The Journey of Lily in Sue Monk Kidd's The Secret Life of Bees

Lily shows her non-racist side in the very beginning of the book, after Rosaleen has been put in jail for spitting on a very racist white man’s shoe. She willingly sneaks into jail and attempts to free Rosaleen, but gets sent home with the racist and mean father, T. Ray. She once again tries to free Rosaleen, and this time sneaks into a hospital to free her. Lily is successful this time, and runs away with Rosaleen.

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

This part of the monomyth is represented by the archetype of the fairy godmother or the guardian angel. Mary is a perpetual messenger of god, a virtuous woman who represents the very ideals of power, struggle, despair, perseverance, and courage. Mary is considered a religious figure, a woman who sacrificed everything to god. Lily sees the picture of the Black Mary as a sign from heaven that she needs to go to Tiburon, where she will find what she is looking for. Lily puts her trust in god, as the virgin Mary aids her on her quest of self-fulfillment The Mary picture gives her the courage to go to Tiburon in search of her mothers past.

Throughout the book, The Secret Life of Bees, Lily Owens grows in her knowledge and understanding of the world around her. She got influenced by love, caring, and the way that others taught her about life. Because of this Lily had to go through an uphill climb throughout the book to know where she would discover more possibilities. Although she didn’t have good reasons for going the places she went, she eventually learned where her home would be. The three characters with the greatest influences in Lily Owens’ life are August Boatwright, Zachary Taylor, and Terrence Ray Owens.

Moreover, Lily running away from her T.Ray is a difficult decision that many people today make, so they can live a safer and happier life. As a result of, Lily running away, it leads her to other events that mature her into adulthood. Lily leaves home and becomes more vulnerable to maturing into adulthood like growing awareness of the world. When Lily went to get Rosaleen it shows the readers what was going on in the world, “‘ I can’t just leave,’ she said, untying her wrist.’ If you stay here, those men are gonna come back and kill you, I’m serious. They’re gonna kill you, like those colored people in Mississippi got killed. Even T.Ray said so’”(Kidd 46 and 47). When rescuing Rosaleen, Lily experiences face to face how people are treated differently based on their looks and the fear people have to go through for their lives. Recognizing racism causes oneself to mature because it shows the world is not filled with rainbows and smiles. All the experiences that Lily goes through leads her to mature by herself.Finding and having support in Lily’s life leads her to become a mature adult. Rosaleen was an important part in Lily’s life for her to grow up in the excerpt,”I was the only one who knew that despite her sharp ways, her heart

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.

This concept leads Lily to believe that the Virgin Mary is in many ways her mother, even though she is a mother to thousands of other people as well (Emanuel 41). Lily receives support and love from August and the community like the bees, though it is a secret to the rest of the world. The bees act as pathfinders for Lily as she learns more about herself, along with Zach

From the moment you read the first page of the novel, Secret Life of Bees, Kidd allows the reader to immediately get a glimpse of Lily’s life. Soon enough we become aware of the biggest hole in Lily’s heart, her experience of the death of her mother. It is little by little that the reader comes across details from Lily’s childhood and the atmosphere in which she now lives in. When she escapes from her house and her journey begins, so many new characteristics of her come to life. As I read the novel, the impressions I developed of Lily were that she were that she is hurt, yet brave, mature, and passionate.

In the novel, The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd, Lily is the character whom has changed the most. First of all, Lily is the fundamental character, protagonist, and narrator of her story. At the point when Lily first shows up in the novel, she is a beaten down, misused, and abused by her brutal father. He runs a peach farm where Lily has carried on with her entire life. However, inside of Lily are qualities she finds when she leaves home and goes on the run with her nanny, Rosaleen. Through her interactions with other individuals all through the novel, Lily gains strength in her independence, understanding of prejudice, and loving connections in her life. There are numerous areas in the novel that demonstrate that Lily is changing. One of

Someone once told Lily Owens that the bees she are seeing represent the death of someone, and in the case that loved on was in fact Lily’s mother. Throughout the book Lily has also learned many other things about bees, most she has learned from the women who first taught her about the Black Madonna. The Black Madonna, another motif. The Black Madonna comes up so many times throughout the novel just like the bees do. The Black Madonna represents both spiritual religion, strength and hope, and a little bit of racism equality. Both are very important, so pay close attention. The bees first play out in the very beginning of the novel. Lily is laying in her bed when she hears humming noises in her walls, and one by one, she notices bees, pouring out from within the walls. she stands up and its like all the bees are swarming around her, quite beautiful if you think about it, in my opinion, anyway. She runs to her father’s room, to show him, by the time they are back, poof, they are gone. The Black Madonna first appears a little after Lily and Rosaleen, her maid, runaway. Lily recognizes a photo of the Black Mary on a honey jar and that was there one big step to the Boatwright’s house, the women who held onto the religion’s statue, we know as The Black Madonna. When Lily and Rosaleen first step foot inside the Boatwright’s home, that is when they notice The Black Madonna. Lily examines The Black Madonna, notices the color, and the heart above and along her chest, Lily steps closer, longing to touch her

“Most people don’t have any idea about all the complicated life going on inside a hive. Bees have a secret life we don’t know anything about.” (Kidd 148). In the book August told Lily about how bees live and how the queen bee lays eggs that become worker bees later on. This make Lily think about herself and her life as a girl. She realizes that the queen bee is like a mother to all the thousands of worker bees in the hive. this realization makes Lily understand that even though she never lived with her mother, doesn’t mean that she could not have a motherly figure to love her and take care of her like her mother would have. Also later in the story, Lily understand the statue of Mary also symbolizes a mother to thousands. Understanding this

Although many characters found in the novel appear to have a “secret life”, the ones that primarily come as a shock towards Lily are her parents, T. Ray and Deborah. Straightaway Lily portrays T. Ray as a monster that seems only to exist to harm Lily both

As people in a modern time period, we know about Dinosaurs. We know the different species, shapes and sizes of Dinosaurs and we also know that they are known to be extinct. However if one were to appear in front of us we would be in shock because even though we know so much information on them, by seeing them we received new information, (the fact that they are not extinct) which causes our shock. Once Mary accepts that there is new information she did not know she can began to investigate life with color, causing her to learn to how to adjust and apply the previous knowledge she knew before.

The Boatwrights opened Lily’s eyes to helping one another , having fun , and worship the statue Black Mary. This is when Lily sees the Black Mary and idolizes it as “beautiful”, realizing that it knows the truth about her lying to the Boatwrights . “The lips on the statue had a beautiful , bossy half smile , the sight of which caused me to move both my hands up to my throat. Everything about that smile said, Lily Owens , I know you down to the core” (Kidd, 71).

So Lily got Rosaleen out of jail and