Their Eyes Were Watching God (Ch 1+2): Insight to Janie

In the first chapters of Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, one quickly learns about the main character, Janie. Hurston first introduces Janie as she returns home form Tea Cake and is criticized by the local, envious women. When Pheoby visits Janie, Janie begins to recount her childhood and story. At sixteen, Janie retains dreams of becoming "a pear tree," or, in fact, "any tree in bloom" (Hurston pg 11). She mentions earlier that she seeks "confirmation" but is incapable of discovering an answer to her restlessness. She comes across flies who were "marrying and giving in marriage" (Hurston pg 11). Thus, Janie quickly aspires to become "any tree in bloom" so that she will encounter the flies who marry and give in marriage. She wishes to meet the "kissing bees" who will mark the "beginning of the world" (Hurston pg 11). Janie wishes to discover these singings bees so that her life can "begin," but she believes only by maturing and "blooming" into a woman will she be able to meet the bees, flies, and therefore marriage. Thus, Hurston gives insight to Janie's character because one recognizes a feeling of loneliness which produces Janie's desire to be loved. She reveals that she does not believe her life has begun and so she is waiting restlessly. Janie does not long to be tree but specifically a tree "in bloom." Hurston divulges that Janie is waiting to not only "bloom" into womanhood, but also to blossom into her life. One questions whether Janie's aspirations will eventually lead her to break away from the traditional lifestyle that slavery sets during the time period Hurston creates.