Zora Neale Hurston Qualities

Similarly, Janie makes another great sacrifice when she decides to leave her life of ease and luxury in Eatonville, so she can start a new life with Tea Cake. In Eatonville, she had authority as the store owner and as the former mayor’s wife, but she decides to follow her heart which ultimately leads to her fulfillment of self-actualization with the help of Tea Cake. Without Tea Cake, Janie could not have found herself, and his impact on her remains even after his death. Janie recounts her life lesson to Phoeby saying, “Love is lak da sea. It’s uh movin’ thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it’s different with every shore...Two things everybody’s got tuh do for theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin’ fuh theyselves” (191-92). Through Janie’s words, the effect of Tea Cake on her is eminent through how Janie learn about life and herself and leads her to becoming independent. Because Janie sacrifices her luxurious life in Eatonville, through Tea Cake, she fulfills her need of self-actualization, a recurring idea in the book. Janie’s values concerning her life and of Tea Cake are also illuminated in her conversation with Phoeby before she leaves Eatonville. She and Tea Cake “‘...[had] done made up [their] minds tuh

Human life is not an open book. No one can predict every page, but instead, the thriller novel is written as it happens because characters in every story are dominated by their complex traits. For example, who can truly say that one who is laughing is purely happy or actually concealing sorrow? Contradictions exist everywhere in life and literature attempts to grasp and portray them in human characters to create complex traits. Being a black woman forced to undergo three marriages in a stubborn, male-dominated, and oblivious American society right after the civil war, Janie Crawford is a complex character full of confidence and self-reliance, but also with a weakness and desire of finding true love which forces her to become submissive. Zora

     In Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston, the reader is given a particular glimpse into Janie's life with reference to the men she has known.  Janie's three men are all very different, yet they were all Janie's husband at one point in her life.  Although they all behaved differently, in lifestyle as well as their relationship with Janie, they all shared certain similarities.

Tea Cake’s given name is Vergible Woods; he entered Janie’s life soon after Joe’s death. Janie was reluctant to trust Tea Cake; however, he eventually wins her over by not only sweet talking her but spending time with her. Janie still did not fully trust Tea Cake, so in an effort to try to win her over he professed his love to her, “Twasn’t ‘cause Ah wanted tuh stay off lak day, and it sho Lawd, wuzn’t no woman. If you didn’t have de power tuh hold me and hold me tight, Ah wouldn’t be callin’ yuh Mis’ Woods. Ah met plenty women before Ah knowed you tuh talk tuh. You’se de onliest woman in de world Ah ever even mentioned gittin married tuh. You bein’ older don’t make no difference. Don’t never consider dat no mo’. If Ah ever gits tuh messin’ round another woman it won’t be on account of her age. It’ll be because she got me in de same way you got me – so Ah can’t help mahself” (Hurston, 26-27). Tea Cake not only professed his love for Janie, but he also said that he would remain faithful to her and that their twelve year age difference did not mean anything to him. Janie eventually falls in love with Tea Cake and they get married and run away together. Meta G. Carstarphen dissects Janie and Tea Cake’s relationship in his analysis “Fantasy and Reality in the Novel,” “… the desire to be a couple never overcame a shared inability to unite over life goals” (92). Tea Cake

How is Janie ever going to find true love? In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Janie has failed twice at finding a husband with whom she is in love with. Janie believes she loves her third husband Tea Cake, but is the feeling mutual? Could Tea Cake just she Janie as a piece of his property just like the other men of the time saw their wives? Equality is what makes Janie believe she has found her true love. Though Tea Cake is often jealous of men lusting Janie, and he goes so far as hitting her, Tea Cake does not see Janie as a piece of property or subordinate to him, but views her as his equal their relationship.

After his death, she struggles to feel remorse for the loss of her husband. Nine months after his death, she marries Vergible Woods, also known as Tea Cake. He is everything Jody was not, he treats Janie like a woman deserves to be treated and is very confident in his ability to provide for his new wife and remain faithful to her. After having been treated like a pack mule by one husband and silenced by another, Tea Cake provides her with a healthy relationship that she can learn about herself within the walls of. He teaches her new things, and encourages her to develop her skillset and life

Nevertheless, Janie is quite infatuated with Tea Cake and could not hope for anything more. Janie’s relationship with Tea Cake becomes hectic. He takes her money, goes out for the whole night, then comes home with few explanations for his actions. He ends up hitting her because of his jealousy and possessiveness towards her. Janie’s intense passion and love for Tea Cake causes her to stay with him.

Three things that make a man a good husband are honesty, sweetness, and personality. In the novel Their Eyes Are Watching God Zora Neale Hurston portrays many ways of what a good husband is. In this book Janie is married three time throughout her life, each one of her husband's is very different on how they treat her and on how they think she should be treated. Although Joe has a good personality and Logan is sweet they both don’t make Janie happy or make her feel the way Tea Cake does by being honest with her and many other things.

Up to this point, the relationship between Janie and Tea Cake has seemed almost too good to be true. Chapters 13 and 14, while continuing to demonstrate that their relationship is a good experience for Janie, raise some complex questions about Tea Cake’s character. Their arrival in the Everglades is a moment of fulfillment for Janie as she finds herself surrounded by fertile nature. Overall, her experience is generally a fulfilling one. Nevertheless, Tea Cake manipulates her in subtle ways, raising, once again, the specter of male domination in her life.Chapter 13 is marked by Tea Cake’s cruel absences from Janie. Although Janie accepts his explanations, it is hard to believe that someone as intelligent as Tea Cake could be so careless only

Thus, their inability to relate to her does not come from hatred but form their upbringing or skepticism. Janie’s story (profoundly economic in emphasis, as Houston Baker has argued) focuses on three representative husbands (Newman, Oct., 2003). Although the focal point of Their Eyes Were Watching God correlates with Janie’s relationship with her three husbands and other people. It is the main and primary idea of Janie’s search for divine clarification and a strong sense of her own identity. Janie is alone as seen in the beginning and the ending of the story.

As Janie reached the end of her forties she finally meets the man of her dreams, Tea Cake. Tea Cake was about 12 years younger than Janie when they first met. It was a Sunday afternoon, everyone went to the baseball game all except Janie who was keeping watch of the store. Then a young man appears wanting to buy cigarettes, as the young man and Janie talk he says he wants to play checkers. Tea cake woes Janie in with a game of checker. There was not a single man in Eatonville that had asked Janie to play checkers with her or teach her to play. This led to each other flirting with each other, eventually Janie slowly falls in love with Tea Cake. Janie discovered things that she has never discovered before when she was with Joe and Logan. Tea

She likes the feeling of being free and independent. Janie's begins to feel certain that she doesn’t need a husband and says she’ll never be married again. Eventually she meets Tea Cake, a guy who is much younger than her. Tea Cake is very fun and adventurous. Together Janie and Tea Cake do things that Janie would've never imagined doing. Tea Cake shows Janie a new way of enjoying life besides being trapped working in Jody’s store. First, Tea Cake offers Janie to play checkers. Janie is shocked and sees this as a sign of Tea Cake’s respect for Janie. No other man had respected her enough to ask her that. Instead she was bossed around and told to do work all day. Janie enjoys her time spent with Tea Cake and he tells her that he likes her. Janie is shocked because she doesn’t believe Tea Cake is attracted to someone so much older than him. Janie turns him down and tells him she only likes him as a friend keeping her word and remaining independent. Tea Cake continues to express his feelings for Janie but Janie is afraid that he will take advantage of her like every other man did. Tea Cake didn’t give up on Janie and they begin to make their “relationship” public. Janie and Tea Cake became the talk of the town. With her being the Mayor’s widow everyone is shocked to see her with someone new. Janie’s friend pheoby begins to tell her that she should leave Tea Cake alone because

Finally, it is unfortunate that Janie had to suffer over half of her life with men that were not good husbands, however, without them, she would have never learned from her mistakes and never met the love of her life, Tea Cake. While being married to Logan and Joe, she should have stood up for herself and never let these men dictate her life the way they did. Coincidentally, both of them failed at trusting Janie. They never let her be the woman she truly was. On the other hand, Tea Cake was trusting, loyal, and respectful. He loved her for who she was and never asked her to change. You should never let a man hold you down from being all that you can be.

Janie comes to the realization that she is interested in Tea Cake, but does not want anyone to know. She is insecure and embarrassed because she is nearly fifteen years older than him; at the time, it was unusual for women to be older than their spouses, let alone by twelve years. For the most part, men were older than their wives to show dominance and protection. Janie believes that people would find their relationship inappropriate. Tea Cake, however, treats her as if she was a young woman again, showing by the way he flirts and jokes around. She is comfortable with him because he is not pressuring her to marry again, like everyone else is, but instead gives her time to think about what she is doing, no matter how eager he is. He is trying

Tea Cake is one of the most well-developed ones. He also appears to be the best out of the 3 love interests Janie has, although both Hurston’s novel and Native Son show the oppressive nature of many men including Tea Cake. According to Yvonne Mesa-El Ashmawi in his article titled “Janie's Tea Cake: Sinner, Saint, or Merely Mortal?”, while it could be argued that Tea Cake is irresponsible (such as when he gambled on Janie’s money and partied all night with the winnings) and he chose to live on the Muck which one scholar Ashmawi quoted called a “labor camp”, he is better for Janie than her other husbands were because he teaches her how to do things that are commonly regarded as men’s activities, including playing checkers, fishing, and shooting; he also embraces her femininity (204). Still, Ashmawi’s main argument is that Tea Cake is somebody with both good and bad qualities. I agree with this, as I think Tea Cake is the husband of Janie’s with the most likable personality. Yet, like Janie’s second husband, Joe Starks, Tea Cake also physically assaults Janie; both of them do this in order to assert their masculinity and power (80, 147). Meanwhile, her first husband, Logan Killicks, never lays a hand on Janie. Although Logan Killicks is not chosen by Janie, but by her grandmother, whom Janie refers to as Nanny. Nanny feels that since Janie is a Black woman, she is vulnerable and therefore, Janie needs a man to