mad at Janie once and tried shooting and killing her but didn’t succeed because
Janie shot him first. The resolution
shows how although her true love is dead, she is happy that she got to leave
and experience it because it was the best feeling and time of her life.
