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Janie QUOTES

Janie QUOTES

1 " They plan and they fix and they do, and then some kitchen-dwelling fiend slips a scorchy, soggy, tasteless mess into their pots and pans…So when the bread didn’t rise, and the fish wasn’t quite done at the bone, and the rice was scorched, he slapped Janie until she had a ringing sound in her ears and told her about her brains before he stalked on back to the store. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

2 " When Janie looked out of her door she saw the drifting mists gathered in the west -- that cloud field of the sky -- to arm themselves with thunders and march forth against the world. Louder and higher and lower and wider the sound and motion spread, mounting, sinking, darking. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

3 " Times and scenes like that put Janie to thinking about the inside state of her marriage. Time came when she fought back with her tongue as best she could, but it didn’t do her any good. It just made Joe do more. He wanted her submission and he’d keep on fighting until he felt he had it. So gradually, she pressed her teeth together and learned to hush. The spirit of the marriage left the bedroom and took to living in the parlor. It was there to shake hands whenever company came to visit, but it never went back inside the bedroom again. So she put something in there to represent the spirit like a Virgin Mary image in a church. The bed was no longer a daisy-field for her and Joe to play in. It was a place where she went and laid down when she was sleepy and tired. She wasn’t petal-open anymore with him. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

4 " So Janie waited a bloom time, and a green time and an orange time. But when the pollen again gilded the sun and sifted down on the world she began to stand around the gate and expect things. What things? She didn't know exactly. Her breath was gusty and short. She knew things that nobody had ever told her. For instance, the words of the trees and the wind. She often spoke to falling seeds and said, 'Ah hope you fall on soft ground,' because she had heard seeds saying that to each other as they passed. She knew the world was a stallion rolling in the blue pasture of ether. She knew that God tore down the old world every evening and built a new one by sun-up. It was wonderful to see it take form with the sun and emerge from the gray dust of its making. The familiar people and things had failed her so she hung over the gate and looked up the road towards way off. She knew now that marriage did not make love. Janie's first dream was dead, so she became a woman. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

5 " Didn’t even have to argue with her. She just told me she loved me and offered the back of her neck.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “How many pups you got with Janie Mae now, Bubba Ray . . . and still she’s as unmarked as a newborn babe. So which Smith has control of his female now, boy? "

― , Howl for It Bundle: The Mane Event / Angel of Darkness / Howl for It

6 " King- Hamilton, Judge Alan ( b 1900 )'...I think he erred on the side of severity when he gave Janie Jones, the notorious madame, seven years after the jury had acquitted her'. 'Well, these things are relative of course. It all depends on what you've been acquitted of. Miss Jones was innocent of a very serious offence. "

7 " Pheoby's hungry listening helped Janie to tell her story. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

8 " ...you needs uh man.” Janie laughed at all these well-wishers because she knew that they knew plenty of women alone "

9 " We left the nursery in silence, Ma smoking a roll-up, looking like she hadn’t slept in a week or maybe like she had slept for a whole week. When the nursery was just a grubby finger smudge behind us Ma looked down at me and said in her poshed-up telephone voice: “Will you speak to Janie about swearing? Fuckin’ busybody!”

I laughed and swung our linked hands.

“Aye, fuckin’ busybody.”

Pleas of laughter escaped us and spiraled up into the hot, blue Scottish sky. We laughed all the way home "

― Kerry Hudson , Tony Hogan Bought Me an Ice Cream Float Before He Stole My Ma

10 " Husbands and wives always loved each other, and that was what marriage meant. It was just so. Janie felt glad of the thought, for then it wouldn't seem so destructive and mouldy. She wouldn't be lonely anymore. "

― Zora Neale Hurston , Their Eyes Were Watching God

11 " In the cool dark basement, she whispers, " It's not Ralph, is it?" Cabel's quiet for a moment, as if he's thinking, " You mean like Forever Ralph? Uh, no." " You've read Forever?" Janie is incredulous. " There wasn't much else to chose from on the hospital library cart, and Deenie was always checked out," Cable says sarcastically. " Did you like it?" Cabel laughs softly, " Um...well, it wasn't the wisest thing to read for a fourteen-year-old guy with fresh skin grafts in the general area down there, if you know what I mean. "