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Examples of prejudice and discrimination in the secret life of bees
Examples of prejudice and discrimination in the secret life of bees
Examples of prejudice and discrimination in the secret life of bees
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Lily’s Discovery of a Mother Figure In The Secret Life of Bees, written by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily lacks a mother figure in her life, which leads her on a compelling journey as she desperately searches for answers about her true mother. Her abusive father, T. Ray, causes Lily to run away along with Rosaleen, the housekeeper. They are led to the Boatwright household by one of the few things Lily still possesses from her mother, a Black Madonna Honey label. Lily is given the opportunity to create a mother-daughter type bond between her and the Boatwright sisters. August, one of the sisters, acts as the “queen bee” throughout the story. August teaches Lily that a mother does not have to be someone who you share blood with, but rather, a mother is …show more content…
T.Ray, her father, has a very large lack of sensitivity towards Lily in regard to this event in their life. “The truth is, your sorry mother ran off and left you. The day she died, she'd comeback to get her things, that's all. You can hate me all you want, but she’s the one who left you." (Kidd, 39). After an argument between Lily and her father, he tells her that Deborah left her. He also makes fun of her attempts to improve her knowledge by reading books. “Who do you think you are, Julius Shakespeare?” (Kidd, 16). Events continue to occur where T.Ray proves he’s not a good fit for a father position in her life, and they eventually lead her to build a hatred for him, which will lead her on her journey to discovering more about her mother. “When T. Ray gives Lily a hard time about bird droppings on the floor, Lily realizes Rosaleen must lover her ‘beyond reason’ when she stands up to T.Ray and defends Lily’s pet.” (Hebert, 14). Rosaleen is a black woman who cares for the Owen’s household; she is the first character that acts as Lily’s mother figure. “At the beginning of the novel Lily perceives Rosaleen as a protector – someone who is willing to create a safer environment – something Lily desperately needs for her emotional growth.” (Herbert, 14). Rosaleen is portrayed as Lily’s defender against T.Ray. Rosaleen is the first mother figure to enter the story …show more content…
August Boatwright is a reliable friend, a caring woman, and a positive influence to Lily. “August lives up to her name as the ‘Mistress of Bees’ and the ‘portrayal into [Lily’s] mother’s life’ in the first moments she welcomes Lily and Rosaleen into her home and offers them refuge in the honey house.” (Herbert, 20). August becomes a mother to Lily by giving her a place to stay and someone to lean on. August recognizes that Lily is missing something from her life, but she waits for Lily to confess the truth to her. “There is a hole in Lily’s heart from not having parental love, especially mother love, but August teaches her that if one’s earthly mother is not dependable, there is always a heavenly mother.” (Themes, 237). August creates her own religion for her self and her friends based around a statue of black Mary that has been in the Boatwright’s’ family for years. The group of African American women call themselves The Daughters of Mary. This group of women also plays a role in Lily’s search for comfort in a mother figure. “August becomes not only a mother, but a sort of spiritual teacher for Lily. She tells Lily about the secret life of bees, which includes the secrets of human life as well.” (Themes, 237). August teaches Lily lessons about patience, love, and forgiveness. She teaches her how to forgive, not only others, but herself as well. August says, “Every little thing wants to be loved.” (Kidd, 92). Lily learns
People share their secret lives without even talking about them. It only takes a glance or feeling to see that others have faced similar situations and problems, some people even live parallel lives. Despite the fact that many people believe it impossible for a measly insect, like a bee, to know the pain hardships a human faces, Sue Monk Kidd proves them wrong with her book The Secret Life of Bees. In her novel she derives many of her characters from the types of bees that exist in a hive. Lily and Zach have characteristic that are akin to that of field bees, August has that nurturing personality of a nurse bee, and the Lady of Chains is revered by her subjects just like a Queen bee is by her hive. Nowadays, no one ever faces a problem that someone, or something, has already faced. No one really has a secret life all to themselves.
As strong, independent, self-driven individuals, it is not surprising that Chris McCandless and Lily Owens constantly clashed with their parents. In Jon Krakauer’s novel, Into the Wild, Chris was a twenty-four-year-old man that decided to escape the materialistic world of his time for a life based on the simplistic beauty of nature. He graduated at the top of his class at Emory University and grew up in affluent Annandale, Virginia, during the early 1980’s. In The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily was a fourteen-year-old girl who grew up in the 1960’s, a time when racial equality was a struggle. She had an intense desire to learn about her deceased mother. Her nanny, Rosaleen, with whom she grew very close over the years, raised Lily with little help from her abusive father. When her father failed to help Rosaleen after three white men hospitalized her, Lily was hysterical. Later, Lily decided to break Rosaleen out of the hospital and leave town for good. While there are differences between Chris McCandless and Lily Owens, they share striking similarities. Chris McCandless’ and Lily Owens’s inconsistencies of forgiveness with their parents resulted in damaged relationships and an escape into the unknown.
Most runaway youth are homeless because of neglect, abuse and violence, not because of choice. Lily Owens is the protagonist in the novel, Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, is no different. Lily is a fourteen year-old girl still grieving over her mother's death. T. Ray a man who has never been able to live up to the title of a father, due to years of abuse, has not made it any easier. Lily is a dynamic character who in the beginning is negative and unconfident. However, throughout the novel Lily starts to change into the forgiving person she is at the end.
In life, actions and events that occur can sometimes have a greater meaning than originally thought. This is especially apparent in The Secret Life Of Bees, as Sue Monk Kidd symbolically uses objects like bees, hives, honey, and other beekeeping means to present new ideas about gender roles and social/community structures. This is done in Lily’s training to become a beekeeper, through August explaining how the hive operates with a queen, and through the experience Lily endures when the bees congregate around her.
For example, T. Ray punishes Lily by making her kneel on grits and verbally abuses her. Lily resents T. Ray for his brutality and gains the desire to flee her birth home. This shows that Lily desires more than just a physical house to live in, but also loving parental figures who can help guide her in life and show her love. This quest for acceptance led her to meet the Calendar Sisters.
Lily’s biases in The Secret Life Of Bees have altered greatly; she now knows that people of color have the ability to fend for themselves, and that they can be strong and influential people. The most outstanding thing that has caused Lily’s biases to change is the Boatwright sisters. August Boatwright was the person that took Lily by surprise, Lily was raised with this false philosophy that because she was white, she was superior, more intelligent than African Americans. “At my school they made fun of colored people’s lips and noses. I myself laughed at these jokes, hoping to fit in.
Heart break, joy, love, happiness, The Book The Secret Life of Bees has it all! The book is about a young girls that accidentally shot her mother. After spending nine years with her abusive, and emotionally absent father, she decides to run away. So, she breaks her beloved nanny out of prison, and Lily escapes to Tiburon South Carolina, a town she links to her mother through the writing on one of her old possessions. While in Tiburon, Lily finds the calendar sisters three very different, very helpful sisters. The family agrees to take Lilly in, despite the fact that almost every white person in town frowns upon the very idea of this white girl staying in an African American household. While staying with the sisters, August, May, and June, Lily learns lots of things, ranging from bee keeping, to why and how her mother first left her. She falls in love, explores her past, and finds it within herself to forgive her mother for leaving her, and herself, for shooting her mom. This book is rich in both emotion, and culture.
According to pages 31 and 32, Lily said, “I watched their wings shining like bits of chrome in the dark and felt longing build in my chest. The way those bees flew, not even looking for a flower, just flying for the feel of the wind, split my heart down its seam.” She was the bee, flying to feel the wind, but full of emptiness because she couldn’t find her flower; her mother. Since the age of 4, Lily grew up without a mother. After the bees came the summer of 1964, she thought, “Looking back on it now, I wanted to say the bees were sent to me. I want to say they showed up like the angel Gabriel appearing to the Virgin Mary, setting events in motion I could never have guessed.”(32) The bees set the course of the novel, and finally, at the end of the novel, helped her find closure for her
Many individuals have a philosophy of life, but Lily Owen’s is unique. Throughout The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily Owens establishes her philosophy of life. At the opening of the novel, she is a pure girl whose horrors become a reality the following day. Once she has the truth of her mother’s parting imprinted into her head, everything Lily favors correct is proven wrong. After fleeing the jailhouse alongside Rosaleen she endures a drastic transition in age.
A poignant and touching classic, The Secret Life of Bees details the coming of age stories of a young girl named Lily. Her life up until the start of the novel was hard, she was friendless with an abusive father and a heavy conscience, as she believes that she is responsible for her mother’s death. Lily’s only solace is her stand-in-mother, a black woman named Rosaleen, so when Rosaleen is hauled to jail for standing up for herself, Lily decided to run away to a mysterious town that has some linkage to her mother. Her escapades lead her to three, wonderful, eclectic, devout followers of Mary, and to a new life. As the story unfolds, an elaborate symbol lies hidden just beneath the surface, one that seems so obvious, but only lies as a hidden
Lily and Rosaleen arrive on the outskirts of Tiburon, after a combination of hitchhiking and walking, hungry and tired. As Lily shopped in a convenience store for lunch, she noticed a jar of honey with the picture of the same black Mary as her mother’s picture. The store clerk points them in the right direction and they end up at the Botwright's house. As she is conversing with August Botwright, Lily notices something peculiar. As she lies on her cot she thinks to herself; “T. Ray did not think colored women were smart.
When the book begins, Lily is depressed and guilt-ridden over the loss of her mother and her father T. Ray’s cold and abusive behavior. These are symptoms of queenlessness, a hive in chaos. “The queen...is the unifying force of the community; if she is removed...the workers very quickly sense her absence. After a few hours...they show unmistakable signs of queenlessness” (Kidd 1). Without Deborah in the house, Lily and T. Ray suffered and the distance between them grew. Without a queen bee to give them a direction, they had no sense of community. Lily and T. Ray did not work together to prosper, and neither could function at their full
Lily expresses that a black Mary was never mentioned in her church. This explains the prejudice in the world and how it has always been that way. Lily begins to reflect on why her mother held a picture of a Black Mary. The Black Mary will lead her to the Boatwrights where she finds out how powerful the Black Mary
Lily has a lot of mother figures in her life. In ?The Secret Life of Bees? two mother figures that she has are Rosaleen and August. A mother cares for her young and guides them trough life. She comforts and soothes them when they need it. Lily?s Mothers are Rosaleen and August. Both act as mothers for Lily in different ways.
The Secret Life of Bees delineates an inspirational story in which the community, friendship and faith guide the human spirit to overcome anything. The story follows Lily Owens, a 14 year old girl who desperately wants to discover the cause of her mothers death. Her father T. Ray gives her no answers, which leads their maid, Rosaleen, to act as her guardian. Together, Lily and Rosaleen run away to Tiburon, South Carolina and find a welcoming community. It is in Tiburon that Lily learns many life lessons, including many about herself. In her novel The Secret Life of Bees, Sue Monk Kidd explores a theme of spiritual growth through Lily's search for home as well as a maternal figure.