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The Struggle For Independence In Taylor's The Bean Trees

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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.
In The Bean Trees, Taylor exhibits independence throughout the work by planning to leave her rural hometown due to the lack of opportunities for women there. She does this by getting a job at the county hospital and uses the money she earns to buy a car. From when Taylor is a teen she plans to escape pittman. She wants to be the one to get away. First, she finishes high school. Acquiring a job at the county hospital on her own terms, she saves a few hundred dollars. Using the money she earned, she buys a ‘55 Volkswagen young age, Taylor plans to get out of Pittman County, Kentucky. She wants to be the one to “get away”. Taylor Does not want to be stuck in …show more content…

This bolsters her image as an independent, resourceful and “do-it yourself type of woman. “In Pittman if a woman would have tried to have her own tire store she would have been run out of business”(p.59). This quote not only reinforces Mattie's independence as a single woman running a whole business, but also describes how women did not have opportunities in Pittman outside of traditional gender

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