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"Yes, she would love Logan after they were married. She could see no way for it to come about, but Nanny and the old folks had said it, so it must be so. 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." - Chapter 3

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because Nanny tells her so, Janie assumes that marriage entails love. she assumes that after she marries Logan, she will magically wake up one day and love him.

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"He don’t even never mention nothin’ pretty."

She began to cry.

"Ah wants things sweet wid mah marriage lak when you sit under a pear tree and think. Ah…"
- Chapter 3

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janie has this idea about love that it comes with nothing but happiness and sweetness, but when logan fails to meet these standards, she feels cheated.

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"Den they’d tell me not to be takin’ on over mah looks ‘cause they mama told ‘em ‘bout de hound dawgs huntin’ mah papa all night long. ‘Bout Mr. Washburn and de sheriff puttin’ de bloodhounds on de trail tuh ketch mah papa for whut he done tuh mah mama. Dey didn’t tell about how he wuz seen tryin tuh git in touch wid mah mama later on so he could marry her. Naw, dey didn’t talk dat part of it atall. Dey made it sound real bad so as tuh crumple mah feathers." - Chapter 2

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because janie's father is known as a white rapist and her mother being the result of that, janie has to learn how to have strength for herself to overlook the bad.

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"Honey, de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able tuh find out. Maybe it’s some place way off in de ocean where de black man is in power, but we don’t know nothin’ but what we see. So de white man throw down de load and tell de nigger man tuh pick it up. He pick it up because he have to, but he don’t tote it. He hand it to his womenfolks. De nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see." - Chapter 2

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nanny points out an even more victimized group – black women. y virtue of being both a racial minority and the "weaker" sex, black women had it worst of all and were essentially the bottom of the totem pole.

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What she doin coming back here in dem overhalls? Can’t she find no dress to put on? – Where’s dat blue satin dress she here in? – Where all dat money her husband took and died and left her? – What dat ole forty year ole ‘oman doin’ wid her hair swingin’ down her back lak some young gal? – Where she left dat young lad of a boy she went off here wid? – Thought she was going to marry? – Where he left her? – What he done wid all her money? – Betcha he off wid some gal so young she ain’t even got no hairs – Why she don’t stay in her class? – " - Chapter 1

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the porch wants to confine Janie to a rigid and easily-definable category , through gender, social class, and age. the fact that she freely moves between high and low classes as well as male, female, and youthful types of dress makes her too ambiguous for the people to classify.

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"The familiar people and things had failed her so she hung over the gate and looked up the road towards way off." - Chapter 3

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because her relationship with Logan is so not a fairytale, Janie longs for freedom, away from her husband’s property and towards an unending horizon.

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"How come?"

"’Cause I hates de way his [Logan’s] head is so long one way and so flat on de sides and dat pone uh fat back uh his neck."

"He never made his own head. You talk so silly."
- Chapter 3

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janie’s fate is also subject to her looks; at least her first two marriages, which both give her increasing social status, are a direct result of her attractiveness.

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"Nanny sent Janie along with a stern mien, but she dwindled all the rest of the day as she worked. And when she [Nanny] gained the privacy of her own little shack she stayed on her knees so long she forgot she was there herself….Towards morning she muttered, "Lawd, you know mah heart. Ah done de best Ah could do. De rest is left to you." She scuffled up from her knees and fell heavily across the bed. A month later she was dead."
- Chapter 3

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despite all her misfortune, Nanny entrusts herself to God/Fate. Her prayer shows that she believes that in order to have a good life, two things are necessary: you need to work hard and do your part, and trust that God will do the rest.

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"They huddled closer and stared at the door. They just didn’t use another part of their bodies, and they didn’t look at anything but the door. The time was past for asking the white folks what to look for through that door. Six eyes were questioning God."
Chapter 18

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the question in their eyes is an expression that hinges on God’s response; it can lean either towards hope or despair.

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"The question in their eyes is an expression that hinges on God’s response; it can lean either towards hope or despair."
Chapter 18

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only when faced with a natural disaster in the magnitude of a hurricane does man feel humbled at his smallness in the face of God.

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"The sun was gone…It was the time to hear things and talk. These sitters had been tongueless, earless, eyeless conveniences all day long. Mules and other brutes had occupied their skins. But now, the sun and the bossman were gone, so the skins felt powerful and human. They became lords of sounds and lesser things. They passed nations through their mouths. They sat in judgment."
Chapter 1

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when the "bossman is gone," their humanity returns to them and they finally have the capacity to speak and listen and judge.

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"Ah don’t mean to bother wid tellin’ ‘em nothin’, Pheoby. ‘Tain’t worth the trouble. You can tell ‘em what I say if you wants to. Dat’s just de same as me ‘cause mah tongue is in mah friend’s mouf."
Chapter 1

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janie trusts Pheoby enough to repeat what she says faithfully to the porch gossips.

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"It was a cityfied, stylish dressed man with his hat set at an angle that didn’t belong in these parts. His coat was over his arm, but he didn’t need it to represent his clothes. The shirt with the silk sleeveholders was dazzling enough for the world. He whistled, mopped his face and walked like he knew where he was going. He was a seal-brown color but he acted like Mr. Washburn or somebody like that to Janie. "
Chapter 4

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his social class seems to be above that of any other black person she’s ever met, so he’s intriguing.

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"Considerin’ youse born in a carriage ‘thout no top to it, and yo’ mama and you bein’ born and raised in de white folks back-yard."
Chapter 4

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he considers himself, in his freedom and hard-earned living, classier than Janie. "considerin’" she comes from a lower social situation, he thinks she doesn’t have the right to act independent or have many opinions.

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"Humph! don’t ‘spect all dat tuh keep up. He [Logan] ain’t kissin’ yo’ mouf when he carry on over yuh lak dat. He’s kissin’ yo’ foot and ‘tain’t in uh man tuh kiss foot long. Mouf kissin’ is on uh equal and dat’s natural but when dey got to bow down tuh love, dey soon straightens up."
Chapter 3

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for a man, according to Nanny, love must be dignified. It is a dishonor for a man to "bow down" to a woman, even out of love.

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"On the train the next day, Joe didn’t make many speeches with rhymes to her, but he bought her the best things the butcher had, like apples and a glass lantern full of candies. Mostly he talked about plans for the town when he got there … Janie took a lot of looks at him and she was proud of what she saw. Kind of portly like rich white folks. Strange trains, and people and places didn’t scare him neither. Where they got off the train at Maitland he found a buggy to carry them over to the colored town right away."
Chapter 5

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janie’s pride in Joe is not for his merits, but a self-congratulating pride that claps her on the back for having found as fine a catch as Joe

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"Now, women forget all those things they don’t want to remember and remember everything they don’t want to forget. The dream is the truth. Then they act and do things accordingly."
Chapter 1

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women reconstruct their pasts through selectively forgetting and remembering different aspects of their lives.

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"Old Nanny sat there rocking Janie like an infant and thinking back and back. Mind-pictures brought feelings, and feelings dragged out dramas from the hollows of her heart."
Chapter 2

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memories are presented as a chain of events that reach into the deepest part of the human soul.

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"Janie’s coffee-and-cream complexion and her luxurious hair made Mrs. Turner forgive her for wearing overalls like the other women who worked in the fields."
Chapter 16

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janie's hair separates her from other colored people.