Janie, Self-Fulfillment, and Eyes on God

Throughout Their Eyes Were Watching God, we see Janie defining her life with this imaginary concept of a "perfect" relationship. With Nanny constantly watching over her, wanting her to marry as soon as possible to a man with the material and financial stability to keep her happy, she rushes into relationships, suppressing her desires and following Nanny's instead. But after her traumatic relationships with Logan and Jody, Janie decides to follow her own wants instead, despite the unwanted criticism and opinions on her relationships from the whole town watching her every move. This break from the cycle of relationships and unhappiness represents a turning point for Janie. She is no longer living based off of what others want for her. Picking Tea Cake means she finally chose to let go and put her own happiness over others. 

Her relationship with Tea Cake had questionable moments, but she was definitely far happier with him than the first two. The end of Tea Cake meant the official start of choosing herself. Killing him meant saving herself, putting her own life above what was left of his. By completely ending the one relationship she found happiness in, Janie proves that she does have self-respect and therefore has grown so much. She is now self-fulfilled due to all the realizations. The relationship she needed all along was a stable one with herself. 

Every time I thought about the title, I gave up. When reading the book, I tucked the title away in the back of my mind, forgetting about it until the end when it made more sense for me. I personally think it relates to personal fulfillment and not finding your future in others but by following God. "Their Eyes Were Watching God" means they're looking to God for their next move, letting go of too many complications because God could change their fate at any given point. For example, the hurricane strikes and partially leads to numerous occurrences - including the death of Tea Cake. I think Janie had her eyes on God because she accepted her fate. She didn't watch other people for validation, she just did what she felt was right and it led to self-fulfillment. 

Comments

  1. Stefania November 25, 2021 at 11:58 PM

    I find your speculations on the title very interesting! I have also been wondering what the title means. I'd say the hurricane does bring all of the themes of the book together since it's such a dramatic part of it, and a natural disaster being a time when people turn to or connect with God makes a lot of sense.

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  2. Madeleine K.December 1, 2021 at 11:08 PM

    I was also fascinated on the idea of who God is in this story. We don't see God mentioned in this way until the hurricane. I sort of took it as they were watching something so big and larger than themselves when they watched the storm. However, this doesn't really connect to the rest of the novel so I'm unsure.

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  3. Isabel DennisonDecember 2, 2021 at 10:56 AM

    I agree with your analysis, especially on the title. I think not only is the hurricane an event of reckoning for the town as they decide whether to leave or stay, but it's also a final test for Janie. She was inspired into love by witnessing an act of nature, so it's very fitting that the hurricane is the finale.

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  4. MitchellDecember 3, 2021 at 2:36 PM

    You don't mention it explicitly here, but the later scenes with the hurricane feature the actual deployment of the title in the text: they are "watching God" to see what their fate will be as the storm approaches, with "God" here figured as natural forces that are large, destructive, overwhelming, and also seemingly random. They are waiting to find their fate--as Madeleine puts it, "something so big and larger than themselves." It's less a traditional religious concept of God and more of a sense of what the romantics in the nineteenth century called "the sublime"--the sense of overwhelming enormous forces that shape our lives and before which we are tiny and insignificant. There's a kind of religious awe in simply facing fate in this way, grasping all that is outside their hands. And, of course, in the scope of this novel, "God" here is about to end Tea Cake's life and transform Janie's reality profoundly.

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  5. eveDecember 13, 2021 at 1:42 PM

    I think also "Their eyes were watching god" conveys looking up, sort of in pride. This reminds me of when Janie walks back into Eatonville, and even though she is tired and has just lost her husband, everyone on the street can tell that she is still very strong and proud.

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  6. RowanDecember 13, 2021 at 3:03 PM

    I think the idea you mention of "looking to God for their next move" also kind of means that Janie doesn't just do what she thinks is right, but that she somehow knows it's right. This seems especially important because of how little support she gets from the people around her a lot of the time, and like you say it was following her own path rather than the crowd that led to her fulfillment.

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