In Zora Neale Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie is encouraged to develop her own personality throughout the book and is forced to constantly move along the streets after having been abandoned by her grandmother and her three husbands. This movement offers her the opportunity to explore and form her ideas and voice in solitude. These external variables cause her to look inward and not depend on others as a source of survival. When he finally comes to terms with its influence, he stops running away. He realizes that his voice can be heard wherever he is. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay Janie's grandmother and primary caretaker, she dies when Janie is only seventeen, this is the rudimentary cause of her running away. In counseling and pacifying Janie, the nanny says that she wanted to "make a highway through the wilderness" for her, so that "she [Janie] could express what Ah [Nanny] felt" (15). The nanny knows that she will not be able to reach a point of freedom to express her voice throughout her life, yet this goal is crucial; as a result, she feels that by passing on her stories of slavery and conflict to her granddaughter, Janie will achieve what she has always fought for, and she too will be free. Although Nanny doesn't feel capable of building a "highway," in fact, she at least gives Janie direction to one. The nanny forces Janie out of the "cocoon" when she is sixteen, this allows Janie to be exposed to different types of husbands, allowing her to freely conclude that some do not meet her needs. Had she been older, her nanny's narrow-mindedness of staying in one place, even if unhappy, would have been too embedded in her unconscious to overcome. The nanny also serves to inspire Janie to proceed the way she does, saying that "your grandmother has gone many ways on her own" (23). Janie transcends her grandmother's ideas: those familiar "roads" that her grandmother walked. Tata's ideas, however, are no less important, as they must be put into action for Janie to overcome them. Janie's relationships with Logan and Joe are a continuation of the journey sent to her by her grandmother. The two are obstacles that threaten her confidence, pride, and strength by pushing her to be a submissive wife; he must overcome them to ultimately proclaim his voice in the world. Janie first asserts her voice when she decides to leave Logan "even though Joe [is] there waiting for her...the morning air of the street [is] like a new dress" (31). Janie realizes that to be recognized as an individual with personal principles she must move her life along the way, the new freedom of thought she gains is so wonderful it seems like a new dress. She throws her old apron "on a low bush by the road" (31), declaring to herself that she will be enveloped in her own ideas, not those of others who walk away or sit passively along her road to freedom. At this moment he actively decides to move forward and not simply towards another man. Even though this is just the first step, it demonstrates her desire to become a self-sufficient woman. After taking this action, however, Joe, paradoxically, becomes a more acutely negative version of Logan; he reprimands her, saying, "leave your mind off the streets and go on about your business" (66). What this quote shows is that he is trying to exert ultimate control over Janie, even to the point of keeping her locked up, immobile. Streets and streets symbolize her ideas and her voice, by telling her to keep off the "streets" she is attempting to take them awaythese things. The fact that Janie, even if she seems to give up on the outside, keeps her mind focused on the road, is an example of the strength she possesses within herself that allows her to evolve. Streets symbolize her attraction to concepts such as people, community, and culture that are bigger than her, as a street is more formal, busier, and usually larger than a street; these concepts give rise to the texture of his voice. When Joe is on his deathbed, Janie verbally expresses her understanding that he "isn't Jody [she] ran away down the street" (82). She realizes that she has become stagnant and must keep herself moving otherwise she will be discarded like her apron was. This attitude puts her in a position to be open to someone like Tea Cake who will come and take her away. Tea Cake focuses all of Janie's unguided energy by presenting her with knowledge and experiences that allow her to take this intensity and transform it into her. own ability to verbalize. It exposes her to "dirt roads so rich and black that half a mile would fertilize[e] a Kansas cornfield" (123). Tea Cake offers her the opportunity to experience the world, to feel it, and to walk the paths she had only observed. Her ideas, which had been undernourished, are "fertilized" by his ability to take her away from the city she is stranded in and into a more creative environment - the muck, where Janie is surrounded by "pianos living three lives in one" . Blues made and used right on the spot Dancing, fighting, singing, crying, laughing, winning and losing love every hour" (125). These are all signs of life, community, and the richness of black culture, to which Janie has desperately wanted to participate. Tea Cake must take her away from the city where their leader, Joe, "is like a pig dying in the swamp and trying to drive away the riots" (81). he died there, trying to take Janie with him, “he didn't want her to stay young while he grew old” (73) Joe monopolized her physical movements so much that his thoughts became his only passage, “he thought about from time to time.” a country road at dawn and considered flight. To where? Toward what?" (72). Janie's life has been structured and planned by Nanny, Logan, and Joe to the point that she would not have known where to seek her freedom without Tea Cake's guidance. Tea Cake serves as a tour guide to the world, showing her "where" and "what" is available. Although Tea Cake is the one who reverses Janie's mutism and allows her to assert her existence, it is necessary for her to die in the storm to put Janie back into solitude so that she can achieve reconciliation with herself. Tea Cake does not die in the actual storm, even though the novel suggests that her "time [had] come" (151), which Janie says is the point that people are destined by God to die to give Janie the chance to verbally express her love to Tea Cake and care for him while he is ill, to repay the debt she feels she owes him for helping her walk her path and assert her voice ill, with his head in her lap, she tells him "that God snatched her from the fire through [Tea Cake]", (172). Fittingly, this well-articulated gratitude is the result of Tea Cake's encouragement to be an individual. At the end of the story, Janie sits "wiping the road dust out of her hair" (183). She finally developed herself and "expressed" her ideas. His movement is over. For the rest of his life he will be able to process and enjoy his independence and his voice. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay Although Janie has had three husbands, she is not" (184).