The Bean Trees Major epiphanies are found in “The Bean Trees.” The characters, Taylor and Lou Ann, both have a major epiphany. Taylor’s epiphany is that a community is necessary for her. After Taylor and Turtle rent a room at the Hotel Republic and Taylor's money is gone, Taylor knows that she has to get a job to support herself and Turtle; however, she is wondering how she will be able to afford childcare for Turtle. After Taylor moves in with Lou Ann, she finds a community. Taylor learns over time that she can depend on Lou Ann and her neighbors to help care for Turtle.
Taylor tries desperately to escape the lifestyle of a barefoot and pregnant Kentucky wife, while still being trapped by the human condition. Even so, her travels bring to light the different natures of the world and the true faces of the american people. Throughout the novel The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver; Taylor Greer discovers the darker, inhumane and prejudice parts of the world, while still experiences the inevitable force of the human condition.
In The Bean Trees, Taylor is one of the people who is hurt emotionally knowing that she let Turtle down by “letting” someone hurting Turtle. According to The Bean Trees, “She won’t talk…. Not now...Maybe not ever,” (Kingsolver, 224). Based on the tone of the way Taylor is talking about Turtle’s situation from this evidence is with disappointment, sadness, and lost hope. From Lou Ann’s point of view, child abuse is another problem that you can’t blame anyone for.
The Bean Trees was published to an enthusiastic reception in 1988 and received an American Library Association award in that year (Demarr). In the novel, The main character, Taylor Greer leaves her hometown of rural Kentucky in search of a better life. Along her Journey she faces many difficulties and made long lasting relationships. Taylor never lost hope and remained optimistic. In The Bean Trees, Barbara Kingsolver establishes the theme of hope for the future through the use of similes, motifs, and symbolism.
The child’s grip was so tight that Taylor named her Turtle because it reminded her of the mud turtles back in kentucky. Then in Arizona taylor responded to a newspaper ad of a woman with a baby who needed a roommate. Instantly Lou Ann and Taylor clicked so Taylor moved in with Turtle and got a job at a tire store near by. Another reason why they aren’t a traditional family would be because of the way they worked together. When Taylor would not be home, Lou Ann would watch Turtle and Dwayne Ray and Turtle and make them dinner.
Taylor is making closer and closer connections with the people around her as she tries to make Turtle open up to her once again after she was molested. Taylor was trying so hard to make everything perfect for her, but in reality “[a]ll you can promise is that you’ll take care of [her] the best you can...and just hope for the best” (226). All this time Taylor has tried to show Turtle that she can protect her from the world. Throughout the traumatic experiences they both went through, this eventually brought Taylor and Turtle closer than ever before. It got to the point where she would do anything for her, even when it came to the government's attention that “[she] had no legal claim to Turtle” (233).
The character endures many difficult trials in the third stage, but ends up gaining a new insight about life in the fourth stage. Taylor’s journey in the Bean Trees has all four of these stages, making her a bildungsroman character. Although Taylor’s desire for independence begins her journey, she eventually realizes people need a network
It shows the relationship between Taylor and her mother and the difference of Taylor and her environment/ society “"She's not really mine," I said. "She's just somebody I got stuck with."... "Yeah, I know exactly what you
Using her own experiences unmistakably makes The Bean Trees truly hers as she drew from her experiences as a mother to accurately show Taylors transition from adolescent to motherhood. Only people who have experience motherhood can truly comprehend what it encompasses. Sometimes it takes a while to comprehend when big changes occur that they have happened. Turtle was big change in Taylor’s
Some people mature faster than others, and some take their time doing so. In the book The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver, a young woman named Taylor happens to end up with a little girl, Turtle. Throughout the story, Kingsolver mentions birds often. Birds represent maturity to Turtle. She use birds to compare to Turtle's life and her situations while she is maturing and growing up.