TEWWG Style Commentary

Example #1 Chapter 2

How? Why? It was like a flute song forgotten in another existence and remembered again. What? How? Why? This singing she heard that had nothing to do with her ears. The rose of the world was breathing out smell. It followed her through all her waking moments and caressed her in her sleep. It connected itself with other vaguely felt matters that had struck her outside observation and buried themselves in her flesh. Now they emerged and quested about her consciousness.

She was stretched on her back beneath the pear tree soaking in the alto. chant of the visiting bees, the gold of the sun and the panting breath of the breeze when the inaudible voice of it all came to her. She saw a dust-bearing bee sink into the sanctum of a bloom; the thousand sister-calyxes arch to meet the love embrace and the ecstatic shiver of the tree from root to tiniest branch creaming in every blossom and frothing with delight. So this was a marriage! She had been summoned to behold a revelation. Then Janie felt a pain remorseless sweet that left her limp and languid.

Example #2 Chapter 5

So Joe Starks and his cigar took the center of the floor.

 “Ah thanks you all for yo’ kind welcome and for extendin’ tuh me de right hand uh fellowship. Ah kin see dat dis town is full uh union and love. Ah means tuh put mah hands tuh de plow heah, and strain every nerve tuh make dis our town de metropolis uh de state. So maybe Ah better tell yuh in case you don’t know dat if we expect tuh move on, us got tuh incorporate lak every other town. Us got tuh incorporate, and us got tuh have uh mayor, if things is tuh be done and done right. Ah welcome you all on behalf uh me and mah wife tuh dis store and tuh de other things tuh come. Amen.”

Tony led the loud hand-clapping and was out in the center of the floor when it stopped.

Example #3

“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 left 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?—”

When she got to where they were she turned her face on the bander log and spoke. They scrambled a noisy “good evenin’ ” and left their mouths setting open and their ears full of hope. Her speech was pleasant enough, but she kept walking straight on to her gate. The porch couldn’t talk for looking.

The men noticed her firm buttocks like she had grapefruits in her hip pockets; the great rope of black hair swinging to her waist and unraveling in the wind like a plume; then her pugnacious breasts trying to bore holes in her shirt. They, the men, were saving with the mind what they lost with the eye. The women took the faded shirt and muddy overalls and laid them away for remembrance. It was a weapon against her strength and if it turned out of no significance, still it was a hope that she might fall to their level some day.

Example #4 Chapter 8

“Dis sittin’ in de rulin’ chair is been hard on Jody,” she muttered out loud. She was full of pity for the first time in years. Jody had been hard on her and others, but life had mis-handled him too. Poor Joe! Maybe if she had known some other way to try, she might have made his face different. But what that other way could be, she had no idea. She thought back and forth about what had happened in the making of a voice out of a man. Then thought about herself. Years ago, she had told her girl self to wait for her in the looking glass. It had been a long time since she had remembered. Perhaps she’d better look. She went over to the dresser and looked hard ather skin and features. The young girl was gone, but a handsome woman had taken her place. She tore off the kerchief from her head and let down her plentiful hair. The weight, the length, the glory was there. She took careful stock of herself, then combed her hair and tied it back up again. Then she starched and ironed her face, forming it into just what people wanted to see, and opened up the window and cried, “Come heah people! Jody is dead. Mah husband is gone from me.”

DFW Empathy and Human Experience in TEWWG

At first glance there isn’t much connecting a 2005 commencement speech about living an empathetic life and a 1937 novel about a woman going through a journey of self-discovering. Though, through further analysis, the texts complement each other. Both of the text conveys the similar theme of understanding the bigger picture. In a sense that, you can never really know what someone’s feelings or what their intentions are unless you experience them yourself. Wallace explores this idea in his speech by discussing how humans subconsciously assume and make judgement of other individuals without understanding the entire situation. Early on in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”, Janie appears to have an idea of what love is. This idea of love is the gears which move her along her journey of finding true love and self-identity. As the novel concludes with her having an entirely different output of what love is, heavily contrasting her idea of it from the beginning of the novel. Hence mirroring the idea of not truly understanding something without fully experiencing it. A more straightforward example of Wallace’s idea comes in the form of Janie’s experiences with Jody Starks. Jody at first seems like the man that will fulfill Janie’s idea of true love that she had been dreaming of. By initially flattering her and spoiling her, Janie sees Jody as a perfect man for her. Though over time Jody begins to start demoralizing Janie, as well as treating her like an object. Only using her as a means of boosting his reputation and power as mayor with her beauty, instead of loving her and giving her the treatment of someone on the same level as he is. This mirrors Wallace’s discussion on the sub conscience judgment that humans have at first glance, and how the struggle to turn off these automatic assumptions will lead individuals to living a more fulfilling life. Also, a cool connection is between Wallace’s idea of worship consuming us and the character of Jody. As Wallace discusses how we all worship something, and that some people worship power and are consumed by it. A similar idea can be seen in the power-hungry character of Jody, who’s character undergoes negative changes as he acquires more and more power. To conclude, both “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and “This is Water”, discuss the necessity to experiencing events and people before making sub conscious decisions about them.