Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 1 Summary •One evening, Janie Crawford returns to Eatonville, Florida, from the Everglades in mourning. •Her old community welcomes her back with scorn and derision. They’re all sitting on their porches, watching her return and exchanging nasty gossip born from jealousy of her beauty and social mobility. They make snide comments about Janie having left town in satin and returning in overalls, having left with a young man and returning alone, etc. •Pheoby, Janie’s best friend, defends Janie, saying that she has never done anything to hurt anybody. Then Pheoby leaves to take Janie some supper. •Pheoby finds Janie washing her feet. Their banter establishes to us that they have been good friends for a long time and that they trust each other. •Janie’s sure that she’s being gossip about, which Pheoby acknowledges. Janie doesn’t care what the others think of her and tells Pheoby so. •Actually, the men just gawk at her because even though she’s forty, she’s really hot. •The two friends discuss how the local gossip-mongers are just aching to get in everyone’s business and probably can’t wait until Judgment Day so they can hear the lowdown on everyone. •When Janie walks past all of her neighbors without stopping to chat, they take her silence as arrogance, which fuels more gossip about her. •Janie seems to want to talk about her story just as much as Pheoby wants to hear it, and live vicariously through her friend. •We learn that Janie loved a man named Tea Cake, whom the gossipy ladies say she was way too old for. •Janie begins by silencing Pheoby’s fears that Tea Cake took all of her money and ran off with a young girl. That didn’t happen – Tea Cake was great to her. •One of the things they resent is Janie’s beauty and the fact that she had a relationship with a man younger than herself. They try to paint her as whorish. Page | 1 •Janie says that Tea Cake is "gone" though what that means isn’t clear…yet. Janie gets ready to tell Pheoby a long story. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 2 Summary •Janie starts to tell her story, and she doesn’t start with Tea Cake – she starts at the beginning. We enter into a flashback of Janie’s early life. •Janie never knew her father or mother. She’d been raised all her life in West Florida by her grandmother, who she calls "Nanny," along with four white children in the Washburn household. •Janie spends so much time with the white children that she doesn’t realize she’s black…until she sees a photograph of the family. After all the white children in the picture are pointed out and named, there’s only a dark skinny girl left. In the moment of revelation, Janie cries, "Aw, aw! Ah’m colored!" •Janie is often called Alphabet in the Washburn household, a nickname she gained because so many people call her different things. he slept with her mother. But they keep the part about her father attempting to marry her mother hush-hush. •However, Nanny does her best to give Janie all the advantages she can. She even buys her own land and house. •We flash forward and Janie is now sixteen-years-old and discovering the phenomenon of sex for the first time. •While lying out under a blossoming pear tree, Janie witnesses a bee pollinating a pear blossom and describes it as a sexual experience. The whole experience is so beautiful, she’s sure that this is what love and marriage must be like. She envies the tree. •Janie happens upon Johnny Taylor, who had never before seemed appealing to her, but in her romantic pear tree daze, he’s a "glorious being." •Even as a child, Janie’s beauty is apparent and envied. •Nanny, who’s in the house taking a nap, wakes up to hear Janie and a boy talking outside. She looks out the window just in time to see Johnny and Janie in a liplock. •Because she often dresses in the white children’s hand-medowns (unlike many other black children, who didn’t have such quality clothing), she’s picked on by other black children. •Nanny pronounces that Janie is now a woman and tells her to get married as soon as possible. Janie resents the idea; she doesn’t feel like she’s really a woman yet. •The kids tease Janie relentlessly, using the story of Janie’s parentage to shame her. Everyone knows the part about the police sending bloodhounds hunting after her father because •Nanny’s worried that Janie will naively end up being used and treated like garbage by some man without her grandmother’s guidance. And granny’s getting on in age. Page | 2 •A man named Logan Killicks is interested in marrying Janie, but Janie is disgusted because of the huge age difference, and because "He look like som ole skullhead in de grave yard." Definitely unappealing. •Nanny accuses Janie of not wanting to be an honest wife and slaps Janie for her insolence. •When Janie begins to cry, Nanny immediately repents and rocks her granddaughter in her arms. •Nanny explains that she doesn’t want Janie to suffer as she has and as Janie’s mother did. She says that the black woman is "de mule uh de world" and her only motive behind suggesting reliable old Logan Killicks is to help Janie avoid a terrible fate. •Nanny feels her days on earth are numbered and she wants to see Janie "protected" before she goes. Even though Janie is young, she should get married before Nanny dies. •Nanny tries to explain to Janie where she’s coming from. Though it’s the early 1900’s right now, Nanny grew up as a slave. •Nanny describes a scene during the Civil War when her former master rode off to fight and she was left to face the wrath of the mistress of the house. When the mistress discovered that Nanny’s daughter had gray eyes and blond hair, she started slapping Nanny and threatened to have her Page | 3 beaten to a pulp and have the little girl sold off. In case you don’t get why, it’s because the baby’s looks are proof that the master had been sleeping with Nanny. •Nanny ran away into the swampland and was lucky enough to survive until slavery was abolished. •As a free woman, she decided not to marry though she had plenty of proposals. She was worried a man would mistreat her daughter. •Nanny settled in West Florida with the Washburn family and put her daughter, Leafy, in school as soon as she could. •Many years later, Leafy was raped by her white schoolteacher at age 17. After Leafy gave birth to Janie, Leafy became an alcoholic and ended up leaving. •So all in all, the women in Janie’s family have had hard lives and it’s no wonder Nanny wants to see her granddaughter married. •The chapter ends with Nanny’s sincere plea, "Ah can’t die easy thinkin’ maybe de menfolks white or black is makin’ a spit cup outa you: Have some sympathy fuh me." Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 3 Summary In case you didn’t realize it, we’re still in a flashback to for Janie’s bad mood (she’s doesn’t love Logan), Nanny belittles it. She thinks that being an honest woman and Janie’s youth. being respectfully called Mis’ Killicks should be enough Janie questions whether or not marriage brings love. for Janie. Nanny assures her it does and that she’ll learn to love Janie dislikes Logan’s practical, non-romantic-ness. All Logan after she marries him. he does is chop wood for her. Logan also isn’t So Janie consents to marrying Logan and becoming the attractive in appearance or hygiene – apparently he mistress of sixty acres of land. has an asymmetrical head and doesn’t wash his feet. Janie marries Logan at Nanny’s house and afterwards When Janie starts to cry, saying she wants to have a they feast. marriage like a blossoming pear tree, When Janie reaches Logan’s house, she finds that it’s a Nanny sends her away without comfort, telling her to pretty lonely, boring place off in the middle of wait a bit longer for love to come. nowhere. Nanny worries about Janie, but is sure that she’s done She waits three months for love to come and when it the best for her granddaughter that she could do. She doesn’t, Janie goes to see Nanny. prays to God to take care of the girl. During her visit with Nanny, Janie is pretty quiet and Within a month, Nanny is dead. seems down in the dumps. About a year later, Janie has learned her lesson: Nanny goes from thinking that Janie is quiet because marriage doesn’t bring love. With this realization, she she’s pregnant ("knocked up already"), to assuming grows increasingly distant, taking comfort in the that Logan is abusing her ("beat mah baby already"). beauty of nature around her. She is fascinated by the But when Nanny learns the more melodramatic reason concept of creation, especially now in the spring. Page | 4 The chapter ends with a sort of adage. Janie’s first dream of love died. Thus she became a woman. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 4 Summary •Janie’s marriage has gone all wrong. Essentially, the honeymoon period is over and Logan has come to take Janie for granted. •Logan and Janie bicker about chopping wood. Logan thinks Janie should be able to haul wood, and maybe even chop it, too. After all, his first wife chopped wood…blah blah blah. We could be wrong, but talking about your first wife doesn’t seem like a good way to win your current wife’s heart. •One day, Logan asks Janie to help him prepare potatoes for planting while he goes off to bargain for a second mule. When Janie asks him what they need with two mules, he says he’s looking for a big harvest and this other mule has been "all gentled up so even uh woman kin handle ‘im." •Apparently, Logan thinks that Janie should be plowing the fields and planting potatoes along with keeping the house and making meals. •While he is away, Janie sees an urban, stylish, confident man walk down the road. To get his attention, she furiously pumps water, which is loud and the effort makes her beautiful hair cascade down. (OK, so we made that part a bit more dramatic, Page | 5 the book just says "heavy hair fall down," but her hair really is attractive, everyone comments on it.) •The stranger stops, eyes her meaningfully, and asks for a cold drink. •She learns that his name is Joe Starks from Georgia and he’s heard of a town made up completely of black people who are going to build and run their own city. He means to find the town, go in early, invest, and get rich. •They flirt and it’s obvious that Joe wants to see Janie made a proper lady, not laboring behind a plow. •Joe decides to stay in the area for a week or two of rest. He and Janie find lots of time to talk. •It’s clear that Joe is interested in Janie. He spends his time talking about what a great future he has ahead of him. •Though Janie is obviously unhappy with Logan, she has a few reasons keeping her from just ditching him for Joe. First of all, Nanny wanted her to marry Logan. Secondly, it’s nice and all that Joe would bring a new, unimaginable kind of life, but she also doesn’t imagine having pear tree blossom love with him either. •The day before Joe leaves town, he assures her that he wants to make a proper wife out of her; he doesn’t just want to haul her off like a rogue. After all, Joe assures Janie that he’s "uh man wid principles." •He promises to come down the road beyond the gate the next morning and if she wants to come, she’ll meet him and they’ll run away together. •That night in bed, Janie considers the opportunity. When she tries to talk with Logan, he keeps blabbering about how grateful she should be to have him, considering her parentage and all that. •Then she poses to Logan a hypothetical situation to ask him what he’d do if she ran away. Though it strikes a powerful fear in Logan, he scoffs at her and says no man aside from him is foolish enough to want her. •The next morning, they argue. While Janie’s making breakfast, Logan starts yelling at her to help him move a manure pile. She refuses, saying she’s in her place (the kitchen or home) and he’s in his (working outdoors). •Logan responds, claiming that her place is where he wants her. •Janie’s had enough of Logan and she tells him that he hasn’t done her a favor by marrying her. To top it off, she doesn’t care at all for his sixty acres. Page | 6 •Enraged, Logan calls her spoiled, thinks that she looks down on him because she was raised in a white household, and says that her mother and grandmother weren’t hardworking. And, he threatens to kill her with an axe. •We imagine she doesn’t have much of a dilemma anymore about running away with Joe. •Janie isn’t even mad. She finishes breakfast for Logan and all the while she can feel a change coming. •After breakfast, she tosses away her apron and she wanders down the road to meet up with Joe. •Janie has high hopes. She believes she’ll have love and romance in her life from now on. •Together in a carriage, Joe and Janie ride to Green Cove Springs, where they are married. •Joe and Janie head off, but Hicks and the other townsmen are all ready envying Joe for having Janie. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 5 Summary •Joe isn’t a romantic poet, but he at least treats Janie well, getting her nice food and candy. He seems to want to spoil her as much as Logan wanted to un-spoil her. •When Janie looks at Joe, she’s reminded of white people; he’s slightly portly like them and unafraid of new, strange places. So far, Janie’s proud of her new husband. •They arrive in the highly-anticipated town and find it disappointing, much smaller than they imagined. Joe demands to talk to the mayor. •A man named Amos Hicks, upon seeing Janie, pretends to be the mayor. He thinks Janie is Joe’s daughter, but when he finds out the truth, he drops the façade since he’s definitely not getting anywhere with the pretty, married girl. •Hicks, in particular, is jealous and starts blabbering on about how popular he is with the ladies. Hicks thinks it’s a "good thing he [Joe Starks] married her befo’ she seen me. Ah kin be some trouble when Ah take uh notion." •The town is named Eatonville after the Captain who donated land. The Captain lives on a neighboring piece of land and Joe ventures to talk to Captain Eaton, seeking to buy more land from him for the town. •Most of the village follows Joe just to see him get ridiculed. •Meanwhile, Hicks doubles back to the house that Joe is renting to try his luck with Janie. He thinks the world of his manliness and grows surly when Janie doesn’t respond to him. She basically tells him that he talks too much. Looks like Joe doesn’t have any competition around here. •Later that evening, Hicks has a conversation with his friend Coker. Coker know Hicks didn’t succeed with Janie, so he lets Hicks go on about how Janie isn’t so pretty afterall. •Joe discovers that the town doesn’t have a mayor yet. •Hick directs Joe and Janie to a house that they can rent until they are settled and get their own place. Page | 7 •Coker tells Hicks that Joe succeeded in buying 200 acres of land from the Captain in cash. Joe Starks plans to build a store and post office on the land. Eatonville previously only consisted of 50 acres, so Joe Starks just became the big man in town. •Hicks gets jealous and doubts that Joe will actually start a post office. Hicks is sure that white people won’t let a black man run a post office. •Coker, on the other hand, seems to thinks that Joe Starks is capable of a lot and doesn’t find it wise to underestimate him. •That evening, Joe asks around about the location of a sawmill. He wants to start building a store immediately. He knows that in order to grow, Eatonville needs a store, which can also serve as a gathering place and the heart of the town. This guy is a natural urban planner. •The next day, Joe organizes a town meeting. The men of the town decide to get together to make two roads to run through Eatonville. Joe also hires some men to build his store. •Joe’s business skills bring in new residents, so Joe is already making a return on his investment by selling off lots for homes. Joe also starts selling tons of goods from the store before the building even has a roof. •For the grand opening of the store, Joe wants Janie on display. He wants to make sure that she always looks better than all of the customers, too. •Joe is magnanimous and gives out free drinks, cheese, and crackers to the customers. Page | 8 •Tony Taylor is so overwhelmed with joy at the progress of the town that he gives an impromptu speech thanking Joe. He is laughed at by his fellows because he doesn’t know how to give an effective speech. •Nevertheless, Joe responds with his own speech in which he says that the town needs a mayor (what a slick politician!) and welcome to his store… •The town shows their pleasure by unanimously voting him mayor. •The cheerful crowd wants a thank you speech from Mrs. Mayor Starks, but Joe doesn’t let Janie speak, saying that he didn’t marry her for her speaking ability and her place is in the home. •Janie didn’t really care to make a speech, but it bothers her Joe didn’t even give her a chance to decide. It leaves her cold that night. •Joe’s full of plans for town (and full of himself). He insists that he can’t run the store because he’ll be busy with more important things. Despite her objections, Joe is determined that Janie must run the store. •The town continues advancing. Joe arranges for street lamps to be brought in and makes a big deal about lighting them. He arranges a party around it, complete with a barbeque. •The lighting of the street lamps is surrounded by religious imagery and hymns. But later that night, Janie reveals that she feels Joe’s role as mayor makes their relationship strained and unnatural. Joe disagrees, saying she should be happy because it makes a "big woman" out of her. The conversation ends with Janie feeling lonely. •Janie soon learns that being the Mrs. Mayor means being kept at a distance from the other women in town. Instead of being friends with the local women, she is envied by them. •Joe is also a bit of a town bully. He somehow has a way of forcing people to do things for him, like dig drainage ditches around the streets by his store. •In every way, Joe sets himself up as the master of the town. It harkens back to the times of slavery. Joe has a huge, white two-story house, making everyone else’s house look like a servant’s. •Joe acquires a fancy spittoon cup that most people would be proud to display as a vase. He doesn’t stop there either. He gets a small flowery one for Janie. Joe’s conspicuous displays of wealth makes the townspeople feel cheated and envious. •They become increasingly resentful because they feel one of their own (a black man) should not treat his own so haughtily. •After Joe catches a man, Henry Pitts, trying to steal some of his ribbon cane (candy) and drives him out of town, the Page | 9 townspeople start gossiping about their mayor behind his back. •Some point out that he’s getting rich off of the rest of them. •They basically accuse him of loving to hear his own speeches, being bossy, and being arrogant because of his education. Someone observes that he changes things around him but never lets himself be changed. •The townspeople also disapprove of the way Joe treats his wife. Janie is kept under certain constraints. She must keep her hair bound and up whenever she’s in public and Joe rages at her if she makes a mistake in the store. •Janie seems to take Joe’s tyranny without missing a beat; because they don’t know any better, the townspeople decide it’s because she and Joe "understand one another." •Overall, Joe Starks acts like the king of the town, and despite disliking him, the townspeople don’t challenge him Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 6 Summary •Some of the men like to tease Matt Bonner about his skinny yellow mule. Though everyone loves the conversation (except Matt), Joe has forbidden Janie to join in. He thinks she is too good for them and Janie resents him for it. •She also resents how hard Joe makes her work in the store, especially since he doesn’t do much there himself. The most irksome thing, of course, is his staunch resolution for her to wear a head-rag in the store. •We learn Joe does this because he is supremely jealous of other men "figuratively wallowing" his wife’s hair while she is going about her business in the store. But he does not tell Janie this; he simply commands her to wear the head-rag. •When Matt Bonner’s yellow mule gets loose, the men decide to catch it and tease it for fun. Janie watches helplessly, feeling sorry for the poor beast. •Then Joe does something unexpected. He buys the mule from Matt Bonner. When Matt ridicules the Mayor for it, saying that the mule will probably be dead within the week, Joe reveals that he hasn’t bought the mule to work, but simply to give the poor animal some rest. •At this revelation, the others agree that it’s generous of Joe to do such a thing. Janie praises him for his big-heartedness, Page | 10 comparing him to Lincoln freeing the Negroes, and one of the men remarks that Janie is a born orator. •The freed mule becomes the talk of the town and the people imagine him doing a great many comic things. •Eventually the mule dies with its legs stuck straight up in the air. One man named Lum concludes that the mule, being a spirited creature, saw Death coming and fought to the end – which is why he is found in such an unnatural position. •The whole town has a great "draggin-out" for the dead mule, who has become something of a local celebrity, and they put on a hilarious funeral for him. •Everyone enjoys the funeral celebration immensely – except for Janie. Joe orders his wife to stay at the store because he claims it wouldn’t be proper for the Mayor’s wife to be seen at such an event. •Janie is sullen afterwards, but silent. Joe sees her resentment but thinks she is just being petty and ungrateful for all the good things he does give her. •Much of the remainder of the chapter describes the townspeople having fun on the porch of the store, arguing and pretending to court young girls for Joe Starks’ entertainment. •Joe, of course, ruins all of Janie’s fun by making her stop watching the scene and go attend to some business in the store. •When one of the ladies being "courted" requests a pickled pig foot (ew!), Lum (a guy that helps Janie out in the store) looks for the jar but can’t find any pig feet. •Joe comes to look for the pig feet, which was supposed to have arrived yesterday. He can’t find them and he can’t find the bill that came with the shipment. He blames Janie and they get in a fight with her sick of him bossing her around, and him saying he only tells her what to do "’cause you need tellin" and "Somebody got to think for women and chillun and chickens and cows. I god, they sho don’t think none theirselves." Ouch. •Eventually, after a number of scenes like this, Janie give up trying to fight Joe because it just makes him more mad and demand her submission. She just hushes and takes it. •Janie is only 24 and she’s been married for seven years. By this time, she realizes that their marriage is falling apart. She doesn’t even associate their bed with anything fun anymore; it’s just a place to sleep. •Even worse, after these seven years, Joe slaps Janie for messing up his dinner. At that point, Janie realizes that she is saving herself up for some other man, and that she has Page | 11 learned how to hide her inner thoughts from Joe while putting up a front. •Joe, for all his sexism, does want peace with Janie but on his own terms. •At the end of the chapter, the men at the Starks’ store are lampooning Mrs. Tony (a townswoman) for her impudent behavior, saying that her husband should beat her. Janie speaks up in the defense of women – telling the men how pretentious and ignorant they are for thinking they know everything about women. Joe quickly silences her Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 7 Summary •Janie lives with Joe for years in resigned silence. She gets no emotional support from Joe, and his wealth and the possessions he gives her are of no comfort. •Janie considers running away but feels trapped. She even realizes that she’s been with Joe half her life – she married him at 17 and is now 35. •She learns to imagine herself sitting underneath the comfort of a tree in summertime while she does her work and outwardly submits to Joe. •Joe’s age is beginning to show – he’s about thirteen years older than Janie – and to avert people’s attention from it, Joe piles more and more ridicule on Janie, making her out to be old and haggard. He calls her an "ole hen" and stuff like that. •Eventually Janie loses her temper and stands up to Joe in the store. She confronts him saying that he should stop pointing out how old she is all the time and maybe comment on himself once and a while. •When Joe continues to insult her, she hits him where it hurts, saying, "Talkin’ ‘bout me lookin’ old! When you pull down yo’ britches, you look lak de change uh life." •The men in the store say how they’d hate to hear that comment about themselves, which really destroys Joe’s pride. Page | 12 He can’t stand the thought of being pitied by the men of the town, whom he considers inferior to him. •Joe reacts with violence, hitting Janie. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 8 Summary •After that, Joe moves into the room downstairs and he and Janie hardly talk to each other. •Janie doesn’t want to apologize to Joe for belittling him once since he’s been doing that to her for their whole, long marriage. •Still, Janie notices that Joe really is getting old. He’s saggy and baggy all over. •Unbeknownst to Janie, Joe wants to regain his manliness in her eyes and in desperation, consults with charlatan herbalists ("root doctors") trying to find a cure. •Janie also discovers that Joe isn’t eating her cooking anymore. He’s having an old lady, who’s a far worse cook than Janie, make his meals. This really hurts Janie. •Janie, who at some level still loves Joe, sobs out her sorrows to her best friend, Pheoby. (This is the first mention of Pheoby within the frame of Janie’s narration.) Janie doesn’t want Joe to think ill of her. She feels like she’s killing Joe. •Pheoby advises her to just bear it. There’s nothing Janie can do to take back what she said about his manhood in the store, and it’s far too late to get a divorce. •Joe continues to get weaker, but won’t see a real doctor, only the "root doctor." He takes to his bed and gets tons of Page | 13 visitors who pay no attention to Janie. Furthermore, Joe’s new-found friends report to the sick Mayor about his wife and how incompetent she is in the store. •In desperation, Janie calls a real doctor from Orlando in to diagnose Joe. He tells her that Joe’s kidneys have failed and it’s just a matter of time before Joe dies. •Janie doesn’t want Joe to die alone, but Joe refuses to see her. •Janie works up her nerve to confront Joe. She gives him a piece of her mind, telling him that he never gave her the chance to show him her love. •She tells him that he’s dying, which terrifies him. He doesn’t want to confront the truth. •Janie points out that if he had listened to her before and had seen a doctor, he wouldn’t be dying right now. He never listened to her and never knew her through their twenty years of marriage. •Enraged, Joe wishes death upon her. •Janie confesses that he’s not the man she ran away with. All she wanted was to make a home for him, but he was too ambitious and demanded her submission. Janie says Joe never let her show him her love because he was too wrapped up listening to his "own big voice." •Joe dies trying to rebuke her. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 9 Summary •Janie contemplates his face in death and feels pity for him. •The community puts on a grand funeral for Joe. Tons of people show up. •Then she thinks about herself. She goes to the mirror and lets her hair down. Her youth is gone, but she’s still a beautiful woman. Janie is not destroyed by Joe’s death; rather, we get the feeling that she can finally get on with her life. •The chapter ends with Janie announcing out of the window that Joe has died. •Janie, however, doesn’t feel grief, only a great sense of freedom. •After the funeral, Janie burns all of the headrags that Joe forced her to wear. •She lives her life much as she had with Joe. The only public changes she makes are keeping her hair down and allowing herself some indulgence in the gossip on the store’s porch in the evenings. •However, Janie still feels lonely and searches for meaning for her life. Her thoughts wander to her deceased Nanny. She decides she hates Nanny for rendering her so unhappy in the name of love, for strangling her dreams. •Her new position as a (wealthy) widow draws many men wanting to "advise" her and saying that a woman can’t stand by herself – a woman needs a man to take care of her. Janie laughs them off; she’s not about to trade in her new found freedom for another loveless marriage. •Ike Green, a local man visiting the store, warns Janie about her suitors. He says these strange men are just looking to take advantage of her. Page | 14 •When she assures Ike that she has no interest in marrying, he says she’ll change her mind because she’s still young. Ike predicts that within a few months she’ll be thinking about remarrying. •Ike’s wrong, though. After six months (the mourning period), not one of Janie’s suitors has ever gotten farther than the store. •Hezekiah, the store assistant and delivery boy, takes to imitating Joe. Janie is greatly amused by him and feels affection for him. Hezekiah starts taking of the role of Janie’s older brother and helps her manage the store and collect rent from her tenants. •Janie revels in her freedom. •Pheoby talks to Janie about how she might want to consider marrying, but Janie tells her friend that she’s not staying single because she misses Joe; she just loves her freedom. Janie doesn’t care if the whole town knows how she feels. Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 10 Summary •One day, the whole town leaves to attend a baseball game in Winter Park, including Hezekiah. Janie tends to the store by herself. •In the evening, a man walks in and they immediately hit it off. He’s charming and claims to have come to the wrong town looking for the ball game. •Then he invites Janie to play checkers. Since she doesn’t know how to play, he teaches her and she’s delighted that a man thinks it natural for a woman to play as his equal. •Janie gets excited about him. He’s everything a girl could want – tall, dark, handsome, not-misogynistic – so different than her old, fat, dominating husbands on every point. •They joke around for the whole evening and we learn that this man has a high opinion of women, saying they can do the same things as men – play checkers, walk far, ride a train. •Eventually we learn the stranger’s name is Vergible Woods, but he goes by Tea Cake. •He ends up helping her close up the store and walks her home. •Though Janie is cautious, she finds herself very comfortable around him, as if she has known him her whole life. Page | 15 Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 11 Summary •Janie worries about the kind of man Tea Cake is. She thinks he’s too young for her, probably just wants to take her money, and other thoughts like that. Janie is determined not to get sucked into another marriage without love so she determines to treat Tea Cake coldly if he ever comes back. •He comes back after a week, and Janie can’t keep from being friendly to him. Janie and Tea Cake end up joking around again. •They play checkers, and while the store’s other customers are surprised, they don’t seem to disapprove. •Tea Cake walks Janie home again, and this time ends up sitting with her on the porch – something Janie didn’t allow any of her other suitors to do. The end up chatting the night away and eating pound cake and drinking lemonade (freshly squeezed by Tea Cake). •After the late night snack, Tea Cake takes Janie fishing and she feels like a child gleefully breaking the rules. She doesn’t get back home until early in the morning. •The next day in the store, Hezekiah warns Janie that she shouldn’t be walking with Tea Cake at night. Janie asks if Tea Cake is a bad guy or a thief…or married. It seems that Hezekiah’s objection is that Tea Cake never has any money, so he has no place cozying up to a rich widow. Page | 16 •The next night when she gets home from work, Tea Cake is waiting for her on her porch with some fish he’s just caught. They go inside and Janie cooks up the fish. •After dinner, Tea Cake starts playing the piano and singing, which lulls Janie to sleep. She awakes to find Tea Cake combing her hair. This apparently isn’t sketchy, but romantic. She really likes it and it makes her even more comfortable. •He compliments her aspects – hair, lips, eyes. But she points out that he’s probably said the same things to other women, which he says is true. •So Janie says she’s going to go to bed. But Tea Cake knows she’s just trying to get rid of him because she’s worried he’s "uh rounder and uh pimp." He’s pretty perceptive. •At this point, Janie walks away from him. Tea Cake all but admits he is in love with her. •Janie, however, plays it safe. She’s worried that he’s going to make fun of her later for being an "old fool" (she’s twelve years older than him). Janie says he only thinks he cares for her; this is just his "night thought." Essentially, she says she’s too old for him and he’ll change his mind about her by tomorrow morning. •Tea Cake leaves. •She goes to bed, but not before she checks out her hair, eyes, and mouth in the mirror. Maybe she’s checking to see if he was being honest in his compliments. •For one full day, he does not come and Janie tries to console herself by convincing herself that he is trash anyway, spending his time with some other woman. •The next morning, Tea Cake returns with the intention of telling Janie his "daytime thoughts." In other words, he hasn’t changed his mind about loving her. •That night when Janie gets back from the store, she finds Tea Cake on the porch. They snuggle on the hammock for a little while. Next we know, they’re waking up in the morning and Tea Cake is kissing Janie all over. •After Tea Cake leaves to go to work, Janie lies in bed, incredibly happy. •After four days, Tea Cake comes back. In this interval, Janie has begun to doubt his love. •But he comes back with a car and tells her they are going to town to buy groceries. He wants to take her to the Sunday School picnic on the morrow and he re-declares his love for her when she questions him. Page | 17 Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 12 Summary •After the picnic, Janie begins spending more time with Tea Cake and the town notices. They disapprove of her accompanying such a young man around with her husband only nine months in the grave. •Sam Watson discusses the matter with Pheoby. Pheoby still believes Janie will marry the undertaker from Sanford, but she doesn’t disapprove of Tea Cake as much as the men do. She points out that Janie is her own woman and can do what she wants. But she agrees to talk to Janie nonetheless. •Pheoby goes to see Janie the next morning. Pheoby tells Janie that people are talking, saying that Tea Cake is dragging her off to low-class entertainment like baseball games. Janie admits she always wanted to do that kind of stuff before, it was just that Joe wouldn’t let her. •Pheoby wants to know if Janie thinks Tea Cake is just after her money. Janie assures Pheoby that Tea Cake has never asked her to pay for anything. And if Tea Cake does want her money, then he’s no different than the other suitors that the townspeople approve of. •Pheoby also cautions Janie about seeing a younger man – they’re usually in the relationship for money. •Janie says she intends to marry Tea Cake, sell the store, and start a new life far from Eatonville. She doesn’t want to stick around and have everyone comparing Tea Cake to Joe Starks. •Janie explains that Nanny wanted her to live the leisurely life of a white woman, which is what she obtained with Joe, but she felt she was being suffocated. Now that she’s done what her grandma wanted her to, she can go off and live her life the way she chooses. •Janie asks Pheoby not to tell everyone her plans to sell the store and go off with Tea Cake. She’ll make it public when she’s ready to. •Janie is determined to try for a new life with Tea Cake. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 13 Summary •Janie receives a letter from Tea Cake telling her to come to Jacksonville; she leaves the next morning in her wedding clothes – blue satin picked out by Tea Cake. There are few awake to witness her leaving. •She and Tea Cake get married. Janie doesn’t tell Tea Cake about the two hundred dollars she has brought with her, at Pheoby’s urging, just in case things don’t go well. •After being married for a week, Janie wakes up to find Tea Cake gone. This doesn’t alarm her terribly because he had said earlier that he was planning on going fishing. Hours pass and Tea Cake doesn’t return. Then Janie discovers her secret stash of $200 is missing. •The image of an Eatonville widow named Mrs. Tyler jumps to Janie’s mind. Mrs. Tyler was courted by a young tramp named Who Flung who promised to marry her, then left her penniless in a strange town. •Tea Cake eventually comes home that night, serenading her with a guitar and his voice. He assures her that he’s very much in love with her. He’s know plenty of women, but she’s the only woman he ever even considered marrying. •He tells a relieved Janie that he did indeed take her two hundred dollars. He had never had so much money in his life before and decided to put on a party. He partied with all the Page | 18 railroad hands and spent all but twelve dollars of the two hundred. In his defense, he says he wanted to come back and bring Janie, too, but was scared that she wouldn’t want to mingle with such common people. Janie assures him otherwise and demands that she’s not left out of the action in the future. •Tea Cake tries to win back the two hundred dollars gambling. He is gone almost all night and Janie begins to worry. To distract herself, she comes up with arguments about how Tea Cake is a better man, despite his gambling habit, than all sorts of "so-called Christians" who might criticize him. •When Tea Cake finally shows up at dawn, he looks like he is asleep. Janie discovers it is from blood loss. •Tea Cake got into a fight with another gambler named Double-Ugly who had lost all his money and accused Tea Cake of cheating. Tea Cake got away with his winnings and two wounds from Double-Ugly’s razor. •Janie cries as she cleans her husband’s wounds and listens to his story. •He has won back more than just the two hundred. He has a total of three hundred and twenty-two dollars and he tells Janie to take her two hundred back. •He vows that they’ll live off his earnings and not depend on her cash or the money she has saved up in her bank account. Page | 19 •Tea Cake assures his wife that they’ll go try their luck farming in the Everglades once he recovers. As he falls asleep, Janie feels a "self-crushing love" for him. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 14 Summary •Janie and Tea Cake arrive in the Everglades and Tea Cake immediately finds employment with the "right folks" – those who plan to plant a lot of beans. Then they acquire a house, which is really a shack for migrant workers, but Janie makes it a home. •Because there is nothing else to do, Tea Cake and Janie go hunting. Tea Cake teaches Janie to shoot and she eventually becomes a better shot than he. •Migrant workers finally begin arriving in hordes. Though they don’t have housing and camp out by fires, the workers make a lively scene with their banjos and jook houses (see Hurston’s definition of a jook joint). They all make good money, farming out in the fertile muck of the bean fields. •Janie stays at home cooking beans and keeping house while Tea Cake works in the fields. Eventually, Tea Cake starts coming back at strange hours of the day when he should be working. Janie asks him about it, suspecting that he doesn’t trust her being alone all day and he refutes it, saying he comes home because he misses her badly. He asks her to come work with him and relieve his loneliness. •Janie agrees and it turns out well. It shows the rest of the people that Janie is not too stuck up to work with the rest of them. And everyone enjoys the capers Janie and Tea Cake pull Page | 20 behind the boss’s back. They become great favorites in the little community. •Now that Janie’s working during the day, Tea Cake even helps her make supper in the evenings. •Janie reflects happily on her situation and considers what Eatonville would think of her now, mucking around in the fields with Tea Cake and all the migrant workers. She laughs at the thought and rejoices in her freedom. •The chapter closes with a scene of three of the migrant workers playing cards, illustrating all of the fun that all of the workers have together, and Janie’s contentment. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 15 Summary Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 16 Summary •Janie becomes jealous of a "little chunky girl" named Nunkie who keeps flirting with Tea Cake. Tea Cake allows himself to be drawn in to the game. •After the harvest, the migrant workers leave in droves, but Janie and Tea Cake decide to stay. •One day in the field, Tea Cake and chunky Nunkie go missing. When Janie finds them in the cane field, they are "struggling." Nunkie takes off running at the sight of Janie. Irate, Janie tries to catch the younger woman, but Nunkie is too quick. •At home that evening, Janie and Tea Cake fight; Janie tries to physically strike him, accusing him of "messin’ round" with Nunkie, but he denies it. •They continue fighting but eventually they tear each other’s clothes off and their aggression turns into desire. As you might predict, they end up having great sex. •In the morning, Tea Cake again denies that he ever wanted Nunkie, saying, "Whut would Ah do wid dat lil chunk of a woman wid you around? She ain’t good for nothin’ exceptin’ tuh set up in uh corner by de kitchen stove and break wood over her head. You’se something tuh make uh man forgit tuh git old and forgit tuh die." •Janie celebrates her victory. •Janie becomes friends with a woman named Mrs. Turner, who comes from a mixed heritage, much like Janie. Even though Mrs. Turner isn’t beautiful (she’s slightly deformed), she takes pride in her own appearance because she thinks it sets her apart from the other black people. •Mrs. Turner decides to befriend Janie because Janie is also fair-skinned. •In her conversation with Mrs. Turner, Janie learns that the woman is very anti-black and resents having to live with them. She really feels above black people and likes to think of herself as practically white because of her mixed blood. Mrs. Turner thinks that her new friend Janie should feel the same way. •Mrs. Turner wants Janie to ditch Tea Cake (who she thinks is too dark) and marry her brother, a scholar who has perfectly straight hair and freely criticizes Booker T. Washington. She arranges for Janie and her brother to meet, but Janie reminds the woman that she is already married and isn’t interested in any man but her husband. •Tea Cake overhears the whole conversation. Janie reassures him that she is happy with him and has no intention of marrying Mrs. Turner’s brother. Page | 21 •Tea Cake hates Mrs. Turner and doesn’t want her hanging around his house. •Tea Cake meets Mr. Turner and his son one day on the street. Mr. Turner is described as a "vanishing-looking kind of man" whose features were "dwindled and blurred." Tea Cake learns that Mr. Turner doesn’t approve of his wife’s behavior, either, but can’t do anything about it. •From Mr. Turner, Tea Cake also learns that the Turners have had bad luck with childbirth – they lost several children at birth and only have one son. •Mrs. Turner is extremely racist in her perspective on black and white people. She sees white people as gods and black people as worshippers. •She "worships" Janie to a certain extent because Janie has more white features than she does. And even if Janie treats her badly and doesn’t encourage her, Mrs. Turner admires Janie the more for it, thinking that gods and idols shouldn’t always be nice to those below them. In Mrs. Turner’s mind, Janie’s snubs prove that she’s worth worshipping. •In her mixed up racist-religious scheme, Mrs. Turner hopes that worshipping white people will gain her admittance into a heaven of white people. Page | 22 •As part of her idolization of white people and white features, Mrs. Turner fervently hates black people, especially Tea Cake, because she sees them as "desecrators" of her faith. •Janie tries to discourage Mrs. Turner from visiting, but she is persistent. Janie and Tea Cake simply ignore her for most of the fallow season. •The chapter ends with the migrant workers returning again with the onset of the planting season. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 17 Summary •Mrs. Turner brings her brother to meet Janie. •Tea Cake, of course, gets jealous. He beats Janie – not because she has done anything wrong, but to relieve the fear inside him and to show the Turners "who is boss." He may be feeling insecure, but this show of possession is just not cool, although the book seems to glorify it a little bit. •One of Tea Cake’s friends, Sop-de-Bottom, remarks how different Janie is from other women because she doesn’t fight back when beaten or yell. She only cries. And this is attractive to Sop-de-Bottom (which is more than slightly creepy). •Tea Cake intervenes. He accuses Coodemay of disrespecting Mrs. Turner and her restaurant, threatening to throw him out. •Dick Sterrett defends his friend. Soon everyone in the place has taken sides. •The argument erupts into a full-blown brawl and Mrs. Turner soon sees that Tea Cake’s noble efforts to defend her restaurant will cause more trouble than simply allowing the two drunkards to stay. She tries to tell Tea Cake so, but he insists on defending her honor. •The fight continues and everything in the restaurant is destroyed. •Tea Cake seems even more proud of his wife now and continues to justify his display of domestic violence, claiming that beating Janie is the best way to get Mrs. Turner to lay off. •Eventually, Coodemay admits he is wrong and offers to buy drinks for everyone. They all hightail it to another bar and leave Mrs. Turner in the ruins. •Sop-de-Bottom assures Tea Cake that all the workers will side with him against Mrs. Turner and they plan to drive her away. •Mrs. Turner is enraged at the destruction. She takes it out on her husband, who did nothing to stop the fight. •On Saturday afternoon, the workers are paid, so naturally they go out and party. •Finally, Mrs. Turner decides to go back to Miami "where folks is civilized." •Dick Sterrett and Coodemay, some of Tea Cake’s friends, get drunk and head over to Mrs. Turner’s eating house for dinner. •Little does she know that her brother and son have been threatened by the workers and have already made tracks for Miami. •The little restaurant is packed and there is no place to sit. When Coodemay’s order comes, he demands that Sop-deBottom give up his chair. Sop refuses and a fight ensues. Page | 23 •Tea Cake’s scheme went according to plan – he and Janie are now rid of Mrs. Turner. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 18 Summary •Janie notices some Native Americans of the Seminole tribe trekking east through town. She asks them where they are going. They answer that they are seeking higher ground because a hurricane is coming. •Most of the workers don’t believe there will be a hurricane because the white men aren’t moving. They ignore all the warning signs – the animals migrating east in droves, the strangely calm weather. •When Tea Cake is given a chance to hitch a ride east with one of his Bahaman friends, he refuses. Like most of the other workers, he’s decided to stay. •That night, the migrant workers hold a massive party, complete with storytelling, singing, dancing, cards, and gambling. Tea Cake gets caught up in a game against Motor Boat. •Meanwhile, the weather continues to worsen. •Lake Okechobee begins to roil and the sun can’t be seen though morning has set in. •At this point, Tea Cake and Motor Boat finally stop competing and they listen to the howling wind outside. •They finally realize that a furious hurricane is approaching. Page | 24 •Tea Cake, in his own way, asks forgiveness of Janie. She tells him she would rather die with him in the coming storm than to have stayed in Eatonville and never have met him. •Fear overtakes the couple and they watch the sky and question whether God is going to let them die. Here we see the phrase which is the namesake for the book: "They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God." •The house starts to flood. Tea Cake decides to make a break for it. He tells Janie to wrap up all their money and insurance papers to keep them from getting wet. •The car is nowhere to be found so they have to walk to higher ground. Janie, terribly frightened, wants to stay in their shack and sit it out, but Tea Cake convinces her to move. •The three of them – Janie, Tea Cake, and Motor Boat – run for higher ground. •They see the true awesome power of the storm behind them; the lake has swollen and is flooding the entire area. The wind blows at 200 mph. •Some of the fleeing workers drown. •After a brief respite in an abandoned house, Tea Cake decides they must continue on and get to higher ground. •Motor Boat, however, has given up. He elects to stay in the house, sleep, and depend on luck. Tea Cake tries to argue with him, but to no avail. •Janie and Tea Cake strike out on their own. They must swim through the flood to reach safety. Janie is not a strong swimmer and Tea Cake has to hold her up. This exhausts both of them. By the time they reach a stopping point – the bridge at Six Mile Bend – fleeing workers have crowded it so there is no room to stand. •Jane and Tea Cake have to walk on. •Death is everywhere. Tea Cake is too exhausted to stand and collapses. •Janie spots a piece of tar-paper roofing nearby and thinks it could provide a makeshift roof for poor Tea Cake. However, when she grabs the roofing, it acts like a gigantic kite, catching the wind and blowing Janie out into the raging water. •Nearby a cow is slowly swimming in the flood with a massive dog sitting on its back and shivering. Tea Cake yells for Janie to grab onto the cow’s tail to be dragged to safety. •Janie manages to grab onto the cow, but the dog on the cow’s back tries to attack her. The dog, however, is afraid of the water and cannot reach Janie. •Seeing the ferocious dog, Tea Cake comes to Janie’s rescue. Page | 25 •Tea Cake kills the dog with his knife, but not before being bitten once on the cheekbone. The narrator makes it apparent that if Tea Cake had his full strength, he could’ve killed the dog in one stroke, without getting bitten. This will prove to be fateful later. •Janie and Tea Cake reach safety on higher ground and they stop to rest. •The next day they reach Palm Beach just as the storm peters out. With their money, they acquire a place to sleep. •Janie insists on finding a doctor for Tea Cake’s bite, but he refuses – he just wants to rest. •They discuss how fierce the dog was. Janie describes the animal as "pure hate" and calls Tea Cake "twice noble" for saving her. •When Tea Cake feels sorry for himself for bringing all this disaster upon her, Janie reassures him of her love. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 19 Summary •After resting for two days, Tea Cake decides it is time to go find some work. Janie warns him that there is no work to be had except being enlisted by the white men to bury the dead from the hurricane. •Tea Cake decides to try his luck anyway, reasoning that if he has money in his pockets, the white men will leave him alone. •He’s wrong. The first two white men he encounters force him to help out with the messy job that Janie described. •Many black workers are doing the same thing – dumping any human bodies they find into a deep ditch. •Soon, however, the orders change. The workers are to separate the white corpses from the black because the white ones will have coffins made for them, and the black corpses won’t. •Motor Boat is particularly lucky. When Tea Cake and Janie split ways with him, Motor Boat fell asleep on the top floor of an abandoned house. His whole building was swept away by the flood, but the storm never touched him. •Tea Cake finds work in the ‘Glades, helping rebuild what the hurricane destroyed. •At home, Janie continues practicing her shooting. •In the fourth week, Tea Cake starts exhibiting signs of sickness. He asks for food, then when Janie brings it to him, refuses to eat it. Then he asks for some water, but gags it up. •Janie, alarmed, calls in a white doctor and has Tea Cake diagnosed. She tells the doctor the story of their escape from the hurricane, including the episode with the cow and dog. •The doctor prescribes some pills and then pulls Janie out to talk to her privately. •After several hours of this toil, Tea Cake realizes Janie will probably be worrying about him. So he runs away, even after being threatened with guns. •He reveals that Tea Cake has been bitten by a mad dog (in other words, one with rabies), and that Tea Cake’s inability to drink water is one sure symptom. •At home, he finds Janie weeping. He consoles her and convinces her to leave Palm Beach with him. •He warns Janie to stay away from Tea Cake, especially when he has one of his choking fits, because she could get bitten and be infected by the same disease. Tea Cake has a very slim chance of living. •They return to the Everglades. Tea Cake discovers some of his friends – Sop-de-Bottom, Stew Beef, Dockery, ‘lias, Coodemay, Bootyny, and Motor Boat – alive. Page | 26 •The doctor assures Janie that he will send for the antidote serum from the city, but warns her that Tea Cake should have taken it weeks ago. It probably won’t help much now. •She reassures him of her love, but while she is putting him to bed, she feels the cold steel of a pistol underneath his pillow. She says nothing because he hasn’t brought it up himself. •Janie clings to hope. •She realizes that the dog of pure hate has killed her after all, but not directly. He is killing her slowly and painfully through Tea Cake’s suffering. She asks God for help, but her prayers remain unanswered. •Meanwhile Tea Cake still thinks seeing a doctor is unnecessary. He says he only gags on water because Janie’s been giving him dirty water. When he pumps his own water and has the same reaction, he becomes embarrassed; he doesn’t want Janie to see him in such a weak state. •When Janie leaves home to see about the medicine, she does it in secret because she doesn’t want Tea Cake to worry. •Janie runs into Sop-de-Bottom and Dockery. She asks them to go sit with Tea Cake while she is gone and keep him company. They comply. •When Janie returns home, Tea Cake has become madly jealous because Sop has told him that Mrs. Turner’s brother is back in town and has the same sickness as Tea Cake. Tea Cake takes this to mean that Janie has been visiting with Mrs. Turner’s brother. •When Janie tells him the truth (that she has gone to check on the medicine), he breaks down, crying in her arms. •That night, Tea Cake suffers two choking attacks and continues being unaccountably suspicious of Janie. He will not let her out of his sight, even to get the doctor. •Janie is frightened by Tea Cake’s odd behavior, so while he’s in the outhouse, she sets the pistol underneath his pillow so that it will snap three times before actually firing. She hopes she is wrong in fearing that Tea Cake will turn the pistol on her but she wants to err on the side of safety. •Tea Cake returns with a strange loping stride and his jaws set strangely. •His natural jealousy is being amplified by the disease. He asks Janie coldly why she no longer sleeps in the same bed as him. She reminds him that the doctor prescribed it. But he is beyond reason. •Tea Cake thinks that Janie is fooling around with Mrs. Turner’s brother and he turns the pistol on her. Page | 27 •As the three clicks come and go, Janie whips out a rifle to protect herself. •Janie recognizes that Tea Cake is no longer Tea Cake; her husband has been taken over by the fiendish disease that urges him to kill anything in sight. •Janie shoots an instant before Tea Cake does. He misses. She doesn’t. •Tea Cake dies in her arms, still hateful and biting down Janie’s forearm. She weeps over his body and silently thanks him for giving her the chance to love. •The same day, Janie is put on trial for killing Tea Cake. •The entire black community is set against her; they feel like she has betrayed Tea Cake. Ironically, the white women in the audience sympathize with Janie. •Dr. Simmons, who treated Tea Cake, testifies on Janie’s behalf. •A man named Mr. Prescott testifies against Janie, saying that Tea Cake always treated her well and that she left Tea Cake for another man while her husband was sick. Hardly the truth of the situation. •When Janie gives her testimony, she makes a point of telling the truth as she knows it and not pleading to anybody. Page | 28 •The verdict is in Janie’s favor so she goes free. •The white women surround Janie in their support while her black peers leave with their heads hanging. •As she leaves, Janie overhears a couple of men saying she only went free because she had killed a black man, not a white one. •Janie arranges an elaborate funeral for Tea Cake, whom she has come to idealize as "son of the Evening Sun." •She is so distraught that she doesn’t care about her appearance; rather than wearing black for mourning, she wears her overalls. Their Eyes Were Watching God Chapter 20 Summary •The black community’s anger against Janie is short-lived. They take it out on Mrs. Turner’s brother instead, running him out of the ‘Glades. •Janie stays a few weeks after Tea Cake’s funeral, not because she wants to, but because the community begs her to. •She gives away everything in her house except a little packet of seeds that reminds her of Tea Cake. She means to plant them when she gets home. •At this point, Janie’s story ends. She is back in her house in Eatonville, talking to Pheoby. Janie tells Pheoby that she is home for good and now feels that she has lived a full life. •She also gives Pheoby permission to relay her story to Eatonville’s gossipy ladies. Janie urges her friend to tell them love is not a single constant thing, but it is like the sea, shaped by the shores it meets. •After listening to Janie’s story, Pheoby doesn’t feel satisfied with her small isolated life. She wants to spend more time with her husband, Sam. She also assures Janie that she won’t stand for hearing a word spoken against her. •Janie advises her friend that experiencing life is the most important thing – going out, living, and finding God. It will not satisfy you to just sit around, talking and listening to tales. Page | 29 •After Pheoby leaves, Janie goes upstairs into the bedroom, which is full with memories. •She remembers the fateful day of Tea Cake’s death and decides that Tea Cake is not dead and will not be until Janie herself dies. He helped her see her own limits, her own horizon. •The book ends with Janie feeling at peace.
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