Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, contains several different themes that thread through the novel. One of the beauties of the novel is that the more one reads it and analyzes it, the more one "gets" out of it. Hurston constantly uses imagery and symbolizm that make her themes more vivid to the reader. She manipulates thoughts and experiences to emphasize certain key points while not removing or adding anything unreal to Janie's story. One way in which Hurston manipulates these thoughts and experiences is through her characters. Each of the main characters in the novel represent a different view of society and the role of women in that society. These differences in view stem from the varying life experiences of the characters. Throughout Janie's adventures, the reader sees Janie's opinion and point of view develop into the individualistic and self-reliant entities they are at the end of the novel. The beginning pages of Chapter 9 exemplify the various themes of the story and illustrate the development of Janie's personality, needs, and values. The section,while giving the reader examples about the influences of Janie's development, also expands on the themes of expectations (personal, social, expectations of self and others) as well as how social views impact one's life.

I felt this particular section contained many pertinent and useful aspects of the story, and that I could use those aspects to further others' understanding of the book. The passage contains different points of view as well as highlights certain key themes of the novel.
What I think is demonstrated most in this passage is the fact that all throughout her life, Janie's development has been impacted by other people, and she had been taught to behave in certain ways because her social surroundings deemed it proper for her to do so. Janie's life, up until the point when she leaves with Tea Cake for the Muck, has been defined by social standards, and Janie has always just accepted them as so. It is at this point in the novel, after Joe's death, that Janie realizes that she does not have to live her life by other people's standards - only her own. Janie realizes that she has to answer to no one but herself, and that it was about time she started living her life according to her own terms.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is in the genre of bildungsroman. This particular section highlights certain characteristics of a bildingsroman and illustrates certain ways in which Janie develops as a woman and an individual. One of the ways in which Hurston uses the concept of the bildungsroman is through the various points of view she includes. The section I chose for my hyper-text contains references to several different points of view. It touches on the Caucasian social view, Janie, Jody and Nanny's views, as well as the African-American social view. Despite the source of the social view, Hurston emphasizes that they all influence Janie in some way. Hurston relays to the reader the fact that it doesn't matter where the social view comes from (white, black, male, female, etc.), but it is the fact that each view has some sort of impact on Janie that matters. The views of marriage, dress, women, men, and society addressed in this passage all have some connection to Janie and her process of development. Each view has some role in influencing the ways in which Janie matures and her actual development into the self-relaint and strong woman she is at the end of the novel.

Also in this section, Hurston discusses the ways in which Janie is special. Hurston includes explanations as to why Janie is viewed as special by others, as well as why Janie sees herself as special. Here, Hurston makes a personal point about society and its tendency to take the "specialness" away from people, and threads it into the underlying meaning of the text. Hurston also mentions why other characters in the novel do not see themselves as "special" and try to take Janie's "shine" away from her.

When Janie returns from the Muck not accompanied by the man she left with, or with any man for that matter, the comments made and offers of marriage proposed to Janie reveal the social attitude towards a woman's role. Janie is told that she needs a man because for a woman to be single is not within society's approval. In her discussion of As I Lay Dying, Nanci Kincaid discusses a point also relevant to Their Eyes Were Watching God. Kincaid states that "[t]he assumption that beauty equals goodness serves to condemn the woman without a man. The woman with no husband, poor thing, is not beautiful enough, her goodness not ample enough; otherwise some man would have chosen her" (3). Kincaid goes on to say that "[t]his message in southern culture persists still: that men choose the beautiful women; that beauty equals goodness; and that women with men are good and women without men are not good" (3). Of course there are those who want to take advantage of Janie in the financial position she is in, but, as Ike Green states, "You wants to be keerful 'bout who you marry, Mis' Starks. Dese strange men runnin' heah tryin' tuh take advantage of yo' condition" (86). Janie's condition is one she has never been in before. It is at this time that Janie makes some serious life decisions (mainly to run her life herself, without the concern of any one else's input) and the passage I selected illustrates the process in which Janie goes through to do so.