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Themes In The Secret Life Of Bees By Sue Monk Kidd

621 Words3 Pages
Being mistreated and neglected on a daily does not seem enjoyable at all. T. Ray, father of Lily, abuses his role as the only parent by dictating Lily's life. T. Ray was an unkind father who does not understand Lily's wants. Being the only parent, T. Ray also tends to blame Lily for the death of her mother. T. Ray damages Lily physically and emotionally to take out his anger and resentment about his wife.Throughout the book, The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, parental duty is a major theme that has a big impact on the plot.
In the book, The Secret Life of Bees, Lily is constantly being mistreated by her dad, T. Ray. T. Ray is a neglective and abusive father who likes to take his anger out on his kid. Cussing, hitting and kicking your
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161 Words | 1 Pages

Sue Monk Kidd indirectly characterizes Rosaleen through speech , in The Secret Life of Bees, as brave in order to reveal that she cares about Lily enough to stand up to T Ray and be like a mother figure to Lily. An example of this is when Rosaleen defends Lily and her new baby chick, “ she said and looked him up one side and down the other ‘You ain’t touching that chick.’ ” (Kidd 11).In this scene, T Ray was threatening to kill Lily’s baby chick that she had recently acquired. Since Lily was only 8 years old she could not defend herself against her father, so Rosaleen is brave and steps in and acts as her mother in protecting her, and what she cares about, from her ill-tempered father. The author does this in order to explain to the reader

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683 Words | 3 Pages

In The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily Owens is raised by her abusive father, T. Ray, because her mother died when she was young. Despite Lily’s negative upbringing, her nanny, Rosaleen Daise, and friend, August Boatwright, fill in for Lily’s mother’s absence and her father’s poor parental influence. T. Ray Owens raises Lily with discrimination and violence which encourages her to be the opposite. Lily’s father is very sexist and teaches her that girls are not as good as boys. T. Ray does not want Lily to read books because reading leads to college and he thinks that college is a waste of money for girls.

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210 Words | 1 Pages

In Sue Monk Kidd’s novel, The Secret Life of Bees, Kidd incorporates the literary technique of allusion to assist the reader in delving into Lily’s thought process. Furthermore, to incorporate allusion, Kidd compares the message Lily interpreted from the arrival of the bees in her room to the plagues God sent to the pharaoh Ramesses. Lily ponders: Back in my room on the peach farm, when the bees had first come out at night, I had imagined they were sent as a special plague for T. Ray. God saying, Let my daughter go, and maybe that’s exactly what they’d been, a plague that released me (151).

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715 Words | 3 Pages

Although Lily did suffer a great loss from losing her mom, she gained so much more with the love and support that the Boatwrights and their group gave her. She has gained friends, someone to look up to, and the sense of family from all of them. Without the loss of her mom and the abuse of her dad she would never of gotten the experience of such powerful female role models and a new

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585 Words | 3 Pages

At the beginning of the novel, Lily lives with her father, who she calls T-Ray. Her mother died when she was young, and now she only has her father and Rosaleen to live with her and to raise her. T-Ray convinces Lily to think that her mother left them, not that she died. T-Ray told Lily, “‘The truth is your mother ran off and left you’” (39). Rosaleen takes care of Lily.

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1271 Words | 6 Pages

T Ray becomes very violent with Lily, grabbing her, calling her Deborah and yelling at her about leaving him. It isn’t until Lily screams “daddy!” that T Ray stops attacking her. T Ray confesses that Lily looks almost identical to her mother, that they share a lot of personality traits and when he finds that she ran away to the same place Deborah had, he was instantly reminded of Deborah and all his emotions came flowing back to him. Finally Lily understands why her father is so bitter, “But seeing him now, I knew he’d loved Deborah Fontanel, and

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926 Words | 4 Pages

Throughout The Secret Life of Bees bees play a recurring role in the novel, repeatably being mentioned during the novel in epigrams before the start of each chapter and within the story itself. Unfortunately, on certain occasions the reason why bees are included in a certain part of the story can be unclear and confusing to readers, causing them to occasionally misinterpret the importance of bees throughout the novel. Regardless, the bees throughout play a very important role in understanding many of the themes and symbolism that Kidd included within the novel. In The Secret Life of Bees Kidd symbolizes Lily’s experiences and situations through the bees frequently present in the novel to show that seemingly different things can function in the same way.

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1401 Words | 6 Pages

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).

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302 Words | 2 Pages

In the Bildungsroman, The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily, the young motherless protagonist, exists in a life which lacks love and care, but with an act of rebellion, alters the entire course of her life. After enduring cruel punishments from a sadist father, Lily accepts this as the way of life she must live. However, after a crucial moment, Lily begins to consider the idea of freedom from her oppressive life; she realizes this when she and Rosaleen, her substitute mother, come under arrest for disrupting the public and Terrence, her father, would only take Lily out of jail. This is a pivotal moment as Lily a heated conversation with her father and exclaims, “You don’t scare me”(Kidd 38). Her brash action to rebel against her father

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485 Words | 2 Pages

St. Clair High School is a coed, public high school in St. Clair, Michigan. It holds classes for students in grades through 9 through 12. There are around 900 pupils enrolled, and the student-to-teacher ratio is 22:1. The gender divide is even. The graduation rate is 97 percent, and the College Readiness Index is 31.8.

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705 Words | 3 Pages

Two of her sisters have this problem and it has genuinely affected August for better or worse. Lily’s father, T-Ray, deals with his mental illness by using violence and taking his anger out on Lily because of what happened with his wife Deborah. This causes Lily to feel unloved by her father. In the beginning of the story, Lily runs away from home to escape her tragic life with T. Ray.

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1919 Words | 8 Pages

Lily barely knew her own mother, and T. Ray, her father, abuses her and could care less. Lily gets to experience the parent-child love from Rosaleen. Kidd asserts that the interaction between different races can lead to loving

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624 Words | 3 Pages

The character of Lily Owens evolves and changes as any young woman would throughout the course of her life. Lily begins the book as an insecure, detached, and unaware teenage girl. We see how Lily changed into a wise young woman as she solves the mystery of her mother’s life. Towards the end of the book Lily transforms into a young woman who is much more confident, happier, and vicarious. Lily has learned about love and biases.

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1027 Words | 5 Pages

A father plays a crucial role in the life of his children. One modern adage expresses a touching thought about fathers, stating, “Dad, a son’s first hero and a daughter’s first love.” This quote embraces the relationship of Atticus Finch and his children, Jem and Scout, in Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird. Jeremy, the older of the Finch kids, holds his father in extremely high regard and depends on his guidance in life while his younger sister, Jean Louise, trusts Atticus whole-heartedly and adores him despite her occasional indifference toward him. During the three years in which To Kill a Mockingbird takes place, the author grants a glimpse of Atticus’ method of upbringing.

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983 Words | 4 Pages

“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.

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