The Struggle For Independence In Taylor's The Bean Trees

The Bean Trees takes place in rural Pittman County in Kentucky. Taylor Greer, the narrator, and main character, talks about her childhood and her years as a teenager. Later on in life she starts to travel the country and a stranger drops off a kid in her car and she decides to take her in and take care of her.

One way that The bean trees challenges the idea that the poor are lazy is how determined Taylor was. Taylor was determined to escape poverty and make something out of her life, “But I stayed in school, I was not the smartest or even particularly outstanding but I was there and staying out of trouble and intended to finish,” (Kingsolver 3). Many girls in high school were dropping out of school and falling into poverty stricken families, but Taylor knowing what

In Barbara Kingsolver’s novel The Bean Trees, Taylor represents a bildungsroman character. A bildungsroman story is a coming of age story that consists of four stages. In the first stage of a bildungsroman character’s journey, she experiences a loss or painful experience that drives her to start a new life. The character goes through a baptismal rite in the second stage, which always involves water. 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

In the novel The Bean Trees, Kingsolver’s belief that people survive through another 's generosity and empathy recur throughout the novel. This belief holds truth as many of the characters within Kingsolver’s novel find survival within the empathy and generosity they receive from others. The relationship between Taylor and Turtle reflect this theme through their mother-daughter relationship. Kingsolver’s belief also holds truth with Estevan and Esperanza’s situation and the help they receive. Kingsolver even weaves her belief within the relationships between minor characters such as Virgie and Edna as well as Sandi and Kid Central Station.

In the novel The Bean Trees by Barbara Kingsolver, Taylor faces many obstacles. Throughout the obstacles that Taylor faces she grows and changes into a new person unlike the one that she was before. Taylor is a girl who does not want to be stuck in her home state of Kentucky any longer. She leaves her mother in Kentucky to try and find a way to create herself a new life. Becoming a mother so quickly and helping Esperanza and Estevan are obstacles that Taylor faces during trying to start her new life. Since she faces some obstacles she grows to become more loving and more selfless.

Many people in the world would just follow what they were taught even if it’s wrong. Would you? In the novel Coffee Will Make You Black by April Sinclair, the main character, Stevie develops into a young lady who knows how to think for herself. Stevie lets her peers and family influence her physically and mentally, but over the course of the novel, Stevie learns how to resist this oppression by standing up for what she wants and her beliefs. In the end, she lets go of the negative ties to her life.

Have you ever wondered what all immigrants have in common? In the Bean Trees by Barbra Kingsolver it tells about some immigrants from Guatemala. The immigrant experience is classified by not giving up, escaping a past worse life, and making sacrifices.

Indirect Characterization: This quote shows the character’s perseverance and uniqueness while also foreshadowing. It shows the relationship between Taylor and her mother and the difference of Taylor and her environment/ society

Parents are the biggest influence upon their children. From the time a child is born to the time they leave the household, the values that the parents hold are instilled into their children. Parents are required to make crucial decisions about how to raise their children in order to guide them through the inevitable obstacles and hardships of life. In The Glass Castle, many would argue the lack of care and responsibility the Walls had for their children. The author, Jeannette Walls, uses Rex and Mary Walls to demonstrate that their strong traits of non-conformity, self-sufficiency and perseverance are passed on to their children, allowing them to develop to their full potential. Children are dependent on their parents to

In the memoir, The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls, Jeannette manages to overcome her obstacles by realizing her independence. She is impacted by her parents’ incapabilities because she realizes that she has to do things differently than other children. Her father was a stubborn alcoholic who believed that: “[they] were all getting too soft, too dependent on creature comforts, and that [they] were losing touch with the natural order of the world”(Walls 106). He believes that every human should be independent and fend for themselves. By using the term “creature comforts”, her father is trying to separate himself from what he calls the civilians. When he says “ the natural order of the world”, he means that the world should not be subjected

John Steinbeck was born at the beginning of the twentieth century and experienced the turning point of many eras that are evidenced throughout his writings. Steinbeck lived through the strong economic years during World War I, the dirt poor years of the Great Depression, and even saw the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s; all of his dreams for these decades are evidenced in his works, more specifically, Of Mice and Men. Of Mice and Men is set in the 1920’s in the Salinas Valley of California. Other writers, such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, char-acterize the 1920’s as a fun decade with a booming economy filled with men rising from rags to riches, but Steinbeck shows how life was for men

The story “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been” was written by Joyce Carol Oates, published in 1966. In this short story, we are introduced to a 15 year old girl Connie. She is described to be very conceited, and she is always obsessing over her physical appearance. Her family life is perceived as very dysfunctional. Her mother is always comparing her to her older sister June, and Connie’s father is pretty much absent from her life. Because the lack of family support and guidance, Connie lies to her parents of her whereabouts, and she sneaks away to local hangouts. While being out, she unfortunately catches the eye of Arnold Friend. This man will erase Connie’s innosense and expose her to how cruel the world can actually be. Many literary

In The Bean Tree’s, Taylor’s character grows and changes quite frequently throughout the book. When Taylor goes off on her own she becomes even more worldly and cultured. Not that she was ever naive, but experiencing and hearing things like Estevan and his wife's story then Turtle’s prowler encounter opens her up to the real corruption in the world which gives her character a strong desire to make the world better and help those who are mistreated. She also becomes more independent and strong willed from these experiences which is apparent from her name changing decisions. For, it is a very private decision and yours alone to

People often say that your childhood is the most important part of your life, and it is the part of one’s life that affects them the most. In Ellen Foster, by Kaye Gibbons, Ellen is forced to become independent as a result of a challenging childhood, that also affects her view of others and herself. Her father 's actions had a large impact on Ellen’s quickly developing independence, while the loss of her mother and grandmother exposed her to people who influenced the way she viewed others and herself.

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