Well I have no idea if any of you have ever read The Color Purple by Alice Walker, but she was the person who is quoted on the front of Their Eyes Were Watching God as saying "There is no book more important to me than this one." The funny thing is, I happened to be reading The Color Purple simultaneously and completely coincidentally. I was extremely enthralled at the odds. Anyway, reading both novels at the same time (though I haven't finished the Alice Walker yet) made me see some eerie similarities (also HUGE differences) between Celie and Janie. Their names are the first one because I kept getting them mixed up in my mind, but that is the most minor.
Both Janie and Celie are exposed to difficult situations when they are very young (our age) but they handle their situations very differently. They are married off to people that they do not know well very suddenly, and for the good of other people: Janie's Nanny's peace of mind, and in Celie's case, to keep Mr. ------- from her young, smart, and beautiful sister Nettie. But while Logan Killicks and Mr. ------- react to their new wives similarly (a general lack of appreciation, though Mr. ------ goes much farther down this road than Killicks ever did--he also surpasses Joe Starks), Janie shows much more obvious strength and independence that Celie does initially. She walks out on Killicks because she knows what she wants. Celie, meanwhile, is stubborn and selfless, but her fiery streak takes more prodding to activate than Janie's. She was determinately placid for most of the novel (of what I have read so far) until she found all of Nettie's letters that Mr. ------ had been keeping from her to convince her that Nettie was dead. After a few death threats she was calmed temporarily by Shug, the only person besides Nettie that she ever loved, whereas if Janie were in the same situation I am not sure she would have been calmed. I think that this varying aspect of their personalities comes from their polar childhoods. Janie, raised by her Nanny and a companion to white children, was allowed to daydream and have an actual childhood, while Celie meanwhile was the matriarch of her large family for most of her childhood in addition to dealing with her sexually abusive father, whose actions suppressed her spirit for the longest time.
A lot of what drives both of these characters is their need to be loved, and both find ways to make this happen, but the ways in which they go about it seem to embody their personalities. Janie, who has had man after her her entire life, had no issue finding someone to love her, but rather the right someone. Janie had to stick up for what she wanted when everyone around her mistrusted her judgment and her chosen partner, the much-younger Tea Cake. She had to fight to get what she wanted. Celie, on the other hand, had been told her entire life that she was ugly and stupid, once again took the more passive route and found love elsewhere than her marriage. Having heard stories of elusive and exotic Shug Avery, the love of Mr. -------'s life, she too was enamored with this figure, even when the wealthy singer showed her nothing contempt and hatred for stealing her man. Shug eventually did come to love Celie, her primary caretaker, and when they slept together Celie was genuinely happy for what was probably the first time in her life. She never submitted to others' idea that she was too ugly and stupid to be loved, and so she fought this notion her own way.
I know that both of these characters are incredibly strong to survive what each went through and not be a vegetable, (Janie having to murder her husband; Celie being raped and impregnated by her father) but I still marvel at how different their strengths manifest. In a way, Celie is even stronger than Janie, because while Janie has some snap, Celie bore everything in silence. And the novel isn't even over yet.
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