Melinda Dying Tree

Melinda, the main character of speak was raped at a summer party. She calls the cops and that is where it all started. When Melinda reaches high school she is faced with all her old friends. They all hate her and want nothing to do with her, because of her calling the cops. Throughout the whole book Melinda runs into tough situations that eventually lead to her standing up for herself. Eventually, everyone finds out the truth, of why Melinda calls the cops. Although Melinda learns to stand up for herself, throughout the book she shows signs of depression such as poor performance in school, sadness and hopelessness, and withdrawal of friends and activities.

The mood of the speaker changes to guilt as the speaker and her mother realize they would "crawl" with "shame" and leave an "emptiness" in their father's heart and yard. The author negatively connotes "crawl," "shame," and "emptiness" to invoke a more serious and shameful tone. The beginning of the conveyed a more matter-of-fact and pragmatic tone, but changes into a more sentimental one by the end to convey family is more important than the money. The symbol of the tree represents the family, and connects it to their father's hard work and dedication to the family. If they were to cut it down, it would be symbolic of their betrayal. Imagery of the tree is used to describe the freedom and beauty of the tree as it "swings through another year of sun and leaping winds, of leaves and bounding fruit." The tree represents their family bond and how strong it is even through the "whip-crack of the mortgage."

Ironically, the person Melinda finds as the outlet to help her express her feelings is her art teacher, Mr. Freeman. In a class assignment, Melinda is assigned to create an art project based on a tree. She begins to express her inner angst through this art project. At one point, she uses dried bones to sculpt a picture of a skeleton. Then she glues broken knives and forks to the project so that the bones look like the plastic utensils are stabbing them. It is a grim depiction of how Melinda feels, and is immediately praised by Mr. Freeman.

This quote show that Melinda is an outcast, “ I have no friends. I have nothing to say. I say nothing" (Anderson 116). This quote shows that Melinda is insecure because, while Melinda is in the guidance counselor's office, her counselor is telling her that she’s been failing her classes and Melinda feels insecure. She feels out of place in the environment. Melinda is self-conscious that she feels she has to try to be pretty in order to gain her popularity back. Since Melinda has lost some friends coming into high school, she’s been feeling down on herself and depressed. Also, Melinda shows that she is insecure by saying, “ I am an outcast “( 8 Anderson). This proves that Melinda is insecure because before the start of High School Melinda was a very popular girl which is now an outcast. Until things went wrong for Melinda and she called the cops. Melinda had called the cops because she had been raped when she was drunk, so her first response was to call the cops. The cops had shown up, making everyone leave the party because of underage drinking and everyone knows Melinda has called the cops. Since that has happened she feels insecure by being an outcast. Because of this Melinda no longer is popular nor has no friends. Melinda feels she is insecure because she’s an outcast and has no friends which these feelings lead

When Melinda draws for her art class she has to draw trees and the trees represent her life and how she feels. When Melinda was drawing the trees she said “ But when I try and carve it, it looks like a dead tree, toothpicks, a childs drawing, I can’t bring it to life. I would love to give it up, quit, but i can't think of anything else to do so i keep chipping away at it.” (pg.78) As she draws the trees she realizes that they can represent her and her life. The trees are dead looking with branches, thats how Melinda feels she feels like nobody cares and nobody is there for her. Melinda does not know who she wants to be and throughout the novel she will figure it out. High School helps Melinda know who she wants to

In Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak, trees symbolize Melinda’s growth throughout her life to stay sane and pass the horrific time of her life. Depression is her first phase, when she starts to paint the trees that were hit by lightning. It is also shown by her not talking to many people. She starts to realize that she cannot be perfect when she imagines a beautiful oak tree but really cannot carve it properly. Her third phase comes when the trees outside her house has a few sick branches and she decides to let go of the present Melinda who is not letting her grow and nurture the old Melinda, the one before the party, the fun and outgoing one. The last phase, and tree was the one she drew for

Have you ever drawn a picture to express something, or just drawn it for fun? Well Melinda uses her drawings to express her feelings and get away from the world. I think the in the story “SPEAK,” by Laurie Halse Anderson, She uses Melinda's artwork and the tree to express the fact that Melinda got raped and afterwards, when she looked up... and saw... a tree.

Melinda started off in the story afraid, lonely, and out of place. “I have entered high school with the wrong hair, the wrong clothes, the wrong attitude. And I don’t have anyone to

Trees and plants represent life in the novel which ties into the overarching theme of the dehumanization that comes from slavery. Many of the characters in Beloved have been subjected to awful events causing them to feel as if they were worse than animals. Because of this, many characters look to the beauty of nature and trees in particular, to help them heal from their time in slavery. For example, Baby Suggs decided to preach in a place called The Clearing, which is surrounded by tall trees. "In the Clearing, Sethe found Baby's old preaching rock and remembered the smell of leaves simmering in the sun, thunderous feet and the shouts that ripped pods off the limbs of chestnuts. With Baby Suggs' heart in charge, the people let go." (Morrison 94) Another example of trees bringing healing to the characters in the novel is the arrival of Beloved. “A fully dressed woman walked out of the water. She barely gained the dry bank of the stream before she sat down and leaned against a mulberry tree.”(Morrison 60) This tree represents a chance at a new life for Beloved and also offers Sethe a chance to heal. Ever since killing her child, Sethe has been haunted over her decision and she is finally able to confront her past with the appearance of

On extremely great thing for Melinda is what art gives. While she is drawing, painting, or sculpting she’s taking all of her feelings and pent up anger and making it one big pile of art. This is equivalent to therapy. It is like taking your thoughts and using them for good. All of her focus is on her task of drawing the tree, and that allows her to just relax and forget for awhile. In my opinion, art was the perfect therapy for Melinda. She was dealing with so much and art helped her find her way. Art was her cure, per

The tree symbolizes personal growth and confidence. If you aspire to achieve personal growth you must speak your mind. Throughout the book, Melinda has troubles dealing with a situation that has been constantly bothering her. This incident happened during the summer before her freshman year in highschool at a party.

In the story, Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson, Anderson uses images and descriptions in the chapter PRUNING, to portray Melinda’s life. First, as Melinda watches the tree in her yard cut down, she says that, “He’ll only leave a stump (Anderson 30).” Melinda represents the tree as herself. If part of the tree is cut down, it cannot grow back. Melinda is afraid that she may never recover from what happened to her at the party. She may be a stump with nothing left. Next, Melinda’s dad assures her that, “By cutting off the damage, you make it possible for the tree to grow again (5).” Cutting off the “dead” branches symbolizes that Melinda wants to have people with and around her to help her to “cut off” her bad memories and experiences. She does

In this drawing, it depicts a dying tree with a few leaves still intact while a majority is lost and the main character Melinda is sharing her body as part of the tree. Here, Melinda struggled to find her voice after the incident with Andy Evans had close off her feelings and is afraid that if she does speak up, no one would care or damage the idea of a happy family together free of troubles when recalling her childhood. Or she would get hurt by trying to blame it on Andy, who’s a popular upperclassman admired by many girls. Her emotionless state caused her to unsuccessfully put her feelings into her artwork which was a tree, which always turned out to appear dead rather than alive. Here, it represents her inner state that is she unable to

The tree in Speak symbolizes Melinda’s emotional state when at first she finds no meaning in drawing the tree then she finds the courage to speak up about her rape experience. As Melinda is starting her artistic path, Mr. Freeman says his opinion on her artwork and she develops an understanding that her art work could compare to her life.

The events of the movie are the power of nature as well as how to appreciate all that it does for you. The area in the eastern Tennessee Mountains that Little Tree learns to love and calls home is fundamental to his view of the world. Suddenly Little tree wants to stay with his grandparent, but Little tree aunt