The Elusive Identity of the Narrator
In my opinion, Zora Neal Hurston's "Their Eyes Were Watching God" has so far proven to be a work of almost fantastical narration. The tone in which the narrator speaks is both proclaimed and commiserative. This is manifest by the narrator's account of Janie walking away from her dreary marriage with Logan and running off with Jody, and later to the development of Janie's submission towards Jody. These events account for Janie's first and second marriages, and the tone of the narrator proves to either affirm the decisions of Janie as the story is told, or to empathize with Janie as she navigates through difficult events/emotions.
If I am being completely honest, I initially believed the narrator to be God, mostly because the narration seemed biblical to me. Then, I realized this was a flawed hunch because Zora Neal Hurston is not God (I think) and therefore cannot write a story from his point of view. Then I shifted my ideas towards the in-story-background-character idea. The narrator has very deep knowledge regarding the ways in which the towns Janie lives in work, therefore, it is plausible that Hurston meant for the story to be told by an anonymous resident that knows Janie from an outsider perspective.
Interestingly, I observed the narration styles of the book to occasionally fluctuate. The scene in which Jody hits Janie to assert his dominance to another man instead of Janie was concerningly lacking in details of Janie's perspective and feelings. Perhaps this was an executive decision made by Hurston to emphasize the submission and silence Janie experiences during her marriage with Jody, but I primarily believe the scene to have been told by a different perspective in contrast to the narrator we observe in the beginning chapters of the book. Nevertheless, the narrator remains elusive and I doubt Hurston plans to have a grand unmasking regarding the identity of the narrator later on in the book, so it's not an important factor in comparison to the actual characters within the story.
Great post! I think its interesting how you thought of the narrator as God at first. I never really thought of that. Otherwise, you post is easy to follow and makes sense. I also like the last paragraph where you talk about the change in narrative style, its interesting to see how you noticed this.
ReplyDeleteI feel that the way the narrator is bias and opinionated further pushes the idea of thinking deeper and analyzing the text for yourself to come up with your own conclusion (which is a nice touch). Because of the way the book is written, the readers are happily willing to accept whatever the narrator says as truth, and by later on they are more cautious. This is a way better way to convey the message "don't trust everything you read" than just saying it. Great blog post Zoya!
ReplyDeleteNice post! I think it's really interesting how you decided to explore a less prominent aspect of the story in the narration style. I think it's really fascinating how Hurston constantly switches the narration style seemingly out of nowhere so I'm really glad you covered this topic. Great job!
ReplyDeleteI thought this was an interesting perspective! I agree that the narrator seems to be simultaneously omniscient, embellishing Janie’s layer of the frame tale with details she is unaware of and poetic observations about life, and intimately familiar with the characters and communities she depicts, giving an audience that’s removed from these characters’ context a peek into the world they inhabit. I think you could argue that the depiction of Tea Cake’s violence towards Janie is part of this second aspect of the narrator—it seems like, by giving the event little weight in Janie’s mind, they’re showing that Tea Cake was sending a message in a “language” that was pretty widely accepted and understood as commonplace at the time in this society (regardless of how a reader would see the morality of the act).
ReplyDeleteOne aspect of Hurston's narrator that we didn't look at closely enough in class (but which Henry Louis Gates mentions in the Hurston documentary) is how the "literary" or "lyrical" voice of the third-person narrator gradually becomes more and more "vernacular" as the novel progresses, almost as if the "literary" narrator were learning the language of her characters. By the end of the book, the third-person free-indirect discourse narrator is sliding easily between the "Godlike" or biblical tones of the early chapters and a more spoken vernacular dialect style. And as you mention, this often involves the narrator representing perspectives other than Janie's (like Jody's). It really is a remarkable and unique narrative style.
ReplyDeleteHi. I like how you mentioned the shifting nature of the narrator's pov (from seeming omniscient being to uninformed outsider), and I don't think there is a set answer to "Who is the narrator". While the narrator can apparently read a person's emotions, I think it's far fetched to say the narrator is God. I would say the narrator is a mix of an 'insider' and an 'outsider'. The narrator is an insider in cases where we can see Janie's emotions and inner-ideas, while an outsider in cases like when Tea Cake abuses her. Overall, good job.
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