Like I mentioned in my comment, birth is the opposite of death, not life. Life is what matters, it's the time between birth and death. You can't choose to be born, but you can choose death. In Their Eyes Were Watching God Janie did not have to directly choose life, but she did have to save her life by killing her one true love. "Janie held his head tightly to her breast and wept and thanked him wordlessly for giving her the chance for loving service." She had to choose death for her husband, so that he didn't have to be in anymore pain.  In A Good Man is Hard to Find and in every short story the characters have to face the question about their life and how death should come. The Grandma wouldn't stop talking and she recognized the Misfit, which decided the fate of her entire family. The little boy in The River didn't understand any better and ended up chosing death. The Life You Save May Be Your Own tells us that it is already about saving your life. A Stroke of Good Fortune shows that a birth is going to happen in the future, but the lady thinks that it will make her "dead inside." By having birth, death is inevitable to her. Thus, showing a very strong connection between birth and death.

What? I didnt even go to the cactus last night damnit! Too much to do today. Thats alright though, I'll make up for it tonight. Now on to the real business. Zora Neale Hurston and Flannery O'Connor both displayed racism that was typical of their respective time periods in history. In the first story of A Good Man is Hard to Find the grandma is talking to the children, then ever so casually says "Oh, look at that cute little pickaninny!... Wouldn't that make a picture, now?" In Their Eyes were watching God, which took place in the south, also bleeds with racism, both between whites and blacks as well as between blacks themselves. Much of the racism in these books is so matter-of-fact, due to the time period, that in some cases it is overlooked and not even acknowledged.

In the texts by Flannery O'Conner and Zora Neale Hurston, they both have characters that play the role of an onlooker. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie spent the majority of her marriage with Joe following his orders and watching his fame as Mayor grow; "Janie stood still while they all made comments (p.58)." Flannery O'Conner is able to include an onlooker into each of her stories in A Good Man is Hard to Find. In the story The Life You Save May Be Your Own, little Lucynell spends most of her time watching Mr. Shiftlet in everything he does; "...pointing to Lucynell who was sitting on the floor a foot away, watching him, her eyes blue even in the dark. (p.55)" 

Both Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God and O’Conner’s A Good Man is Hard to Find take place in the Old South following the Civil War, and attempt to demonstrate the racism and ignorance prevalent during those times which helps readers to understand and feel how it must have been.  In Their Eyes Were Watching God, one of the most blatant situations involving racism takes place after Tea Cake and Janie run away from the storm.  Tea Cake is forced to clean up all of the dead bodies by white men with guns and told “Examine every last one of ‘em and find out if they’s white or black.  They makin’ coffins fuh all de white folks.  Don’t dump no white folks in de hole jus’ so.”  They do not care about the black folks at all; they just dump them in a big hole and cover them with lime.  In The Artificial Nigger, the same type of racism can be seen but it hits even harder in the face of the reader.  For one thing, both Mr. Head and Nelson refer to African Americans as niggers the entire time.  Hurston doesn’t use that word as often as O’Conner seems to use it in her text, but you still see the racism either way.  Racism is clearly demonstrated after Nelson sees the large black man walking down the aisle on the train.  “He felt that the Negro had deliberately walked down the aisle in order to make a fool of him and he hated him with a fierce raw fresh hate; and also, he understood now why his grandfather disliked them.”  This hatred shown by Nelson represents how much of the South felt after the war and slavery was ended.

The novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God" as well as "A Good Man is Hard to Find" exhibit characters who are determined to achive thier goals.  In "Their Eyes Were Watching God" we can see that the main character is constantly searching for her love.  She tries using the advice of others but fails.  In her quest for love she also decides that she must find herserlf as a woman.  In this quest to find herself she finds that her loves are the ones that are preventing this from occuring.  "She was a rut in the road. Plenty of life beneath the surface but it was kept beaten down by the wheels" (72). In this quote we can see that her "love's" are keeping her from achieving her goals.  A good example of this in "A Good Man is Hard to Find"  We can see a gentleman with the same characteristics.  He marry's in order to drive the nice car and have everything that he wanted. However he realizes that if he goes through with the marriage he will not be happy or acheive his life goals.  His wife would be the "Wheels".

Racism seems to be one of the main themes throughout both texts. Both authors use racism as a way to tell us about a character. For example, in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” Janie is struck with issues due to the color of her skin and the texture of her hair, along with the issues of her wearing overalls and letting her hair down because she is a woman. In “A Good Man Is Hard To Find” the grandmother is your typical lady of the time, but they use racism to really define the issue while she is talking about the little boy they see on the way to Florida as well as the story she tells later about how the little “nigger boy” ate her watermelon because it had the initials E.A.T. on it.

“In my time… People did right then. Oh look at the cute little pickaninny!” she said and pointed to a Negro child standing on the door of a shack. “Wouldn’t that make a picture, now?” she asked and they all turned and looked at the little Negro out of the back window. (O'Connor, 4)

Within Zora Neale Hurstons' "Their Eyes Were Watching God" and Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard To Find" the concept of race and a historical ignorance in regards to African Americans. Both books have a simmilar setting of post slavery/pre civil rights and several examples show a decending view towards African Americans. In "Their Eyes Were Watching God" we are given the vision of injustice as Tea Cake is burying the dead. As he dreadfuly uncoveres corpses he is told that their are not boxes for the black folks, only for the white folks: "Whut tuh do 'bout de colored folks? Got boxes fuh dem too?, Nope". We see here a social injustice as the white man was allowed coffins and the black man was treated to a pit with lime sprinkled on it. In O'Connor's work we see simmilar seperations between races. In A Temple Of The Holy Ghost the fair is described as "lasting for five or six days and there was a special afternoon for school children and a special night for niggers". Another fresh example is in A Good Man Is Hard To Find where the grandma spots a black child explaining that "little niggers in the country don't have things like we do. If I could paint, I'd paint that piture". The grandma is thus conforming to the overall theme in these books which is an ignorance to diversity and a failure to escape stereotypes.

In Their Eyes Were Watching God and in A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Short Stories differences between races is a predominantly recurring theme. Race is a common issue discussed in many situations within Their Eyes Were Watching God. In A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Short Stories issues of race are not as commonly seen, however they still exist. In both books the authors address issues of race differences without the boundaries of politically correct values.

Quotes:

Their Eyes Were Watching God

“Honey, de white man is de ruler of everything as fur as Ah been able to 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.” (14)

“Ah hope so anyhow. Us colored folks is too envious of one ‘nother. Dat’s how come us don’t git no further than us do.” (39)

“The time was past for asking the white folks what to look for through that door. Six eyes were questioning God” (157)

“Dat sho is de truth. De ones de white man know is nice colored folks. De ones he don’t know is bad niggers.” (172)

 A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Short Stories

‘“You said they were black,” he said in an angry voice. “you never said they were tan. How do you expect me to know anything when you don’t tell me right?”’ (107)

 “It was not possible to tell if the artificial Negro were meant to be young or old; he looked too miserable to be either. He was meant to look happy because his mouth was stretched up at the corners but the chipped eye and the angle he was cocked gave him a wild look of misery instead.” (124)

In the book "Their Eyes Were Watching God" and the short story "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" there is a common theme of mothers/grandmothers being in charge when it comes to the daughters/grand-daughters marriages.  In the book Janie's grandmother tells her that she has to marry Logan Killiks. Janie's unsure feelings about this marriage is expressed very clearly on page 21, "She was back and forth to the pear tree continuously wondering and thinking.  finally out of Nanny's talk and her own conjectures she made a sort of comfort for herself.  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."  The fact that she decided to love Logan was only because her grandmother had said that she had to marry him and by deciding to love him she was just making the situation better for herself.

In the short story Lucynell's mother persuads Mr. Shiftlet to marry her daughter Lucy.  This is represented perfectly on page 56 of the story, "You want you an innocent woman, don't you?  You don't want none of this trash.  One that can't talk, can't sass you back or use foul language.  That's the kind for you to have.  Right there,' and she pointed to Lucynell sitting cross-legged in her chair, holding both feet in her hands."  Theres a saying that says that the mother knows best and through these two examples and from the time  period of the books it is obvious that that saying was very well respected in this time.

Their Eyes Were Watching God and A Good Man is Hard to Find both illustrate the domination and control a grandmother has over their daughter and/or entire family. In Flannery O'Connor's book, the grandmother in the first story noticably wants her family to follow her ways. This is seen in the first paragraph when the author writes, "The grandmother didn't want to go to Florida. She wanted to visit some of her connections in est Tennessee and she was seizing at every chance to change Bailey's mind." Even though the family instead traveled to Florida, the grandmother was still in control. She dominated conversations, she pointed things out to the children, and she also forced her son to turn down the road where the accident later occured.

In Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Janie's grandmother is more controlling compared to the one in A Good Man is Hard to Find. The control she has over Janie is seen throughout many pages, such as, "Look at yo' ole grandma!" and "You answer me when Ah speak. Don't you set dere poutin' wid me after all Ah done went through for you!" Janie's reaction to her grandmother's treatment is total compliance - as was the family in the first book. Both of these examples reflect the time period when elders were looked upon as wise; therefore, following grandmother's advice was expected of a family.

Both Flannery O'Connor's A Good Man Is Hard to Find and Other Stories and Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God successfully expose readers to a time period in which women and African Americans were considered to be lesser, allowing the mask of political correctness we are so used to today to be lifted and the true context of the time to be revealed to us.  Although each separate text follows a different sort of main character, whether it be a woman, a man, or a child, the plots and context seemingly all focus on the same subject matter.  By allowing those different viewpoints, we see that even the subjects of the discrimination accept their fate as it is, hence my analysis that this revealing was a successful one.  Because we come from a time when inequality is not okay, at least on the outside, a rare insight into how things used to be can prove to be a good learning experience to those of us who are sheltered by current social norms. In an effort to textually support my argument that these predjudices are made loudly apparent in each of the texts we have read, I will attempt to recite some quotations/context from each work to back this.  In Their Eyes Were Watching God (which I dont have with me) the whole book is about Janie, who is a woman of dark complexion growing up in a time of inequality towards both.  She is expected by her first 2 husbands especially to do the domestic chores and follow the norms of women while the men provide and take over as head of the household. Also, we see the discrimination towards blacks in a vivid way when they describe the burial practices of the white vs black hurricane victims.  In Flannery O'Conner's book, the most outright example of discrimination to me would be found in "The Artificial Nigger." An example would be when Nelson sees his first African American. The man simply walked by, and here were Nelson's thoughts as a result: "He felt that the Negro had deliberately walked down the aisle in order to make a fool of him and he hated him with a fierce, raw, fresh hate." The descriptives used to describe his hatred toward an innocent man as well as the man's entire race are much more vivid than would be acceptable today.  Because of the time period that these books were written, those chaeuvenistic and anti-African American ideas were common and acceptable and explained it much more detail. One last example of how blacks and women were treated and how it was even accepted came in "A Circle in the Fire." When describing her African American workers, Mrs. Cope stated that "he had not gone through the gate because he was too lazy to get off and open it...he was going the long way around at her expense." Rather than ask for an explanation, she assumed outright he was taking advantage of her and was too lazy to do it the right way. Later, she falls prey herself to the stereotypes of women and what is expected of them. First when she "gave a slight shriek. 'I cant have three boys in here with only me and sally virginia." Because she was a woman she was afraid that she was incapable of being left with 3 males. and then later, she falls prey to the expectations of women when her daughter came out with guns and in overhalls. she said "Why do you have to look like an idiot...I look at you and I want to cry" only because her child was dressed up to the standards of the prim and proper lady. She worried what people would think if they saw her because it was everyone's expectation that women behaved a certain way. Not only were those discriminations out in the open, they were sadly even accepted by the victims of them. Not many people today realize that, so an insightful look proves to be beneficial in my opinion.

One obvious theme that I'm sure has already been touched upon is how Flannery O'Connor and Zora Neale Hurston utilize God in their works.  Even though they both share a common theme, both writers seem to use God in different contexts.  O'Connor is almost preachy in how much God is referred to in her stories, and she also utilizes God as a sort of revelatory aid to the characters.  "A Good Man is Hard to Find" is probably the biggest example (along with pretty much every other story)  because the Grandmother continuously asks The Misfit "Do you ever pray?"  Their conversation, while being about God, ends up being a revelation to both, if for just a few seconds: the Grandmother seems to almost accept The Misfit's cruel nature and her own death ("...she murmured, 'Why you're one of my babies.  You're one of my own children!'") and The Misfit maybe starts to have feelings of guilt for being a murderer ("...he said in a high voice, 'if I had been there I would of known and I wouldn't be like I am now.'").  In Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, God is more used as some divine opposing force that's hopeless to fight against.  An example of this is when the hurricane hits Janie and Tea Cake's place:  "They sat in company with other shanties...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."

In both Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God and Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find," racist behaviors ran rampant among a few of the key characters. In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Mrs. Turner discriminated against her own race. She would make comments to Janie, on page 141, such as "Ah can't stand black n---. Ah don't blame de white folks from hatin' 'em 'cause Ah can't stand 'em mahself . . . If it wuzn't for so many black folks it wouldn't be no race problem." A similar attitude of discrimination is displayed by the grandmother in "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" on page 4. During the car ride, the grandmother and the children made comments about what they saw, and the grandmother spotted a boy and made remarks, such as "Oh look at the cute little p--- . . . He probably didn't have any [pants]. Little n--- in the country don't have things like we do." Racism manifested itself in the attitudes and language used by two prominent characters within both texts.

Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God and Flannery O'Conner's short story The Life You Save May be Your Own both address the issue of strength in a woman.  Janie in Their Eyes Were Watching God is strong because not only does she end up surviving three husbands, a hurricane and the overpowering will of her grandmother, she also had the courage to go back and face all the people in Eatonville after Tea Cake died.  Plus, she had a great attitude about it:  "Let 'em consolate theyselves wid talk.  'Course, talkin' don't amount tuh uh hill uh beans when yuh can't do nothin' else.  And listenin' tuh dat kind uh talk is jus' lak openin' yo' mouth and lettin' de moon shine down yo' throat... 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."  (p. 192)  In The Life You Save May be Your Own, the old Lucynell is strong in the fact that she wants to find someone to provide for her daughter when she's gone.  Even though her daughter is not the most "desirable" to be a wife, she tells Mr. Shiftlet that "She's smart, too.  She can sweep the floor, cook, wash, feed the chickens, and hoe." (p52)  Her strength lies in her care and love for her mentally challenged daughter.  Both of these stories are excellent examples of strength in women as displayed by both Zora Neale Hurston and Flannery O'Conner.

Flannery O’Conner’s The Life You Save May be Your Own and Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, both depict the theme of having a powerful role as mother/grandmother when it comes to marrying off their daughter.  In Their Eyes, the power is over the daughter, Janie, but in The Life, the power is over Shiftlet, the soon to be son-in-law because Lucynell’s mother is “ravenous for a son-in-law,” and when trying to convince him to marry her, she says, “She can sweep the floor, cook, wash, feed the chickens, and hoe.”  Both guardians are looking out for their daughter/granddaughter and trying to provide for them the best they can, but now they are getting older and need someone reliable to watch over them. As Janie grandmother states, “Ah’m ole now.  Ah can’t be always guidin’ yo’ feet from harm and danger.  Ah wants to see you married right away.”   Unfortunately, some of the characters have different ideas and feelings of how to overcome what they are being forced to do.

Both Their Eyes Were Watching God, written by Zora Neale Hurston, and Flannery O'Connor's The Life You Save May Be Your Own deal with the act of realization. Near the end of The Life You Save May Be Your Own Mr. Shiftlet realizes that leaving his mother was one of his biggest regrets. He states this clearly on page 61, "I never rued a day in my life like the one I rued when I left that old mother of mine." He regrets leaving his mother and tells this to the little boy he recently picked up; who is running away from his mother. A same type of realization happens when Janie realizes that she does not want to live the life that her grandmother lived. She does not need to marry into land or money, she realizes that she would like to marry into love. Both characters realize something that is important to them and they share that with other characters in the seperate books.