Family Relationships In Barbara Kingsolver's The Bean Trees

This belief has been integrated into her novel The Bean Trees. Through her characters, Kingsolver was able to show the truth behind her belief. From Taylor’s care over Turtle to Virgie simply holding on to Edna to guide her, the belief that people need other’s generosity and empathy to survive was what helped those characters who

The process of gaining independence is an important part of who a person is and how they overcome issues they come across in their lifetimes. Several characters from the book, The Bean Trees, are either independent from the beginning of the story or develop to become independent. Due to these characters strong, self-supporting personalities, they can solve the issues they come across in a self-sufficient manner without help from others. These characters are never stuck relying on others for help or forced to wait for others. In the book The Bean Trees, several characters personify independence throughout the work, which supports the idea independent people can self-sufficiently overcome obstacles they come across.

Thought out a persons ever changing life, the one thing that is always consistent is their name. However, sometimes a persons identity will change so much that their own name seems foreign when speaking it out loud. This creates the need for a new name to match a new identity. Kingsolvers The Bean Trees and Lena Coakley’s Mirror Image both apply characterization, conflict, and symbolism to show how identity changes with names and labels.

Dalen Todorov, Period 8 Eng 10 H, Ms. Reid 1 October 2014 ORP 1 Dialectical Journal Kingsolver, Barbara. The Bean Trees New York City: HarperCollins Publishers, 1988 “"Take this baby," she said….. "Where do you want me to take it?"....... ”She looked back at the bar, and then looked at me. "

The resiliency of Taylor 's mother and her commitment to Taylor, as well as her indifferent attitude toward men, represent Kingsolver 's feminist

After this incident, Taylor was convinced that she can’t take care of Turtle since she couldn’t keep her safe from the world. According to The Bean Trees, “…That they have the right to take her out of a perfectly good home and put her in some creepy orphanage where they probably make them sleep on burlap bags and feed them pig slop”(Kingsolver 235). Even though, Taylor believed that she can’t keep Turtle safe from this society where people try to hurt a child so young, on the other hand, Lou Ann thinks that Taylor can keep Turtle safer than anybody else. According to Abuse in America, “As of September 30, 2004, there were 517,000 children in foster care in the United States” (“Abuse in America”). This shows that people that are living the way that Lou Ann has described is not safe for children, not to mention that lots of people, because of poverty put their children

“Blood makes you related, loyalty makes you family”-Unknown. This quote relates directly to my story “Barn Burning” by William Faulkner. Barn Burning is a story of family, loyalty, and morality and answers the question “how far does loyalty to family go?”. This story follows a boy named Sarty that is at the age where he starting to figure out what kind of person he will be in life. Sarty is a fascinating and dynamic young boy that faces a major ethical dilemma.

Even though Taylor and Lou Ann just met a few months ago Taylor really care about her. Family is not just the people who you are related to it is also the people who love and care for you all the time. Taylor thinks of Lou Ann as a part of her family and care about her as if she was actually related to her. Now with Turtle in her possession, Taylor wants to provide nothing but safety for her. One day when Taylor was coming home from work, she could sense that something was wrong.

With the exception of Angel and Lou Ann’s relationship, it seems like every personal interaction in The Bean Trees is equal parts of give and take. For example, Virgie Mae helps Edna Poppy who is blind, while Edna Poppy runs interference on Virgie’s inappropriate remarks. Lou Ann teaches Taylor how to hone her abilities, and Taylor calms and reassures Lou Ann. Even Estevez and Esperanza are symbiotic; they have been through so much, with their illegal immigration that they cannot function outside of one another. In what ways do these relationships, and the other, less prominent relationships in The Bean Trees promote a network of reliance? Think of the quote, “It takes a village to raise a child", how do these reciprocal relationships enable

This is “bad news” for Taylor, because it means that the government has the right to legally take Turtle away from her. Since Taylor has “no legal claim” to Turtle, she must either find a way to adopt Turtle, or give her up to the government. Taylor has started to learn how to thrive with Turtle, but she must first go through the struggle of finding Turtle’s legal guardian, and having them give Turtle to her. Since she doesn’t even know the name of the woman who gave Turtle to her, finding her, or finding another way to adopt Turtle, will be one of Taylor’s hardest trials in stage three of her journey. After Taylor successfully adopts Turtle, they visit a library while waiting for

The life she has between her child and husband is different than the one with her mother, father and brother. She says her husband doesn’t understand anything that goes on in her family. For example, she says “Nor does he understand that when we talk about sale-leasebacks and right-of-way condemnations we are talking about the things we like best, the yellow fields and the cottonwoods and the rivers rising and falling and the mountain roads closing when the heavy snow comes in.” (Didion 2) So

Taylor was now finding out about how the life of her friends was in danger she knew that this could harm them but she also realized that she couldn’t change much because she was all by herself, this motivated her to do as much as she could for those she

Then realizes that these wisteria trees are a much grander miracle than the rock. Throughout the story there are a lot of miracles. From Taylor receiving a child she named turtle, as well as meeting a girl named Lou Ann. In Taylor's point of view of a miracle she says,“‘Will you look at that,’ I said.

One major theme authors universally write their stories around concern the power of human relationships. Though writers may take different paths to communicate this, the strength that comes from these unique connections that exist between individuals resonates with everyone. Authors clearly articulate through a myriad of rhetorical devices that maintaining relationships is a fundamental part in personal growth and allows for a stronger sense of self. In finding companionship and comradery. people become capable of evolving and arriving at better understandings of who they are.

Mrs. Reed likewise separates Jane from the Reeds’ social circle by confining her to the nursery while her cousins spend their days in the drawing room (22) and calling Mr. Lloyd, the apothecary for “ailing servants,” instead of the family physician for Jane’s illness (15), thus placing her among the servants. However, the servants too reject Jane from their group—Miss Abbot told Jane that she is “less than a servant” because she does “nothing for [her] keep” (9). Jane thus