Journal-3 Techniques (ch 13-15) 2/12/09

Journal:
1. p. 118-simile
"The room inside looked like the mouth of an alligator-gaped wide open to swallow something down."
Janie goes through so much throughout her life that one more thing could make her lose herself forever. One such thing is the state of panic that she went into after the $200 she had pinned to one of her shirts was gone. She frantically looked for it around the room, but truthfully she knew exactly where it was, with Tea Cake. Once this fact is realized she has to sit down to keep control of herself and the room seems to look like the mouth of an alligator to her. This simile was used not only to describe the room, but to also help the reader understand Janie's mood. Her thoughts were turning to denial and anger. She was scared and lonely, feeling like the world was crashing around her and she was going to be swallowed up by her sorrow and despair.

2. p. 128-metaphor/round character
"So her soul crawled out from its hiding place."
Tea Cake is very confident in himself and in Janie, but sometimes having too much confidence can get a man in trouble, but also create stronger relationships as is what happened with Janie and Tea Cake. One night when Tea Cake went gambling to try to win back Janie's $200 that he spent, he comes back to the hotel with two cuts from a fight he got in over winning a lot of money and asks Janie to fix him up. After Janie stitches him up Tea Cake falls asleep and Janie can't help but stare at him while her love for him grows even stronger. That's when, "her soul crawled out from its hiding place"(Hurston 128). This metaphor shows the deep change in Janie's character finally complete. She finally feels like the Janie she was meant to be, a confident, loving, woman who knows what she wants and isn't afraid to go after it.

3. p. 136-personification
"A little seed of fear was growing into a tree."
Tea Cake is a very fun guy who just about everyone likes, but sometimes he is too friendly. For example, how a woman both Janie and Tea Cake worked with named Nunkie really seemed to like Tea Cake a lot. She would make him chase her by hitting him and then running away. This flirtation and the fact that Tea Cake flirted back made Janie very jealous and she began to question the stability of her and Tea Cake's relationship. Hurston personified Janie's fear with being like a seed that is turning into a tree showing that Janie's small seed of doubt in their relationship has grown now that she sees that flirtation going on between Nunkie and Tea Cake. This helps the reader understand the extent to which her fear has grown and how basically she is at her boiling point which allows the reader to predict what might happen in the future (i.e. a fight).