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Mary The Secret Garden Analysis

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The garden, like Mary, is a neglected place; left uncared for, behind the imprisoning walls, it has become a tangle of thorns and briars. Nurture, care and love restore the beauty and freedom of this wilderness. In turn Mary, like the roses, blossoms into a natural and healthy child, and is able to share this healing experience with Colin, her cousin. Danielle Price in her article ‘Cultivating Mary: The Victorian Secret Garden’ proves that the similarities between Mary and the secret garden exist deeply in the text. When The Secret Garden opens, Mary is clearly a bad seed. Or, at least, maternal neglect and her Indian environment have caused weeds to spring up. The novel decisively states that India is not a place conducive to growing literal or figurative gardens. Organic metaphors of the child as seed, are frequently employed by the Victorians who showed their indebtedness to Rousseau and the Romantic poets. This …show more content…

Like the garden, Mary was hidden away, denied to everyone's sight, by her parents, a harassed colonial administrator and his flighty, irresponsible wife. When Mary is discovered in the deserted bungalow, she is identified as "the child no one ever saw," who had "actually been forgotten" (7). Mary's question, "Why was I forgotten?" has implications beyond those suggested by the immediate circumstances. The little girl was uncared for, left in the hands of mindlessly subservient natives who deserted her. Ignored by her parents while they were alive, she was orphaned in a hostile world at their death. Her guardian, the distracted widower Archibald Craven, hardly fills the role he legally holds. His first words to her, after she has been in his care for six months, were "I forgot you. How could I remember you? I intended to send you a governess or a nurse, or someone of that sort but I forgot"

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Sandra Cisneros’, “The Monkey Garden”, uses juxtaposition and personification to provide ominousness to her vignette. For instance, a bit after Esperanza first entered the garden following the family moving, she noted the “hollyhocks perfumy like the blue-blond hair of the dead”, comparing aromatic flowers to dull colored locks from the deceased, foreshadowing that there must be an upcoming negative event of some sort involving death. The foul use of corpses’ hair color to describe a fragrant plant is placed to accentuate their clear differences. Cisneros also uses personification to establish an ominous mood to this piece. For example, after stating the garden was taking over itself, the “flowers stopped obeying” their designated areas.

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Mary of Oignies highly devoted herself to Christ and this, occasionally, was not well received by others. Jacques de Vitry writes such details of Mary’s devotion and encounters to show that she devoted as much time and energy as a male could. She was not always taken so seriously due to the fact that she was a woman. Jacques was in the mindset that actions, such as the ones performed by Mary, were more amazing and that they should not be overlooked. Jacques de Vitry believed that Mary of Oignies actions and devotions were a more amazing feat than that of a man, because of the extreme asceticism she performed even as a woman, and her feminine qualities overall.

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502 Words | 3 Pages

Captured by a man who seem to be like a normal and well kept a man you would never suspect that he kidnapped so many girls. Clover chose a girl who lives in the streets and have families that don’t care about them. That’s how he chose his perfect flowers. They four perfect flower were trapped in a cellar with no way to contact the outside world.

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323 Words | 2 Pages

Mary Reibey’s Parents died at a young age and she was brought up by her grandmother. She was deprived from love and grew up imprisoned and shipped onto a foreign place. Mary did not only experience the death of her parents but of her grandmother at the age of 13 and this would have negatively impacting her self-identity. She became a reckless teenager and ran away from her orphanage disguising herself as a boy. With no parental control she was jailed for horse stealing and in her time was a capital offence making her sentence to Sydney for 7 years.

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596 Words | 3 Pages

How a Community Garden Changes the Lives of Two Characters Gardening is a meaningful way to cultivate self-love. Like meditation, gardening is a time to be still and listen, not just to the sound of the outdoors, but to your inner voice and your innerself. In Paul Fleischman’s novel Seedfolks, two main characters who are dynamic are Maricela and Amir. Fleishman’s vacant lot garden changes the lives of Maricel and Amir, because the garden impacts their lives by changing their views on life and the community. To begin with, Maricela is a 16 year old Mexican girl who is pregnant.

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810 Words | 4 Pages

In a simile, she compares gardening to “boxing… The wins versus the losses” (Hudes 16). Through this comparison, Hudes conveys Ginny’s deep desire for a sense of control and success in her life. This desire is fed by the memory of her father, who was only bearable when he was gardening. Specifically, the assertion of this desire for control is evident as she recalls that her father “was a mean bastard…” but “became a saint if you put a flower in his hand” (Hudes 15). From those experiences of dealing with her father, a psychological analogy between nature and peace was instilled in Ginny’s mind at a young age, and is what she relies on as an adult to handle her emotional trauma.

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1036 Words | 5 Pages

To be closed is to conceal the end from those who do not seek. To be opened is to allow the devotee to find salvation. The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Shrine of the Virgin Mary, from Rhine Valley, Germany circa 1300 AD, is a Vierge ouvrante which is “a form of devotional sculpture, whose exterior resembles traditional cult figures of the Virgin and Child, yet is fashioned so as to open at the center,”. The outside of this sculpture features a “tender representation” of the enthroned Virgin Mary nursing the Christ Child. The Virgin Mary does not engage with her son, though.

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946 Words | 4 Pages

"Mary, Mary, quite contrary, How does your garden grow? With silver bells, And cockle shells, And pretty maids all in a row." This Nursery rhyme was first published in 1744 and originated in England (N/A, http://allnurseryrhymes.com/mary-mary-quite-contrary/). The Mary that nursery rhyme is referring to Mary Tudor, more famously known as “Bloody Mary.”

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757 Words | 4 Pages

The Family After Mary’s Passing Their childhood has ended. With the sudden death of their mother, twelve-year-old Tillie and eight-year-old Minnie must grow up fast. They are now required to do all of the cooking as well as the housework for their father and three brothers. A neighbor steps in to teach the girls how and what to cook.

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676 Words | 3 Pages

The whole journey was new and interesting to Lily, she says this quote that shows her realization that everyone has pain, but not everyone can see it, “I realized it for the first time in my life: there is nothing but mystery in the world, how it hides behind the fabric of our poor, browbeat days, shining brightly, and we don’t even know it” (63) After seeing honey containers with the Black Mary logo on them, Lily asks the cashier about them and finds out vital information regarding where Lily and Rosaleen could go and possibly live. The duo soon gets to their destination; a bright pink house occupied by the August, May, and June, also known as the Boatwright/calendar

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455 Words | 2 Pages

Our time with Dan Ross was very informative. I was not very familiar with the art community of Fort Wayne. Dan Ross explained how important art was in our community, and he described how impressive it is that we have such a thriving art scene. When Dan Ross explained his job description, I could tell how passionate he felt about promoting the arts. I especially like when he described how the ballet studio was created because it showed that he was involved with all aspects of the art community.

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1068 Words | 5 Pages

Her mother died shortly after her birth leaving her father to care for her and her half-sister, Fanny Imlay. The dynamic of her family soon changed when her father remarried. Mary was treated poorly by her new stepmother, and her quality of life was less than satisfactory. Her step-siblings were allowed to receive an education while Mary stayed at home. She found comfort in reading, and created stories in her father’s library.

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455 Words | 2 Pages

In the short story “The Flowers”, Alice Walker sufficiently prepares the reader for the texts surprise ending while also displaying the gradual loss of Myop’s innocence. The author uses literary devices like imagery, setting, and diction to convey her overall theme of coming of age because of the awareness of society's behavior.     At the beguining of the story the author makes use of proper and necessary diction to create a euphoric and blissful aura. The character Myop “skipped lightly” while walker describes the harvests and how is causes “excited little tremors to run up her jaws.”. This is an introduction of the childlike innocence present in the main character.

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524 Words | 3 Pages

Alice Walker uses imagery and diction throughout her short story to tell the reader the meaning of “The Flowers”. The meaning of innocence lost and people growing up being changed by the harshness of reality. The author is able to use the imagery to show the difference between innocence and the loss of it. The setting is also used to show this as well.

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733 Words | 3 Pages

Watching a movie after reading the same book you will notice that are differences. In the secret garden book and movie there are a lot of differences. In the movie her parents die in an earthquake but in the book her parents die of an illness going around India. The book describes Colin’s eyes as wide in the movie his eyes are wide. Mary find the key in the dirt in the book in the movie she finds the key in her aunts room.

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