Sunday, February 19, 2012

Journal #4 - Their Eyes Were Watching God

Passage:
"Dis' sittin' in de rulin' chair is been hard on Jody," she muttered out loud. She was full of pity for the first time in years. Jody had been hard on her and others, but life and mishandled him too. Poor Joe! Maybe is she had known some other way to try, she might have made his face different. But what that other way could be, she had no idea. She thought back and forth about what had happened in the making of a voice out of a man. Then thought about herself. Years ago, she had told her girl self to wait for her in the looking glass. It had been a long time since she had remembered. Perhaps she'd better look. She went over to the dresser and looked hard at her skin and features. The young girl was gone, but a handsome woman had taken her place. She tore off the kerchief from her head and let down her plentiful hair. The weight, the length, the glory was there. She took careful stock of herself, then combed her hair and tied it back up again. Then she starched and ironed her face, forming it into just what people wanted to see, and opened up the window and cried, "Come heah people! Jody is dead. Mah husband is gone from me."(pg.87)
syntax, word choice, tone, and sound devices.
Analysis:
      The syntax isn't manipulated in this passage a lot but creates a nice flow in the passage instead. The sentences are usually lengthy and reflect her thinking by changing the length of the sentence to show the pace at which she is thinking.
       Clear examples in which she chooses certain words to convey a meaning is used to show that Janie let Jody's power take over her. For example in the first sentence, "Dis' sittin' in de rulin' chair is been hard on Jody", which means that the power he had acquired was not good for him. She uses the word "rulin" to show that he made use of his power and took advantage of it like a king. Hurston also uses "handsome woman" to show how Janie became a beautiful woman to a handsome woman because of Jody's power that she was influenced by. She no longer became the same person and a male dominance that took over her. Hurston uses the word "tore" to indicate that Janie was angrily ripping the old her and making herself the beautiful woman that she was.
       The tone in this passage comes to me as joyful but at the same time sad that Jody died which is a big contrast. Janie feels relieved that she found the person that she lost when she became a "handsome woman", she finally realizes that she was not herself anymore. On the other hand there is this dark tone behind it because Jody died.
       Janie after she looks in the mirror and lets her hair down she "cries" that Jody has died. Which shows that by her crying she is sad.

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