Summary
1
Returning home after almost two years, Janie Starks walks past the âporch sittersâ who she knows are judging her harshly. Since she believes gossip and jealousy have a way of diminishing oneâs strength, she simply continues on without saying a word. The townspeople in Eatonville feel justified taking the moral high ground given that Janie is a 40-year-old woman who ran off with a younger man.
With a plate of mulatto rice in her hands, Janieâs âkissinâ-friendâ Pheoby Watson welcomes her back with open arms, and, after hearing the news of Tea Cakeâs passing, the two settle in under the moonlight and Janie tells her story.
2
Grandma Nanny is the only parent Janie has ever known. Abandoned by her wild teenage mother, Leafy, sheâs being raised in the backyard of Nannyâs white employers, the Washburns. Enjoying a carefree childhood frolicking with her white playmates, Janie only realizes sheâs a different âcolorâ than they are at around 6 years of age.
Like the buds on tree branches opening to reveal snowy virginal white blooms, Janieâs sexuality awakens beneath a blossoming pear tree. Innocent and 16, sheâs eager to express her newfound womanhood by exchanging kisses with Johnny Taylor. The sweet experimentation marks the end of Janieâs childhood.
Having witnessed the young coupleâs sensual embrace, Nanny overreacts out of fear for her granddaughterâs future. She tells the story of how Janieâs mother, who, she had hoped would become a teacher, was raped at the age of 17, and turned to drinking and running around after her baby was born.
She prays that by marrying Janie off to the respectable, middle-aged Logan Killicks, she wonât end up with a âtrashyâ man like Johnny. Seeing life from an ex-slaveâs perspective, Nanny is used to dealing in scraps and low expectations.
For Janie, Nanny would only hold her back and keep her from her dreams of finding out what lies beyond the horizon.
3
Itâs a fib they told Janieâthat she would love her husband. Husbands and wives donât always love each other. After three days with Logan, her marriage remains loveless, and even if Nanny thinks love is a foolâs game, Janie wants to understand the things the wind, the pear tree, and the seeds falling on the soft ground seem to tell her.
Nanny seems content in knowing her granddaughter is being provided for. They say a woman should be grateful to have a man with property like Logan, but young Janie cares little for material possessionsâshe wants to experience âthe ecstatic shiverâ of true love; she yearns for sweetness.
When Nanny dies a month later, Janie is on her own.
Seasons pass, and Janie waits at the gate for the things that no one had told her about, but of which she seems to know. She looks down the road and is certain that love would not come to her marriage with Logan Killicks. By admitting that her âfirst dream was dead,â she opens the door to her futureâand she is able to make her own decisions.
4
Any interest Logan has in physical affectionâhe no longer strokes her hairâis replaced with fussing about chores. Janie isnât happy about being told what to do and gives Logan a hard time about his demands. Her boundaries are set and thereâs nothing her husband can do about it.
Janie sits in the yard cutting potatoes when she sees a finely dressed gentleman walking up the road. He stops to talk to Janie, who offers him a cool drink of water sweetened with ribbon-cane syrup. He entices Janie to run off to Florida where colored people are building a town of their own.
Joe (Jody) Starks has $300 in his pocket and has waited thirty years for a chance to be âa big voiceâ in a place where white people donât have all the say. Though heâs not the âsun-up and pollen and blooming treesâ kind of man sheâs been waiting for, what he offers is a change. Lying in bed next to Logan repulses her, so she flings her apron into the bushes and heads south toward a place that fits her new way of thinking. At sundown, Joe and Janie wed.
5
Janie and her new husband arrive in Eatonville and are disappointed with its tiny size and run-down houses. Not one to let the grass grow under his feet, Jody rents a house and buys more land so they can build a proper town. He proposes building a store, roads, streetlamps, and putting in a post office.
Resident Amos Hicks is skeptical of the âstray darkyâsâ lofty claims, but Lee Coker complains that cynical black folks are their own worst enemies. He hopes Jody will deliver on his promises.
Dazzling folks with his leadership skills, he convinces new families to move to town and is soon elected mayor. Jody announces to his constituents that his wifeâs âplace is in the homeââa public humiliation that takes âthe bloom off the roseâ of their marriage.
A whirling dervish, hungry for power and status, Jody builds a wall of superiority around his family, leaving Janie lonely and cut-off from real friendships. The townâs resentment grows towards Jodyâs arrogance, yet he goes unchallenged for thereâs no Eatonville without Jody Starks.
As criticism and suspicion of Janie escalate, she becomes a ghost of her former self. Jody insists she wears a head-rag in public to conceal Janieâs hair from other men in town. His envy oppresses Janie; itâs evidence that sheâs not a partner, but a possession.
6
Jody hides his pleasure from his wife, and tries to control her. Six days a week, Janie minds the general store. Sheâs not engaged in the work, but enjoys the way folks hang out on the porch telling tales and teasing each other. The discourse is colorful; she listens in, but knows Joe doesnât want her to participate in the friendly banter.
Sexual pleasure no longer has a place in their marriage. Janie and Jody argue often. When he begins to strike her, Janie decides itâs best to agree âwith her mouth,â but not with her mind.
After one episode when Jody hit Janie hard, unsatisfied with the meal prepared for him, she looks deep inside herself and comes to realize that she has yet to fulfill her dream. She knows that she has yet to meet that man with whom sheâll truly share herself.
Feeling indignant, Janie asserts herself a little more, and one day even tells the men on the porch that they donât know half as much as they think they d...