What Is Lily's Determination In The Secret Life Of Bees

T.Ray was always mean to Lily and the only person Lily could run and cry to was Rosaleen her nanny, All Lily wanted was for her father to love her and act like a father to her. Lily didn’t ask for all of his abuse and punishments. The reason T.Ray was always mean and punishing her because she accidently killed her own mother and T.Ray was madly in love with Deborah and married her before Deborah found out she was having a baby. He became really bitter because he lost his wife.

Lily, not being able to comprehend the possibility that her father is telling the Truth, then decides to run away. This practically tells us that, out of T-Ray’s words and the possibility of them being true (at the time), Lily acted off of her father’s words and just decided to run away, making T-Ray the main reason for her to run away. The next piece of evidence is the quote, “Children raised in nurturing environments might be more secure, confident, and capable of dealing with later challenges, while those raised in less enriched settings might feel anxious and unable to cope with life's difficulties” (Cherry 2). What the quote dumbs down to is telling the difference between children raised in caring environments & others raised in more unfortunate conditions. As already known, T-Ray isn’t exactly the most caring father figure, quite the opposite of the appropriate, non–abusive father Lily wished she had, so she is more anxious and unable to deal with life’s

T. Ray repeatedly tells Lily that it is her fault Deborah is dead. When Lily hears T.Rays version of the story lily gets mad at her mother for abandoning her. She understands if her mom left T. Ray, but she never believed that she leave her. Although Deborah Owens was dead prior to the novel, she played an important role in Lily's life. As the story came to an end, Lily hears from August what truly happened. By the end of the novel Lily forgives her mother and lives the rest of her life happily.

T.Ray is shown for once caring about somebody other than his dog and this is also a realization to the main character. Kidd chooses very specific words in this passage such as awe and quivered to describe his body language very specifically creating a vivid image of what he looks like after this thought and shows that he has changed from his malevolent temper to a melancholy state where he reflects on everything he knows. Kidd explicitly states this through Lily by saying, “He looked away, toward the window, like he was contemplating the road that led her here,” (Kidd 295) On it's surface this is referring to Lily and how she got to where he is, however, this also is referring to Deborah, T.Ray’s deceased wife, and how she got there when she ran away from them. T.Ray still feels a powerful burning pain in his heart from this abandonment.

In The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, a young girl named Lily struggles with growing up with only a harsh father and a housemaid while trying to find her own place in the world. At the age of four, Lily accidentally shoots her mother while trying to help her in a fight against Lily’s dad. Ever since that day, Lily has a difficult time trying to be a lady and trying to cope with her somewhat abusive father. One day, when Lily is fourteen, the housemaid Rosaleen is sent to jail for pouring dip spit on white men’s shoes but later gets assaulted by the men and is taken to the hospital where Lily goes to sneak her out. In order to help incorporate the story’s title into the story, the author has written epigraphs, that are about bees, for every chapter in the book. Chapter two’s epigraph says “ On leaving the old nest, the swarm normally flies only a few metres and settles. Scout bees look for a suitable place to start the new colony. Eventually, one location wins favor and the whole swarm takes to the air”(34). This epigraph parallels the story because of the similarities in how bees move on and look for somewhere to start their new lives and how Lily and Rosaleen try to start their new

Lily grew up subjected to strange punishments from her father. Since she was raised by T.Ray without her mother around she never got to experience normal childhood things or motherly love, except from Rosaleen. This caused her to feel as though her life was normal because she didn’t know of any other way of life, yet she still feared T.Ray and his punishments

The Secret Life Of Bee’s is authored by Sue Monk Kidd and has interesting themes throughout the book. The star of the show is Lily, she is the main character and takes us on her journey through her life to where she is now, in high school. With a full time angry dad fathering her, she and her maid/friend abandon ship. The two peas in a pod run off to Tiburon, South Carolina. Lily goes to prove that there is a great deal of resilience in the human spirit.

Ray permanently because of his harsh ways. For example, T. Ray always reminds Lily that it was her fault and she was the one who killed her mother. Deborah’s death causes Lily to feel guilty and embark on a journey to find out more about her mother’s life. Lily continues to link together her mother’s background with stories from different characters.

Lily starts off stuck living in an unloving, abusive household and decides to free herself from the negative atmosphere that she had been living in her whole life. Lily is perpetually abused by her father. He forces her to kneel on Martha White's, gets exasperated every time she speaks, and yells at her for no reason. Lily is not the only one noticing the terrible treatment, Rosaleen does too. Once after Lily had to kneel on the Martha White's Rosaleen said to her, “Look at you, child. Look what he’s done to you” (Kidd 25). Noticing the unloving treatment Lily gets, Rosaleen knew that their household was demoralizing place for Lily to be in, which is why she didn’t question when Lily when she later runs away. Lily one day realizes she needs to do something about her horrible life at home. While sitting in her room she hears a voice in her

He was abusive, but not nearly as bad. The thought of his wife wanting to leave him, and her actually getting killed enrages him. He takes out all of his anger on Lily and is heartless to her. He just can't be nice to her. CHAPTERS 4-7 Lily's lying helps her because she is able to get away with things she other of wise couldn't have.

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.

T. Ray had not stopped at tearing her down physically, for he had the strong desire to hack away at what is left of her mental state. By painting such a scarring image of Deborah next to the one Lily made with optimism and fondness, T. Ray’s mirage overshadowed Lily’s impression. This causes her to leave him and start a new chapter in her life. T. Ray’s bestial actions were crucial reasons that influenced Lily’s decision to leave her father and begin her pathway through the perplexing road of her mother’s life.

Luckily for Lily, she comes upon the Boatwright sisters once she reaches Tiburon. Because of the fact Lily does not have anyone to share her love with, she is compelled to stay and live with the Boatwrights. At one point in the novel, Lily and August are having a conversation when August asks Lily “What else do you love Lily?”(Kidd 39). Lily then thinks to herself, “No one had ever asked me that before. What did I love? Right off the bat I wanted to say that I loved the picture of my mother…but I had to swallow that back”(39). Lily does not feel comfortable enough yet that she says, “ I love writing poems, just give me something to write, and I’ll love it” despite the fact that Lily really loves August (39). She loves August so much that she would rather stay in Tiburon with the Boatwrights than be with her own father T. Ray. The loss of Deborah results in Lily going to obtain love somewhere other than her own home. This is also why Lily takes Rosaleen with her. Rosaleen is a black nanny who used to work on T. Ray’s farm. She has been there for Lily in the past but she cannot always be there one hundred percent because of her race. Due to Deborah’s death, Lily does not have a mother figure, however, he journey to Tiburon with Rosaleen proves to be a success as she finds the Boatwrights and strengthens her relationship with her nanny, Rosaleen.

All Lily knew for certain was her mother was gone, so all she was left with was her abusive father T. Ray.  Lily explains “T.Ray because “Daddy” never fit him” (2).  After years of making her kneel on grits, being slapped around and screamed at, one day Lily got into an argument with her father about her mother not caring about her when Lily heard a voice “Lilly Melissa Owens, your jar is open” (41). That afternoon Lily decides she has had enough with T. Ray and it was time for her to leave. The author shows that Lily had it up to here with her father and knew that she deserved better than she was being treated and was ready to persevere through more obstacles in the future. Another character that shows great perseverance throughout the novel is August Boatwright.  August is a middle-aged African American woman who lives in Tiburon, South Carolina with her sisters May and June.  August chose at a young age not to get married because that would mean she would be giving up her independence.  Lily explains, after knowing August for some time, “all I could think was August is so intelligent, so cultured” (78). Here the writer

Ray was stuck raising Lily. It pained him to see her every day. She looked exactly like Deborah, and was also responsible for the death of her. Later on in the book, T. Ray found Lily after she ran away, seeing her and where she was living reminded him of Deborah’s abandonment. He cracked and started beating Lily calling her Deborah, because they looked so similar, saying how she should have never left him. “He stood over me. ‘Deborah,’ I heard him mumble. ‘You’re not leaving me again.’ His eyes looked frantic, scared” (Kidd,294). T. Ray was already broken when Deborah left him, but then he was forced to be reminded by her every day when he looked at Lily and when the same situation happened again, he pictured Lily as his wife and he took his anger and sadness that he felt towards Deborah out on Lily. He eventually realized what he has done and believes that Lily is better off without him. He lets her stay with the Boatwrights as one last