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How Are Jody And Tea Cake Alike

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How Are Jody And Tea Cake Alike
The Anchor to Her Journey or The Bee to Her Blossom?

In the novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston Tea Cake and Jody have similarities and differences. Both desired to reveal their power by physically assaulting, and showing control over her. Unlike Jody, Tea Cake was possessive towards Janie because of the fear of losing her, and to show his affections for her. He transformed Janie’s dreams into reality while Jody limited her freedom by depriving her of a voice, social life, and authority. Jody was the anchor to her journey in finding true love and independence. Jody and Tea Cake are alike because they were men who cherished power and wanted to be the head of their relationship with …show more content…
Tea Cake took control over Janie to praise her, convey his love towards her and because of the fear of losing the grasp of her forever. The narrator says, “ Not because of her behavior justified his jealousy, but it, relieved that awful fear inside him” (147). Since Tea Cake genuinely loved and praised her, seeing Mrs. Turner’s brother after overhearing Janie’s conversation with the Mrs. Turner, awakened the fear inside him. On the other hand, Jody controlled Janie because he didn’t want her to have a voice and socialize with anyone except customers. His voice was the only thing that mattered to him. In page 50 the narrator indicates, “He didn't want her talking to trashy people." Since Janie was Mrs. Mayor, she had a higher standard than all the women of the town. Jody preferred her to act like a white woman with high standards, wear hats, heels, and remain humble for the sake of his reputation. Even though Tea Cake was possessive towards Janie, he also knew how to control himself around her. Whenever Janie got mad he tried to console her and make her smile either by kissing or just playing around with her. However, when there was a conflict between Jody and Janie, Joe always physically abused her, isolated himself from her, and preferred not seeing her face until the day of his death. Tea Cake always stayed by her side while …show more content…
They are similar because they both hold possession of Janie and want to keep her all for themselves. Tea Cake and Jody both abused Janie to show their power to someone else. They both craved to prove that they are the leaders. However, Tea Cake genuinely didn’t hit her because she did something wrong, he abused her because he was afraid of losing her and dearly loved her. On the other hand, Joe slapped her whenever she made small mistakes and didn’t know how to control himself in front of others. However, Tea Cake always complimented Janie while Jody insulted her. He taught Janie how to be beautiful and always stayed by her side. Tea Cake turned Janie’s dream into reality by being the bee to her blossom and giving her the freedom to express herself. Janie was allowed to show her beauty off and finally got color in her black and white life. By writing this novel Hurston Neale is trying to point out how the most precious things in life are free but hard to find. Life is like a science experiment, the more trials you have, the more the results lean towards accuracy. In this case, the more relationship she had, the more she learned and realized who’s the actual bee to her blossom. Hurston also tries to indicate that men aren’t always the equal by differentiating Tea Cake from Jody. She indicates that sometimes, man does favor being powerful and have a voice, but not all men treat women the same. Some men
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