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An Analysis Of Betty Smith's A Tree Grows In Brooklyn

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“In the two years since she had last looked on the school, Francie changed from a child to a woman.” Page 485, A Tree Grows In Brooklyn This coming-of-age novel written by Betty Smith has been a hot topic on whether or not it should be read by ninth graders. The novel follows a young girl named Francie Nolan as she grows up in a rough neighborhood in Brooklyn, NY from 1902 to 1919. The novel brings Francie’s hardships to life and shows her journey to adolescence; when she finally sees the flaws in her life and truly understands the reality of her surroundings. It also provides the reader with Francie’s real-life experiences that children, not only from her era, can connect and relate to. This novel holds truth, violence and heartbreaking …show more content…

Although it does hold a lot of truth, from life lessons to educational purposes, this novel may be too explicit for 9th graders. Some may argue that by 9th grade, children are aware of the existence of violence like sexual assault, molestation or murder -- both present in A Tree Grows In Brooklyn, it still may be too much to handle. For example in chapter 33, a child molester is roaming the streets, terrorizing families and also managed to murder a little girl in Francie’s block. After the chaos calms down, he strikes again. This time, he confronts Francie. With his pants down, exposing his genitals, he waits for Francie at the bottom the stairs in her building. When Francie finally sees him, she freezes in fear as he approaches her, unable to scream. Suddenly, Mama comes out of the house to see what is going on and she quickly runs back inside for the gun and shoots the predator in the stomach. Although Francie isn’t hurt, she is disgusted because his penis touched her leg. Reminder that all of this happened to Francie at fourteen years old. Normally in ninth grade, students are 14-16 years old. Regardless, attempting to imagine something this tragic and traumatizing may be overwhelming for many students. Also, this book is nearly 500 pages, which to many students, is a huge turn off. Smith pays a lot of attention to detail, making sure to describe every encounter with as much detail as possible. From one student’s perspective, the attention to detail may be awesome, but to another, excruciating. Overall, the violence in this nearly 500 page novel may be excessive and stressful for many students, resolving in negative attitudes towards A Tree Grows In

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