Sue Monk Kidd presents Lily’s insecure personality in her novel The Secret Life of Bees to convince the audience to see Lily in an innocent light. Kidd desires to portray Lily as innocent to justify her running away from T. Ray and her home. An excerpt from the onset of the book reveals Lily’s insecurity: “There was nothing worse than clumps of whispering girls who got quiet when I passed. I started picking scabs off my body and, when I didn’t have any, gnawing the flesh around my fingernails till I was a bleeding wreck”(9). As one analyzes this portion of the book, Lily convinces herself that she does not care what the others think about her.
Through indirect characterization, Sue Monk Kidd, author of The Secret Life of Bees, displays Rosaleen as an obstinate character in order to exhibit the southern racism at hand. For example, Rosaleen is indirectly characterized when she comes into contact with the town’s most notorious racist, Franklin Posey, and will not apologize for standing up for her beliefs. Recalling the event, she exclaims, “‘he hit me till the policeman said that was enough. They didn’t get no apology, though’” (46).
In The Secret Life of Bees, author Sue Monk Kidd alludes to the St. Augustine Civil Rights Movement to highlight the racism of the time period and explain why white people in Tiburon had trouble with the concept of Lily staying at a colored house. Although Lily is comfortable at August’s pink house, she is unable to be sheltered from the racist views from the outside world. One day while watching television, she learns of “an integration parade in St. Augustine that got attacked by a mob of white people…” (88). Here, Lily is being informed of a Florida parade in which activists marched together in support of integrating the public schools. Their peaceful demonstrations were violently crushed by Ku Klux Klan members, who believed that white
In this novel, the main characters, Lily and Rosaleen, escape from home facing and overcoming multiple obstacles. From the knowledge they’ve obtained from overcoming these challenging obstacles, Lily and Rosaleen finally came to terms to acquire peace in the new and safe environment they are now settled in. Another
It was not easy for Lily to live in the household of a father with no care for her. Everyday she felt as if she was never loved. Lily never had knowledge T. Ray as a father, “ because ‘Daddy’ never fit him-.”(Kidd, 2). T. Ray would never talk about Lily’s mother and had told her that her mother never wanted her. Lily was all alone to put the puzzle pieces
No turning back, it said. this is it, it said” (235). From the moment the door closed, her lies came the bewildering truth; the reason for the disappearance of Lily’s mother: Lily herself. Her persistent journey to find her queen– the journey that once broke her, warmed her, and healed her– ended up breaking her once again. Her naive fantasies of happily living with her mother were tarnished; heartbreak and rage blinded her heart.
Lily’s mother is the cause of much of her grief, through her journey she imagines her mother in a way that does not accurately depict who her mother truly was. When she finds out what her mother actually was she, “I stood
Lily, the main character in this novel is an insecure girl due to not only girls at school, but also her father, T-Ray, and his lies about her mother. By not having a motherly influence, lily didn’t have the example of a fine woman which is usually learned from girls’ mothers She even contemplated on going to an all girl school, in which it would teach her to be quote in quote “proper’. Rosaleen, as her housekeeper didn’t necessarily have a motherly influence on Lily, thus causing a lack of confidence in the teenage girl. This didn’t help the situation that Lily is haunted by the lingering thought of her mother’s death. In the end she ran away with her housekeeper Rosaleen, and to the only place she knew of, the
In the story, Kidd’s use of characterization successfully reveals the theme that people's lives are more complex than they appear. Kidd demonstrates this theme using the characterization of Lily, T. Ray, May, and Deborah. One character that Sue Monk Kidd uses to portray the theme, is the main character Lily. In the beginning of the story, the author shows that Lily can be both mature and immature at times. An example of her maturity in the text is when she says, “People who think dying is the worst thing don’t know a thing about life” (Kidd 2).
The Secret Life Of Bees- Literary Analysis A conflict in The Secret Life Of Bees is that Lily has to deal with her father with him mistreating her all the time. Her father is depressed, mad and built up with a lot of anger because of the death of his wife. The first situation in the book Secret Life Of Bees is that lily has to deal with her dad, T.ray mistreating her all the time.
In the novel Secret Life of Bees and today prejudice is shown for people’s sexual preference, age but especially race. Since Lily was little she has been told by T. Ray that white people are better and smarter than black people. In the story Lily tells the reader what T-Ray had told her,“T. Ray did not think colored women were smart.” (Kidd 78) “Staying in a colored house with colored women, eating off their dishes, lying on their sheets-it was not something I was against, but I was brand new to it, and my skin never felt so white to me.”
Here Lily transforms from a girl to a woman, learns about herself, and feels what it’s like to be a part of a community. At the end of the book there is a point where the
Title Growth, change, and self-discovery are humanity’s focus. We are constantly moving, developing, and improving ourselves and our environment. Human art and literature reflect our values, and identity is key in the works we create. In The Secret Life of Bees, a novel written by Sue Monk Kidd, the character Lily goes through many ups and downs in order to find her identity, values, and interests, and to develop relationships. We learn about ourselves through characters, and Lily teaches us to discover ourselves through our view of ourselves, our interests and goals, and through our relationships with others.
John F. Kennedy was a well know person in the United States. He was America 's 35th President from January 20, 1961 to November 22, 1963. Sadly his life was cut short in a trip to Dallas, Texas. The gunman was later founded and arrested but never stood trial because he was later killed. FBI release that it was a lone gunman work but many people say that there was another person involved in another build.
“A wonderful novel about mothers and daughters and the transcendent power of love” (Connie May Fowler). This quote reflects the novel, The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd because the protagonist in the story, Lily Owens, her mother have died when she was four years old and she didn’t feel loved by her abusive father, T. Ray Owens, until she met the Boatwrights family with the housekeeper, Rosaleen, and stayed with them. The Boatwrights family are the three black sisters who are August, May, and June. This novel took place in Sylvan and Tiburon, South Carolina, where Lily grew up and where she found the answer to her questions.
