QUOTE BANK:
“Listen, Sam, if it was nature, nobody wouldn’t have tuh look out for babies touchin’ stoves, would they? ’Cause dey just naturally wouldn’t touch it. But dey sho will. So it’s caution.” “Naw it ain’t, it’s nature, cause nature makes caution. It’s de strongest thing dat God ever made, now. Fact is it’s de onliest thing God every made. He made nature and nature made everything else.” Page 64
'Thank yuh fuh yo' compliments, but mah wife don't know nothin' 'bout no speech- makin'.. Ah never married her for nothin' lak dat. She's uh woman and her place is in de home.'" Page 43
"Take for instance that new house of his. It had two stories with porches, with bannisters and such things. The rest of the town looked like servants' quarters surrounding the "big house." And different from everybody else in the town he put off moving in until it had been painted, in and out. And look at the way he painted it - a gloaty, sparkly white." Page 47
"‘You sho loves to tell me whut to do, but Ah can’t tell you nothin’ Ah see!’ ‘Dat’s cause you need tellin’,’ he rejoined hotly. ‘It would be pitiful if Ah didn’t. Somebody got to think for women and chillun and chickens and cows. I god, they sho don't think none theirselves.'" Page 71
“She got up without a word and went off for the shoes. A little war of defense for helpless things was going on inside her. People ought to have some regard for helpless things. She wanted to fight about it.” Page 57
“Naw, Jody, it jus’ looks lak it keeps us in some way we ain’t natural wid one ‘nother. You’se always off talkin’ and fixin’ things, and Ah feels lak Ah’m jus’ markin’ time. Hope it soon gets over.” Page 46
“Janie stood where he left for unmeasured time and thought. She stood there until something fell off the shelf inside her. Then she went inside there to see where it was. It was her image of Jody tumbled down and shattered. But looking at it she saw that it was never the flesh and blood figure of her dreams. Just something she had grabbed up to drape her dreams over. In a way she turned her back upon where the image lay and looked further.” Page 72
“She had no more blossomy openings dusting pollen over her man, neither any glistenings young fruit where petals used to be. She found that she had a host of thoughts she had never expressed to him, and numerous emotions she never let Jody know about. Things packed up and put away in parts of her heart where she could never find them. She was saving up her feelings for some man she had never seen. She had an inside and an outside now and suddenly she knew how not to mix them.” Page 72
“Folkses, de sun is goin’ down. De Sun-maker brings it up in de mornin’, and de Sun-maker sends it to bed at night. Us poor weak humans can’t do nothin’ tuh hurry it up or slow it down. All we can do, if we want any light after de settin’ or before the risin’, is tuh make some light ourselves.” Page 45
“’Dat ‘oman ain;t so awfully pretty no how when yuh take a second look at her. Ah had sorta pass by de house on de way back and seen her good. ‘Tain’t nothin’ to her ‘ceptin’ dat long hair.’” Page 38
“’Speakin’ of winds, he’s de wind and we’s de grass. We bend ever way he blows.’” Page 49
“That night he ordered Janie to tie up her hair around the store. That was all. She was there for him to look at, not those others.” Page 55
“She got up without a word and went off for the shoes. A little war of defense for helpless things was going on inside her. People ought to have some regard for helpless things. She wanted to fight about it.” Page 57
“The spirit of marriage left the bedroom and took to living in the parlor. It was there to shake hands whenever company came to visit, but it never went back inside the bedroom again. So she put something in there to represent the spirit like a Virgin Mary image in a church. The bed was no longer a daisy-field for her and Joe to play in. It was a place where she went and laid down when she was sleepy and tired.” Page 71
“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the Watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by Time. That is the life of men. 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 (1).”
“[Janie] 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” ( ).
“The wind came back with triple fury, and put out the light for the last time. They sat in company with the others in other shanties, their eyes straining against crude walls and their souls asking if He meant to measure their puny might against His. They seemed to be staring at the dark, but their eyes were watching God” ( ).
"Ah don't mean to bother wid tellin' 'emnothin', Pheoby. 'Tain't worth de trouble. You can tell 'em what Ah say if you wants to. Dat's just de same as me 'cause mah tongue is in mah friend's mouf" (6).
"Sometimes God gits familiar wid us womenfolks too and talks His inside business. He told me.how surprised y'all is goin' tuh be if you ever find out you don't know half as much 'bout us as you think yo do. It's so easy to make yo'self out God Almighty when you ain't got nothin' tuh strain against but women and chickens" (70-71).
"She was a rut in the road. Plenty of life beneath the surface but it was kept beaten down by the wheels" (72).
To my thinkin' mourning oughtn't tuh last no longer'n grief" (89).
"Janie looked down on him and felt a self-crushing love. So her soul crawled out from its hiding place" (122).
“Don't say you'se ole. You'se uh lil girl baby all de time. God made it so you spent yo' ole age first wid somebody else, and saved up yo' young girl days to spend wid me" (172).
“Love ain't somethin' lak uh grindstone dat's de same thing everywhere and do de same thing tuh everything it touch. Love is lak de sea. It's uh movin' thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it's different with every shore" (182).
"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" (2).
"Janie saw her life like a great tree in leaf with the things suffered, things enjoyed, things done and undone. Dawn and doom was in the branches” (8).
"'You know, honey, us colored folks is branches without roots and that makes things come round in queer ways. You in particular. Ah was born back due in slavery so it wasn't for me to fulfill my dreams of whut a woman oughta be and to do . . . Ah wanted to preach a great sermon about colored women sittin' on high, but they wasn't no pulpit for me'" (15).
"'Ah wants things sweet wid mah marriage lak when you sit under a pear tree and think. Ah . . .'" (23).
"Janie pulled back a long time because he did not represent sun-up and pollen and blooming trees, but he
"Janie loved the conversation and sometimes she thought up good stories on the mule, but Joe had forbidden her to indulge. He didn't want her talking after such trashy people” (50).
"Janie did what she had never done before, that is, thrust herself into the conversation” (70).
"'When you pull down yo' britches, you look lak de change uh life'" (75).
"It was so crazy digging worms by lamp light and setting out for Lake Sabelia after midnight that she felt like a child breaking rules. That's what made Janie like it” (98).
"[Tea Cake] looked like the love thoughts of women. He could be a bee to a blossom - a pear tree blossom in the spring. He seemed to be crushing scent out of the world with his footsteps. Crushing aromatic herbs with every step he took. Spices hung about him. He was a glance from God” (101).
“She got nothing from jody except what money could buy, and she was giving away what she didn’t value” (76).
“’Dat’s somethin’ for de young folks, Janie, you out dere jumpin’ round and won’t be able tuh git out de bed tuhmorrer’” (77).
“Now again she thought of a country road at sun-up and considered flight” (76).
“Janie had robbed him of his illusion of irresistible maleness that all men cherish…” (79).
“The young girl was gone, but a handsome woman had taken her place” (87).
"Janie starched and ironed her face and came set in the funeral behind her veil. It was like a wall of stone and steel. The funeral was going on outside. All things concerning death and burial were said and done. Finish. End. Nevermore. Darkness. Deep hole. Dissolution. Eternity. Weeping and wailing outside. Inside the expensive black folds were resurrection and life...She sent her face to Joe's funeral and herself went rollicking with the springtime across the world” ( ).
“Here Nanny had taken the biggest thing God ever made, the horizon—for no matter how far a person can go, the horizon is still way beyond you—and pinched it into such a little bit of a thing that she could tie it about her granddaughters neck tight enough to choke her” (89).
“The years took all the fight out of Janie’s face. For a while she thought it was gone from her soul. No matter what Jody did, she said nothing. She was a rut in the road. Plenty of life beneath the surface but it was beaten down by the wheels” (76).
“You changes everything but nothin’ don’t change you—not even death” (86).
“Before she slept that night she burnt up everyone of her head rags” (89).
“’Listen, Jody, you ain;t de Jody ah run off down de road wid. You’se whut’s left after he died. Ah run off uh keep house wid you in uh wonderful way. But you wasn’t satisfied wid me da way Ah was. Naw! Mah own mind had tuh be squeezed and crowded out tuh make room for yours in me’” (86).
“This freedom feeling was fine. These men didn’t represent a thing she wanted to know about. She had already experienced them through Logan and Joe.” (90).
“But she mostly lived between her hat and her heels, with her emotional disturbances like shade patterns in the woods—come and gone with the sun” (76).
“She hated her grandmother and had hidden it from herself alll these years under a cloak of pity…She hated the old woman who had twisted her so in the name of love…like all the other tumbling mud-balls, Janie had tried to show her shine” (90).
“You wouldn’t listen. You done lived wid me for twenty years and you don’t half know me at all. And you could have but you was so busy worshippin’…” (86).
“For the first time she could see a man’s head naked of its skull. Saw the cunning thoughts race in and out through the caves and dormatories of his mind long before they darted out of his mouth” (77).
“But Janie, Tea Cake, whilst he ain’t no jail-bird, he ain’t got uh dime tuh cry. Ain’t you skeered he’s jes after yo’ money—him bein’ younger than you” (112).
“He looked like the love thoughts of women. He could be a bee to a blossom—a pear tree in the spring” (106).
“Janie looked down on him and felt a self-crushing love. So her soul crawled out from its hiding place” (128).
“Ah done lived grandma’s way, now Ah means tuh live mine” (114).
“The men held big arguments here like they used to do on the store porch. Only here, she could listen and laugh and even talk some herself if she wanted to” (134)
“Looka heah, Tea Cake, if you ever go off from me again and have a good time lak dat, ah specks tuh kill ya dead” (124).
“You got de keys tuh de kingdom” (109).
“Tea Cake in a borrowed car teaching Janie how to drive. Tea Cake and Janie playing checkers;playing coon-can…” (110)
“Tea Cake ain’t draggin’ me off nowhere Ah don’t want tuh go” (112).
“See dat? You’se got de world in uh jug and make out you don’t know it. But Ah’m glad tuh be de one tuh tell yuh” (104).
“…She got up and opened the window and let Tea Cake leap ofrth and mount the sky on the wind. That was the beginning of things” (107).
“Don't say you'se ole. You'se uh lil girl baby all de time. God made it so you spent yo' ole age first wid somebody else, and saved up yo' young girl days to spend wid me" (172).
“Love ain't somethin' lak uh grindstone dat's de same thing everywhere and do de same thing tuh everything it touch. Love is lak de sea. It's uh movin' thing, but still and all, it takes its shape from de shore it meets, and it's different with every shore" (182).
"It's uh known fact, Pheoby, you got tuh go there tuh knowthere..Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got tuh go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves" (183).
"'Once upon uh time, Ah never 'spected nothin', Tea Cake, but bein' dead from standin' still and tryin' tuh laugh. But you come 'long and made somethin' outa me. So Ah'm thankful fuh anything we come through together.'" (158)
"'So Ah'm back home agin and Ah'm satisfied tuh be heah. Ah done been tuh de horizon and back and now Ah kin set heah in mah house and live by comparisons.'" (182)
"Here was peace. She pulled in her horizon like a great fish-net. Pulled it from around the waist of the world and draped it over her shoulder. So much of life in its meshes! She called in her soul to come and see." (184)