Barbara Kingsolver: The Bean Trees The Bean Trees is a novel about a young girl who becomes a young woman by overcoming a series of trials that life throws at her. Part of those “trials” is taking care of a three year old child who has been abused both physically and sexually. Taylor is able to pass each and every one of the hardships that are thrown her way. In the book you can definitely see Taylor go through the coming-of-age process. In the beginning of the book, Taylor (then known as Marietta or Missy) was a sassy little girl who wanted to be treated equally without truly understanding what that meant. This can be seen when Taylor demands to be called “Miss Marietta” the way she has to call all the kids of the parents her mother works for. Her mother has no problem with this, the way one might think she would. Had I asked my parents to call me “Miss Angie” when I was younger, I would have gotten a scolding for sure. Taylor’s mother was also very encouraging when it came to anything that Taylor had done. I believe this also plays a huge role in Taylor’s coming-of-age, although I am not sure if for the better or for the worse. I say this because due to this treatment Taylor has a mindset of ‘I always do it right’ and does not like to ask for help. …show more content…
To explain what I mean I will give you an example. Both Taylor and her mother, Alice, believe fully that Taylor was not a “barefoot and pregnant” (pg4) type of girl. Yet, once Taylor is given Turtle, the thought of being separated from her is unthinkable. Taylor definitely begins to enjoy motherhood even though before Turtle she avoided getting pregnant as best as she could. All this to say, that perhaps one should not immediately turn down an idea or lifestyle simply because you cannot picture yourself doing said idea at that