What Is The Meaning Of The Giving Tree By Shel Silverstein

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The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein, a favorite book of quite a few children, Silverstein tells a story of a “tree” giving everything she can to a young boy throughout his life. He comes back when he has taken from her not physically, but mentally and emotionally, and asks for bigger favors as he gets older. He starts to take greater things from the tree until there is nothing left. Which leaves us to think, what if the tree is not a tree after all, and is being used as a symbol for something greater? The Giving Tree is about a mother and son.

The Giving Tree is about the relationship between a mother and son. The relationship between the boy and the tree is almost exactly like a mother and son, or child. The son takes from the mother, and she gives. The giving makes her happy because she knows she is making her child happy by supplying what they want or need. You can see this when the boy swings on her branches, or rests in her shade. this makes the tree happy. A mother will do everything she can to make her …show more content…

The tree feels that if she cannot give to the boy anything she has in the past, she has no purpose. When the boy tells the tree that he just needs a stump to sit on and rest, the tree straightens herself the best she can, and lets the boy, that is now a man, sit on her stump. This makes the tree happy, even though she hasn’t given him anything big like in the past. She is happy with just knowing that she has made him happy.

The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein has many point representing the relationship between mother and son. Mothers give to their children to make them happy, which makes them happy. When their children are not satisfied, they are not satisfied, and will go through anything to make them happy. So, the tree represents a mother by giving symbolism. The tree gives, and the greatest gift she can receive is seeing the boy