Shan’s Blog

This poem by Davis Matlock reminded me a lot of the Cooper one about the tub. Cooper says that people are essentially trapped in their own tub, and they need to look above the rim and see the world. Matlock, like Cooper, is telling all the people to “live it out like a god.” He compares people to bees, who spend all their life in the hive, working. And he states that they never truly live unless they are out in the sun, stretching their wings. He declares the truth to be that “the nature of man is greater than nature’s need in the hive.” This means that man’s need to be out in the world and be free is greater than the need of the work that needs to be done in society.

This can also be connected to the poem by the Unknown, who caged the bird. He took away the hawk’s freedom, and Matlock is saying that, by being confined to responsibilities and work, man is not truly free. The hawk, in the Unknown poem, died in captivity, and Matlock is warning people of dying in that same way.

I really liked the poem by The Unknown, because it was about redemption, which a lot of people can relate to. This person (presumably a man, since they were hunting), shot a hawk and wounded him. He put him in a cage, maybe to be kept as a prize. But in doing so, he took away the bird’s freedom. I can see the relationship between this and Jody’s need to control Janie in Their Eyes Were Watching God. By having her tie back her hair, symbolizing the forced restrain of her independence, Jody is limiting her freedom and, in a sense, putting her in a cage.

Luckily, Janie was able to escape, but the hawk in the poem dies as a captive. The Unknown then says that he searches for the soul of the dead hawk, in hopes of making amends. This shows that the wrongdoings in life can still haunt you even after death. Consequently, you are also able to redeem yourself, and it’s never too late to apologize.

I really liked the poem by Thomas Ross, Jr., when he describes the event of the mother swallow and the snake. When the snake tries to harm her nest, the swallow kills him, and only an hour after, she is killed. Ross connected this to his own life, saying that after he overcame one of his own obstacles, he was killed by his brother’s ambition.

This reminds me of Their Eyes Were Watching God. Janie overcomes her struggles with her two marriages. Then when she thinks she is finally safe with Tea Cake, everything goes wrong. During the storm, which could be represented by the shrike, disaster and death occurs, and Janie loses her love.

We discussed the poem by Aner Clute a little bit in class today, and I really liked it. First of all, when she talks about the boy and the stealing of the apple, she says that everyone labels him a thief. Therefore, he becomes a thief because that’s what everyone is calling him. Suppose that he took the apple because his family was poor and he was starving. Instead of calling him a poor boy that should get help, everyone looks at the negative and says he’s a thief instead. Because of this, he can’t get a job, and can’t earn money, and so has to steal more to survive, and it becomes an endless cycle.

In Aner Clute’s case, I think she’s talking about herself, and how she was promised to be married to Lucius Atherton. Because everyone kept saying it, it became true. Instead of being with Homer Clapp, she married Lucius instead because that’s what the people expected of her.

In a way, this whole love triangle reminds me of Gatsby. Aner (Daisy) meets Homer (Gatsby) and falls in love with him. However, she marries Lucious (Tom) instead, who is young and fearless and has a love of adventure. Homer’s heart gets broken and, like Gatsby, he puts everything at stake in hopes of becoming the kind of man that she would want, someone rich and powerful. But in the end, he loses everything.

One thing I noticed while reading these poems is that a lot of the characters have had good lives, and then have tragically lost it. For example, the poem by Doctor Meyers starts out telling of his life when he was respected and wealthy. He had a wife and children and lived a good life. But it was all ruined when Minerva came to see him, and after she died in his care, the newspapers denounced him and he died unappreciated and unvalued.

This reminds me a lot of Their Eyes Were Watching God, because Janie had a good and full life, but after one tiny incident, it all fell apart. This relates to the theme of going from having everything to having nothing once you’ve reached your personal peak.

Also, the poem by Hare Drummer reminded me of this, because he told us about his days when he was younger, and he and all his friends would go and play together. They seemed like the golden days. But then he asks where his friends are now, and gives the reader the feeling that he, too, has died alone.

The ending was not at all what I had expected. I thought all the rumors were true, and that Tea Cake would take Janie’s money and run off with another woman. I still don’t like his character very much, but he did prove his love to Janie when he saved her, and got sick and died because of it.

Janie returns to Eatonville, where she lets the gossip spread. She doesn’t care about what people say to her, because she has seen what lies beyond in the horizon. Tea Cake showed her what life was like without the constraints that society had on her, and that’s why she loved him. She’s found her voice and been to the horizon and is now completely at peace.

In class the other day, we talked about how Janie might be taking a step back, instead of making progress, when she went from Jody to Tea Cake. She had many suitors after Jody’s death, but she chose to run off with Tea Cake and move to the muck. It was a big change from her position as the mayor’s wife in Eatonsville.

Personally, I do not think she has taken a step back. It is true that she no longer has all the luxuries that she had when she was with Jody. However, she has gained the respect that she had craved. Tea Cake treats her as an equal, and lets her have her own voice, which was what she wanted in the first place. Unlike Jody, he lets her express herself and show her emotions. In that sense, I think she has gained more than what she has lost.

However, in Chapter 17, I was confused when Tea Cake beat her to show his authority over her. “Being able to whip her reassured him in possession… He just slapped her around a bit to show he was boss” (147). This made me change my mind, and makes me think that Janie might have taken a step back. I was surprised that she didn’t stand up for herself more, and was acted passively in this act. She chooses not to speak and forgives Tea Cake easily.

These next chapters really show the transformation that Janie goes through, and we can see that it’s a big difference. Janie doesn’t care what the townspeople think of her anymore, and she openly has a relationship with Tea Cake. Even though the town gossips about it, she doesn’t care anymore. The part in chapter 11, when Janie falls asleep and wakes up to Tea Cake brushing her hair, just adds more to Janie’s new independent image. Her hair, as I’ve said before, represents her own power and freedom. When Tea Cake brushes it, I think he’s encouraging her to be her own woman. He helps her in finding her own voice, and how to express her emotions and understand her desires.

But Tea Cake, as much as I hate to say it, doesn’t seem like a consistent character. He keeps disappearing for long periods of time, leaving Janie to worry. I became especially wary of him when he took Janie’s money and left. Although he did earn the money back, it still makes him slightly untrustworthy that he would do something without Janie’s consent. I think this foreshadows their relationship and the hardships to come. It makes me believe that Tea Cake really would steal her money and run off for good, as was hinted by in the first chapter.

It seems like his book is going by pretty fast… Jody is dead, and within two chapters, we meet the infamous Tea Cake. But before that, we see the power being transferred to Janie. With Jody gone, she is able to, in a sense, free herself and express her emotions. We see her talking more with the people who come into the store, which she was not able to do when she was married to Jody. She frees her hair from the rags and burns them, which represents her emancipation.

I think everyone can relate to Janie in this way. Everyone has something that holds them back from pursuing their dreams and once it’s gone, they feel like nothing can stop them. When Jody dies, Janie becomes her own woman and enjoys being single, and not being tied down to a man. She embraces her newfound independence and doesn’t care what the townspeople think anymore.

Then we meet Tea Cake, who is unlike any other man Janie has been with so far. He treats her as an equal, which is shown when he invites her to play a game of chess with him. Janie enjoys his company, and it probably foreshadows their relationship together later on.

In these chapters, we see a little compassion on Jody’s part. He buys the mule from Matt (1) to free the animal from cruelty and (2) to make Janie happy. I think this shows that he really does care about her, even though he may not admit it. He’s not truly a bad character, he’s just extremely controlling, and it’s sad that the only way he can express his love for Janie is by buying things.

But even so, we see their relationship being strained. He still insists that Janie keep her hair tied up, which represents him trying to control her. In a sense, Janie’s hair might be a symbol for her independence and her own power, which she doesn’t have with Jody. Comparing her relationship with Jody, to her relationship with Logan, it’s obvious that they’re very different. With Logan, she was able to defy him, but with Jody, we see her surprising her feelings and emotions. She hides her irritation and goes along with him.

As the years go by, though, Janie’s marriage becomes empty and she feels lost. At the end of chapter 7, we find ourselves rooting for Janie when she finally sticks up for herself. After years or taking the emotional (and sometimes physical) abuse, Janie unleashes her pent-up feelings. She attacks Jody and his aging appearance and essentially strips him of his status in front of all the other men.. “Janie had robbed him of his illusion of irresistible maleness that all men cherish, which was terrible…” (79).