A Lesson in Imagery

"Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone.  Dawn and doom was in the branches."

 

I noticed that the image of a tree runs throughout Chapter 2 of Their Eyes Were Watching God.  Hurston starts with the quote above, comparing a tree with all of its many different branches to the joys and sufferings of Janie's life.  She continues this tree imagery in various aspects throughout the Chapter, especially when Janie wonders what it would be like to be a pear tree or any tree in bloom on page 11.  The words that Hurston uses seem happy and full of life.  She writes of the "bees singing the beginning of the world" (maybe something to do with some sort of sexual awakening in Janie that may occur? She is 16 and has not had any experiences with a  man but will soon be kissed by one person and married to another) and Janie having "glossy leaves and bursting buds" and there is a newness to these phrases, an innocence that exists in meaning behind these words.  However, we see how quickly the beautiful imagery of the pear tree is destroyed when Nanny tells Janie that she must marry Logan Killicks.  Hurston writes, "The vision of Logan Killicks was desecrating that pear tree, but Janie didn't know how to tell Nanny that (14)."


Since I am an English major, my understanding of this Chapter is focusing on what I know best, i.e., the literary devices that drive the plot or explore the theme of a story.  The dialogue is still throwing me a bit due to the phonetically spelling of the words but Hurston's language is beautiful and that is what I am focusing on to help me with my understanding of the novel.  Though some of her imagery was difficult to make meaning of at first, I feel like as I continue with the novel, I am becoming better at seeing the metaphors and how they relate to Janie's story.


As I'm reading this chapter, I can't help but think back to the novel Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson that I recently read.  The imagery of a tree exists throughout that novel and I feel it can be related here.  There is a great quote from Speak that really summed up the point of the story. It reads:

“A little kid asks my dad why that man is chopping down the tree.  Dad: He's not chopping it down. He's saving it. Those branches were long dead from disease. All plants are like that. By cutting off the damage you make it possible for the tree to grow again. You watch - by the end of summer, this tree will be the strongest on the block.” 

The main character in Speak breaks free from her depression due to tragic circumstances that she had to endure and she becomes stronger because of it.  Based on the ideas that I am drawing from the use of tree imagery in Their Eyes Were Watching God and in Speak, I feel like Janie will also learn to become a stronger woman even after she faces hardships and suffering.  Those branches of doom that Hurston describes must be cut off in order for Janie to grow as a woman.

My prior knowledge as an English major and someone who has experienced the use of a tree as a metaphor for life in another text is helping me understand the novel more.  Though I could be wrong since I don't know what happens to Janie in the end just yet, I'm pretty sure my assumptions are correct.  Through my experiences and things that I have learned before reading this novel, I am able to make this prediction.  I must remember this prediction and see if the knowledge that I brought to the table really did help me understand this novel better.