Although we’ve only just started reading Their Eyes Were Watching God, I found the way gender is portrayed very interesting. At the young age of 16, Janie is married to Logan Killick. Although Janie didn’t want to marry him, Nanny insisted since she doesn’t think that a black women can gain independence without a man. According to Nanny, women are the mules of the world (14) and marriage is a way for Janie to gain status and become financially stable.
This theme of the mule has come up quite a bit in what we have read so far. The mule comes to represent female identity, in the sense that both mules and women must be controlled by their owners and husbands. While Janie is married to Logan, we see her become upset when he intends to buy a mule and expects her to work behind a plow. Janie seems to feel as if she’s being treated like an animal, and insists that Logan didn’t need her help, saying “Youse in yo’ place and Ah’m in mine” (31). Janie seems to feel trapped with Logan, not having found her true love.
Once she is married to Joe Starks, however, Janie doesn’t like being put in her place. According to Joe, she should be sitting at home and acting civilized so he can be seen as a strong leader. Her hair isn’t allowed to show in the store and Joe treats her like a possession. The theme of mules comes up again while she’s with Joe, when a man named Matt Boner buys a mule and works it to death. Here the mule represents victimization. Matt is also criticized for not being able to control his mule, and Janie sympathizes with the mule since they were both subjected to controlling masters. Joe buys the mule from Matt and is viewed as a sort of hero, but this act also symbolizes his ownership of Janie, from which Janie is only freed when he dies. Tea Cake seems to be very different from Janie’s previous husbands, so I wonder if the mule’s symbol of control over women will reappear.
Saying that black women are the mules of the world is really common and it's not just referencing men controlling them but it's also talking about how black women do the work but receive no appreciation for it. But I like the idea that people feel they own her because she is the mule of the world.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting to look at Janie's ostensibly "easier" experience with Joe (where she's treated as "special" and apart from the common folk, put on a pedestal) as another version of "mulehood." He makes her work, but her objection to this isn't quite the same as her extreme distaste for "getting behind the mule" with Logan. In Eatonville, it's more a matter of her being "the bell cow" (another galling livestock metaphor for "a woman's place"), set apart from the rest of the community.
ReplyDeleteThis is an interesting observation - I hadn't noticed the mule theme until you brought it up. The metaphor gets interesting when Joe saves the mule because of Janie - this seems like he is almost keeping the "victimization" of Janie to himself, just like he can't stand when other men admire Janie in the town and makes her tie her hair up.
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