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Background Men

I feel as though the men throughout all the books we have been reading have been interesting to say the least. In "Invisible Man", they seemed to be more well rounded although some of them were still considered bad people. In "Their Eyes Were Watching God", the men seemed much flatter, with only a few being well rounded. I don't know how to feel about the contrasts really, but what I do know is that I don't feel too strongly either way. However, I suppose I prefer the way they were depicted in "Their Eyes Were Watching God". Their role in the novel was what really sucked me in.

The men in "Their Eyes Were Watching God" served primarily as love interests for the main protagonist, Janie. Outside of that, they weren't really used for much (this is not to say they weren't crucial to the book, but in relation to Janie's story, that was their primary purpose). A good comparison would be the women in "Invisible Man". They were just there for sex with the unnamed narrator and not much else as well. There is something I liked about Janie's lovers though, I liked how the author captured their personalities with just a few pages dedicated to some of them. For instance the first lover, who was apparently unattractive and unromantic. Zora Hurston managed to make her background characters (the men) really stand out to me, particularity by highlighting how Janie didn't like them. I sympathize with Janie because of this; men are trash and Janie leaving for Tea Cake made me happy.

I suppose the point of this blogpost was to point out how I liked how the background/rarely seen characters were portrayed in "Their Eyes Were Watching God" vs. in "Invisible Man". The author actually gave us reasons to sympathize with Janie not liking the men and gave the men personalities. To help with the comment section, what do you guys think on how the two authors utilized characters that were never brought back into the story?

Comments

  1. Xanthe BrownOctober 25, 2018 at 1:41 PM

    Hmm interesting post. I never really thought about it like that, that in some way the gender roles upheld by the women in Invisible Man are reversed and then put on the men in Their Eyes Were Watching God. I like that you call them "background men" because I think you're right - the focus is truly on Janie and not on her relationships. Still, I struggle with the fact that Janie's whole life story is pretty much defined by her relationships with men, while Invisible Man featured only brief cameos of women. On the other hand, the Narrator in Invisible Man was almost entirely defined by other people while Janie defines herself, even though that definition is often in relation to men. Thanks for sharing.

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  2. ZonaOctober 25, 2018 at 7:46 PM

    I think what's really important is that Hurston still has an anthropological lens in this novel. So even if she doesn't develop a character for a narrative, it still matters that they are complex for the sake of her cultural exploration. But your blog post made me think about a lot of comparisons fo Invisible Man and TEWWG. Thanks!!

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