Kidd's The Secret Life Of Bees

1379 Words6 Pages
The Secret Life of Bees displays the way memories of someone’s past affects the way they live in the future and how difficult maturing and being who you really are is. A girl, Lily Owens, accidentally kills her mother and is haunted by the memory. She lives with the constant wonder of what her life could have been if that dreadful incident did not happen. Her father is still around, however they have a minimal relationship and he tends to be abusive towards her. It is not known if the abuse stems from the murder of his wife or past issues or tendencies. Lily Owens lives in the time period of severe racism in the south and the beginnings of the Civil Rights Movement. Lily is not racist and eventually runs away from her abusive father with…show more content…
She is still living today at the age of 67. She has won the Quill Award for General Fiction She was born during a time of racism and segregation. Kidd herself was not racist, however her family followed the ideals of the segregated south. Kidd’s family had an African American housekeeper. Her housekeeper was most likely portrayed by the character Rosaleen in this novel. Kidd used scenes in the novel to depict her personal experiences. Kidd saw racism everyday and used these experiences to fuel her writing. Kidd could be described as privileged and well off. However she saw the African American who lived in poverty and used their experiences for ideas. She used her housekeeper for stories. Her housekeeper obviously had first-hand experiences in situations that Kidd knew nothing about. At first Kidd did not write novels like The Secret Life of Bees, which focused on social issues. She was at first a religious writer and her first published piece was of the religious category. Much later in life she recalled the stories of her housekeeper and wrote this novel. Her vivid memories of a segregated south came into play. Kidd used a small town as the setting for the story which is much like the town she lived in. She used typical or stereotypical characters to place in the setting of a racist, small, and southern town. She used people she knew or knew of to create the characters in The Secret Life of Bees. She also used…show more content…
She uses Lily to represent herself. Lily is coming to terms with her life, maturing and developing. Although Kidd did not kill her own mother, she felt the pain of abandonment from her mother and animosity towards her father much like Lily Owens. She uses a style of writing that gets right to the chase and can be descriptive without using many words. Kidd uses a lot of imagery so that you feel like you’re in 1960’s South Carolina too. Kidd really brings out Lily’s no nonsense way of thinking through what she says. Lily is a tell it how it is kind of person and that is represented throughout the novel through text like “I’ve just never heard of a Negro lawyer, that’s all. You’ve got to hear of these things before you can imagine them.” (Kidd 202). Because Lily is this way in the novel and Kidd uses Lily to represent herself, this suggests that she has personality much like Lily’s and this is reflected in this novel. Kidd was also not afraid to be controversial. She uses unconventional ideas in this novel. This whole novel could be controversial. A young girl running away with her African American housekeeper, would have been very controversial during the time period of the Civil Rights Movements.. This novel
Open Document