Reading a Tree Grows in the Brooklyn

1943 semi-autobiographical novel past Betty Smith

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

First edition cover
Author	Betty Smith
Land	United States
Linguistic communication	English
Publisher	Harper & Brothers
Publication date	1943
Media type	Print (Hardcover and Paperback)
Pages	493 p.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a 1943 semi-autobiographical novel written past Betty Smith. The story focuses on an impoverished but aspirational boyish daughter and her family unit living in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York Urban center, during the start two decades of the 20th century.

The volume was an immense success. It was as well released in an Armed Services Edition, the size of a mass-market paperback, to fit in a uniform pocket. One Marine wrote to Smith, "I can't explicate the emotional reaction that took place in this dead heart of mine... A surge of confidence has swept through me, and I experience that maybe a fellow has a fighting risk in this globe after all."^[i]

The main metaphor of the book is the hardy Tree of Heaven, whose persistent ability to grow and flourish even in the inner city mirrors the protagonist's desire to ameliorate herself.

Plot [edit]

The novel is split into five "books", each roofing a different period in the characters' lives.

Book One [edit]

Book One opens in 1912 and introduces 11-year-old Francie Nolan, who lives in the Williamsburg tenement neighborhood of Brooklyn with her 10-twelvemonth-one-time brother Cornelius ("Neeley" for short) and their parents, Johnny and Katie. Francie relies on her imagination and her love of reading to provide a temporary escape from the poverty that defines her daily beingness. The family unit subsists on Katie's wages from cleaning apartment buildings, pennies from the children'southward junk-selling and odd jobs, and Johnny's irregular earnings every bit a singing waiter. His alcoholism has fabricated it difficult for him to hold a steady job, and he sees himself as a thwarting to his family unit every bit a effect. Francie admires him considering he is handsome, talented, imaginative, and sentimental, as she is. Katie has very trivial fourth dimension for sentiment, since she is the breadwinner of the family unit who has forsaken fantasies and dreams for survival.

Book Ii [edit]

Book Ii jumps back to 1900, with the meeting of Johnny and Katie, the teenage children of immigrants from Ireland and Austria, respectively. Although Johnny panics and begins drinking heavily when Katie becomes pregnant with first Francie and then Neeley, Katie resolves to give her children a better life than she has known, remembering her mother's insistence that they receive a practiced education. Kate resents Francie because the baby is constantly ill, while Neeley is more robust. Katie makes a promise to herself that her daughter must never learn of her preference for Neeley. During the first seven years of their marriage, the Nolans are forced to move twice within Williamsburg, due to public disgraces caused commencement by Johnny's drunkenness and later by the children's Aunt Sissy's misguided efforts at babysitting them. The Nolans then arrive at the apartment introduced in Volume One.

Book Three [edit]

In Book 3, the Nolans settle into their new home, and seven-year-quondam Francie and six-year-old Neeley begin to nourish the squalid, overcrowded public school next door. Francie enjoys learning, even in these dismal surroundings, and gets herself transferred to a better school in a different neighborhood with Johnny'due south support. Johnny's attempts to amend the children's minds fail, but Katie helps Francie grow as a person and saves her life past shooting a kid-rapist/murderer who tries to assault Francie shortly before her 14th birthday. When Johnny learns that Katie is pregnant in one case once more, he falls into a depression that leads to his expiry from alcoholism-induced pneumonia on Christmas Day 1915. Katie cashes in the family's life insurance policies on Johnny and the children and uses that money, along with their earnings from later-school jobs, to bury Johnny and proceed the family afloat in 1916. The new babe, Annie Laurie, is born that May, and Francie graduates from grade schoolhouse in June. Graduation allows Francie to finally come to terms with the reality of her begetter's decease.

Book Four [edit]

At the start of Book Four, Francie and Neeley take jobs considering there is no coin to send them to loftier school. Francie works in an artificial flower manufactory, then gets a better-paying task in a press clipping office after lying about her historic period. Although she wants to use her salary to start high school in the fall, Katie decides to ship Neeley instead, reasoning that he will simply continue learning if he is forced into it, while Francie will find a way to do it on her ain. One time the Us enters Globe War I in 1917, the clipping role rapidly declines and closes, leaving Francie out of a chore. After she finds work as a teletype operator, she makes a new plan for her educational activity, choosing to skip high school and take summer higher-level courses. She passes with the help of Ben Blake, a friendly and adamant high school student, but she fails the college's entrance exams. A brief see with Lee Rhynor, a soldier preparing to ship out to France, leads to heartbreak after he pretends to be in love with Francie, when he is in fact about to become married. In 1918, Katie accepts a marriage proposal from Michael McShane, a retired police officer who has long admired her and has get a wealthy businessman and politician since leaving the strength.

Book Five [edit]

As Book Five begins in the fall of this same twelvemonth, Francie, at present almost 17, quits her teletype job. She is about to start classes at the University of Michigan, having passed the entrance exams with Ben's assist, and is considering the possibility of a hereafter relationship with him. The Nolans gear up for Katie's wedding and the move from their Brooklyn flat to McShane's home. Francie pays one last visit to some of her favorite childhood places and reflects on all the people who have come and gone in her life. She is struck by how much of Johnny's character lives on in Neely who has become a talented jazz/ragtime piano role player. Earlier she leaves the apartment, Francie notices the Tree of Heaven that has grown and re-sprouted in the building'due south yard despite all efforts to destroy it, seeing in it a metaphor for her family's power to overcome adversity and thrive. In the habits of a neighborhood girl, Florry, Francie sees a version of her young self, sitting on the burn escape with a book and watching the young ladies of the neighborhood set for their dates. Francie says, "Hello, Francie", to Florry, so, "Good day, Francie" equally she closes the window.

Characters [edit]

Mary Frances "Francie" Nolan is the protagonist. The novel begins when Francie is 11 years old. The residuum of the novel tells of Francie'south life until she goes to college at 17. Francie grows up in Brooklyn in the early twentieth century; her family unit is in constant poverty throughout most of the novel. Francie shares a great adoration for her father, Johnny Nolan, and wishes for an improved relationship with her female parent, hardworking Katie Nolan, recognizing similar traits in her mother and herself that she believes are a bulwark to truthful understanding. The story of Francie traces her individual desires, affections, and hostilities while growing up in an aggressive, individualistic, romantic, and indigenous family and neighborhood; more universally it represents the hopes of immigrants in the early twentieth century to rise in a higher place poverty through their children, whom they hope volition receive "instruction" and have their place amidst true Americans. Francie is symbolized by the "Tree of Heaven" that flourishes under the virtually unlikely urban circumstances.

Katie Rommely Nolan is Francie's mother and the youngest of her parents' four daughters. She is a first-generation immigrant with an evil father and an angelic mother who emigrated from Austria. She married Johnny Nolan when she was only 17 years old. Katie is a hardworking, practical woman whose youthful romanticism has been replaced past a frigid realism that oft prevents her from sympathizing with those who love her most. She runs her home in such a way that her children are able to relish their babyhood despite their extreme poverty. Because Johnny is an alcoholic and tin can rarely concur down a job, Katie becomes the family breadwinner by cleaning apartment buildings. Johnny, notwithstanding, is more attuned to Francie's hopes of graduating from high schoolhouse and becoming a writer. As Francie matures and develops an inclination toward academia, Katie realizes she is more than devoted to Neeley than to Francie. Katie becomes meaning merely earlier Johnny dies and survives on her own until she agrees to marry Sergeant Michael McShane, a pipage-smoking local policeman-turned-politician.

Sissy Rommely is Katie's oldest sister and one of Francie's three aunts. Because of her parents' immigration and lack of noesis in their new surround, Sissy never goes to school and is therefore illiterate. Sissy is kind, compassionate and beautiful, and many men fall in beloved with her. She is start married at 14, only after beingness unable to have any live children with her husband, Sissy leaves him. She marries ii more than times without ever getting a divorce. In between marriages, Sissy has a number of lovers. She calls each of her husbands and lovers by the proper noun "John" until her final married man, who insists that she properly divorce her second husband and demands to be called by his own proper noun, Steve. Sissy has ten stillborn children, but adopts an immigrant girl's baby daughter built-in out of wedlock and eventually gives birth to a salubrious son of her own.

Johnny Nolan is Francie's father. He is a offset-generation American; his parents immigrated from Ireland. He has a protective mother and had 3 brothers, all of whom died young. Johnny marries Katie Rommely at nineteen. He is charismatic, a loving husband and father, loved dearly past his family just specially by Francie. He is, however, an alcoholic. When he does concord a chore, Johnny works as a singing waiter. He has a beautiful voice, a talent that is greatly admired only that is largely wasted because of his reputation as an alcoholic. After Katie tells him that she is meaning with their third child, he stops drinking and immediately falls into a deep depression that ends with his death from alcoholism-induced pneumonia. He is a dreamer, in sharp contrast to Katie, whose view of the world is realistic.

Cornelius "Neeley" Nolan is Francie'southward petty brother. He is a year younger than Francie and is favored by his mother, Katie. Neeley is an outgoing child who is more widely accepted by the neighborhood children than Francie. He shows more emotion when his male parent dies than Francie, who reacts to the loss past becoming even more determined to become an education and rise above her mother's limited vision. Neeley refuses to follow the tradition of Nolan men and determines to never become an alcoholic. Like Francie, he feels that their childhood was pleasant despite their poverty.

Eva "Evy" Rommely Flittman is Katie's youngest sis and Francie's other aunt, playing a role more pocket-size than Sissy's. While considered throughout most of the novel to exist in less dire circumstances than Katie, Evy struggles with her lazy husband Willie, a milk-wagon driver. When Willie suffers an injury, Evy drives the route instead and proves surprisingly good at it, treating the horses much more kindly than Willie does. At the end of the novel, he leaves her to travel as a 1-man band and she carries on without a hubby. When McShane gives Katie $1,000 as a wedding present, she passes $200 on to Evy—the value of Willie'southward life insurance policy. Unlike Sissy, Evy has had only one wedlock and is not assumed to be promiscuous. She has three children, a girl (Blossom), and ii boys (Paul Jones and Willie, Jr.).

Eliza Rommely is Francie'southward tertiary aunt who is only mentioned in one case. She became a nun considering of her mother's love of the Cosmic church. Francie only met her one time. At start Francie toyed with the idea of being a nun, but when she saw her aunt's mustache-like facial hair, she thought that happened to all nuns, and inverse her mind.

Thomas and Mary Rommely are the parents of Sissy, Eliza, Evy, and Katie; they emigrate to America from Austria but earlier Sissy is born. While Thomas hates America, enjoys tormenting Mary, and forbids the speaking of English at home, Mary patiently endures her hardships and serves as a moral/applied guide for her daughters. Mary cannot read or write English language, but she encourages Katie to ensure that her children learn the language, and also to begin saving money so she can buy country someday. The Rommelys' second oldest girl, Eliza, is mentioned simply briefly; she becomes a nun and joins a convent.

Flossie Gaddis is ane of the Nolans' neighbors, a single woman who scares men abroad as she constantly looks for new relationships. She keeps her correct arm covered at all times to hide scars from a childhood accident with a tub of scalding water. She has a brother, Henny, who is dying of tuberculosis.

Lee Rhynor is Francie's first love, a soldier on leave who tries to manipulate Francie into sleeping with him after he wins over her heart. When Francie refuses, he goes back to his fiancee.

Ben Blake is a male child Francie befriends during her showtime summertime of college classes. Ben is driven and determined. While he is the object of Francie's affection at get-go, she feels differently after falling in beloved with Lee. Notwithstanding, at the finish of the novel, Francie goes to college with a hope ring from Ben and hope of a hereafter with him.

Themes [edit]

Although the volume addresses many unlike bug—poverty, alcoholism, lying, etc.—its principal theme is the demand for tenacity: the determination to ascension to a higher place hard circumstances.^{[ citation needed ]} Although at that place are naturalistic elements in the book, it is not fundamentally naturalistic. The Nolans are financially restricted by poverty all the same find means to enjoy life and satisfy their needs and wants. For example, Francie tin can become intoxicated but by looking at flowers. Similar the Tree of Heaven, Brooklyn'south inhabitants fight for the lord's day and air necessary to their survival.

Idealism and pragmatism are weighed and both found necessary to survival in Brooklyn. Johnny lies about his family's accost in society to enable Francie to nourish a amend school, presenting Francie with opportunities that might non have been available to her otherwise. Sissy helps Johnny recover from alcoholic withdrawals past appealing to his libido, helping Katie and Johnny to stay together despite Johnny's disease. Katie explains love and sexuality to Francie from 2 somewhat ambivalent points of view: as a mother and as a adult female. The book revises traditional notions of correct and wrong and suggests pointedly that extreme poverty changes the criteria on which such notions, and those who embrace them, should be judged.

Gender roles prescribed to the sexes are more fluid in A Tree Grows In Brooklyn than in previous novels about young people. Katie's hands grow rough as she performs physical labor while Johnny'due south easily remain smooth and he wears expensive clothing. Francie does not human activity in line with her community's cultural ideas of femininity until she tin can testify useful to her mother in childbirth.

Her awareness of the struggles or perspectives of other women likewise shifts during the novel. Francie discovers her desire for companionship, she begins to sympathize the injustices women are often forced to endure when pregnant out of wedlock.

Other problems the book addresses include:

• Humanity vs. its environment
• Instruction
• Coming of age/loss of innocence
• Family unit
• Exploitation
• Love
• Poverty
• The American Dream

Adaptations [edit]

• The book was adjusted into a 1945 film directed by Elia Kazan, starring James Dunn, Dorothy McGuire, Joan Blondell, and Peggy Ann Garner, who won a Special University Award for Outstanding Kid Actress of 1945. James Dunn won an Academy Honour for Best Supporting Player in the film.
• William Meade Prince adapted the novel into a 1944 comic strip, distributed past King Features.^[2]
• George Abbott collaborated with the volume'due south author to produce and direct the story every bit a 1951 Broadway musical, with music by Arthur Schwartz and choreography by Herbert Ross. The show starred Shirley Booth, Marcia van Dyke, and 12-yr-old Nomi Mitty (every bit Francie). It ran for 267 performances.
• A 1974 "made for tv" picture accommodation, based on the film's screenplay, stars Cliff Robertson^[3] and Pamelyn Ferdin.^[4]

Pop culture references [edit]

Cartoons and animated film shorts [edit]

• A Hare Grows in Manhattan (1947) is a Merrie Melodies cartoon. At the end, Bugs Bunny shows the book to a pack of menacing dogs, whereupon they turn away from him and run to Brooklyn, presumably to urinate on the tree.
• The Warner Bros. Looney Tunes animated short film Scent-imental Over You (1947), featuring Pepé Le Pew, shows multiple dogs looking through a bookstore window displaying A Tree Grows in Brooklyn.

Literature [edit]

• The book was ane of the about popular Military machine Edition books shipped to American military service personnel for free during World War II.^[v] Smith said that she received ten times more fan mail from soldiers than she did from civilians.^[vi] The book was originally printed as series D-117 (~l,000 copies).^{[7] [8] [9]} Demand for the novel was so loftier it was rapidly reprinted every bit Grand-28.^{[9] [x]}
• The protagonist in Jeannette Walls' 2005 memoir The Drinking glass Castle makes reference to growing up reading A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and finding inspiration in the grapheme of Francie Nolan.

Music [edit]

• Jay-Z makes references to the championship of the book in "Some How, Some Mode" (from The Pattern 2: The Gift & The Curse) and "Interlude" (from The Black Album).
• Rapper Talib Kweli refers to A Tree Grows in Brooklyn in Blackstar's track "Respiration".
• "A Flower Grows in Brooklyn" is the penultimate track on rapper Positive K's 1992 anthology, The Skills Dat Pay da Bills.
• The 1997 Lifetime album Jersey'due south Best Dancers includes a vocal entitled "Francie Nolan".
• British vocaliser-songwriter Olivia Chaney recorded a vocal entitled "A Tree grows in Brooklyn" on her 2018 anthology Shelter.

Radio [edit]

On October 7, 1947 Studio One on CBS aired A Tree Grows in Brooklyn starring Rosemary Rice every bit Francie.

Tv set [edit]

• In the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers, episode 9 ("Why We Fight"), Frank Perconte is seen reading the book while on guard duty in Germany, during Earth State of war II.
• Batman, season 2, episode 13, featuring the villain Egghead, is titled "An Egg Grows in Gotham".
• Daria, flavour iv, episode 3 is named "A Tree Grows In Lawndale".
• In flavor 1, episode 17 of I Beloved Lucy, Lucy schemes to get her married man, Ricky, into a play she wrote called "A Tree Grows in Havana", referring to Ricky's homeland of Cuba.
• A Super Grover segment in Sesame Street, episode #4224 takes place "where two trees abound in Brooklyn."
• Season 24 of The Simpsons has an episode called "A Tree Grows in Springfield".
• Ugly Betty, season 1, episode 22 is named "A Tree Grows in Guadalajara".
• In episode 17 of the documentary serial The World at State of war, a soldier can exist seen reading the book in archival footage of soldiers preparing for the D-Day invasion of Normandy.
• Will and Grace, Series 1, Episode 2. Will notices a tree exterior Grace's new apartment in Brooklyn. Grace - "Come across, copse really do grow here!"
• Gossip Girl, Season v, Episode 20. Blair refuses to volunteer at a community garden, telling Dan - "Just because a tree grows in Brooklyn, doesn't hateful I have to be the one planting information technology"
• Morning Prove, Season 1, Episode 7

See also [edit]

• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945 moving-picture show)
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (musical)

References [edit]

1. ^ The Wall Street Journal, Oct 6, 2018, pg. C14.
2. ^ "William Meade Prince".
3. ^ Roberts, Jerry (5 June 2009). Encyclopedia of Television Motion-picture show Directors. Scarecrow Press. p. 231. ISBN978-0-8108-6378-1.
4. ^ "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1974)". BFI . Retrieved 14 August 2020.
5. ^ N.P.R. Staff. "WWII Past The Books: The Pocket-Size Editions That Kept Soldiers Reading". NPR.org . Retrieved 2016-04-thirteen .
6. ^ Giaimo, Cara (22 September 2017). "How Books Designed for Soldiers' Pockets Inverse Publishing Forever". Atlas Obscura . Retrieved 28 September 2017.
7. ^ "Armed Services Editions - James M. Dourgarian, Bookman - Collectable & Rare Books". www.jimbooks.com . Retrieved 2016-04-13 .
8. ^ "Armed services Editions: A Few Foursquare Inches of Abode | HistoryNet". HistoryNet. 27 November 2011. Retrieved 2016-04-13 .
9. ^ ^{a b} Editions for the Armed services, Inc.: a history : together with the complete list of 1324 books published for American armed forces overseas. Half-championship: Alist of the 1324 books published for American armed forces overseas. New York: Editions for the Armed services, Inc. 1948. hdl:2027/uc1.b4162609.
10. ^ "20th-Century American Bestsellers". unsworth.unet.brandeis.edu. Archived from the original on 2016-04-22. Retrieved 2016-04-13 .

External links [edit]

• Spark Notes Guide to A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945) at IMDb
• A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1974) at IMDb

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Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Tree_Grows_in_Brooklyn_(novel)

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