Their Eyes Were Watching God

Janie returns to Eatonville after years away. The porch-sitters gossip. Pheoby brings food and asks what happened. Janie decides to tell her story from the beginning.

Janie's childhood under Nanny's roof. Her sexual awakening at the pear tree. Nanny's history as an enslaved woman and her terror-driven decision to marry Janie to Logan Killicks.

Janie marries Logan Killicks. Love does not come. Janie tells Nanny of her disappointment. Logan begins to treat Janie as a farm hand. Joe Starks appears on the road.

Janie runs away with Joe Starks and they marry. Joe is building Eatonville, 'the first all-colored town.' Janie begins to understand who Joe really is.

Twenty years of marriage to Joe. Janie is Mrs. Mayor but not allowed on the porch with the storytellers. The community's oral life happens without her. Joe controls every surface of their existence.

Joe becomes ill and cruel. Janie finally talks back in public, humiliating Joe in front of the store customers. Joe never recovers and dies of kidney disease. Janie burns the head rag.

After Joe's death, Janie is courted by various men interested in her store and property. Tea Cake Woods arrives. He teaches her to play checkers, takes her to a baseball game, and treats her like a person.

Janie and Tea Cake marry. The community disapproves. They move to the Everglades — 'the muck' — to pick beans. Janie finds community life, storytelling, and herself.

A catastrophic hurricane strikes the Everglades. Tea Cake and Janie flee the rising flood. A rabid dog bites Tea Cake as they escape. The scene of the storm is the novel's most mythic.

Tea Cake's rabies progresses. He becomes paranoid and jealous, then attacks Janie with a pistol. She shoots him with a rifle to save herself. He dies in her arms. She is tried for murder and acquitted.