The Giving Tree has faced a lot of rightful criticism over the years, but the book is still a very important piece of literature.
For those unaware of the classic children’s book originally published in 1964, Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree is about a Tree that loves a Boy so much she gives up everything for him. When I say everything, I mean everything: her apples, her leaves, her branches and her trunk. By the end, she is nothing but a stump and allows the Boy (who is now an old man) to rest on her.
Throughout the book, the Tree is always happy when the Boy is near, and she enthusiastically gives pieces of herself away because she knows it will make the Boy happy — yet the Boy doesn’t seem to show any sort of gratitude.
You can see where the negative reviews come in: the two characters share a pretty toxic relationship. The Boy is ungrateful and takes without giving back; meanwhile, the Tree is perfectly happy destroying herself for the Boy. What’s more, there is no happy ending. Sure, it ends with, “And the Tree was happy,” but the image of a lonely stump certainly does not seem happy. The Tree isn’t even a tree anymore!
The Boy and the Tree have a very complicated relationship. Whether you interpret it as a romantic or platonic relationship, a mother-son dynamic or an environmental analogy, it shows children the flaws of certain relationships; just because a person is happy in a relationship doesn’t mean it’s healthy.
I’d like to briefly explore the different interpretations. First, the romantic or platonic relationship. In this interpretation, the two people in the relationship are equal, or at least, they should be. The book shows a toxic relationship where one person gives everything for their partner in the hopes of receiving more love but ultimately ends up alone and empty. The mother-son dynamic, on the other hand, is often viewed more positively, although I believe this has begun to shift in the recent years.
The Tree’s pronouns are she/her on purpose, giving her a motherly feel. The Tree as a mother figure devotes her entire life to the Boy, always being around when he comes asking for more things, always giving everything she can and desperately craving the love of her child. For some mothers, this makes perfect sense, but for the independent woman who values her individuality, this may not be the case.
There’s a growing shift in the narrative when it comes to motherhood. Motherhood used to be a woman’s purpose, her duty, her greatest joy in life and something she’d be proud to identify with first and foremost. To a lot of women, this is the case; their children are their whole world. Feminist theories, however, argue that a woman is first and foremost an individual. Women should take care of themselves and their children. She shouldn’t destroy herself for her child (unless it’s a life-or-death situation, I suppose). She should care for, love, support and help her child when it makes sense, but she has her own life, her own thoughts and desires, and shouldn’t strip herself (to the stump) for anyone else.
There’s also the environmental analogy, though it isn’t a very popular one. One could interpret the Tree as being a loving “Mother Earth” figure who allows humanity to take and take without giving back. Most likely though, you’ve interpreted the story as being about one of the first two.
People’s problem with the book is that, as a children’s story, they feel it should have some moral or important lesson. Instead, the book’s ironic mixing of emotions and lack of happy ending opens up important discussions for kids.
But this is by no means a bad thing, and it shouldn’t be a point of criticism. The melancholy of The Giving Tree gets kids thinking, asking questions and wondering why the book has such a sad feel to it. It teaches empathy and the difference between compassion and selflessness. It’s a cautionary tale: giving is good, but don’t give your whole self, especially to someone that eagerly takes and never (or rarely) gives back.
Like real life, the book is not completely positive or negative. The Tree is happy, but the Tree gave everything she had away. The Tree is full of love, and that’s positive, but the fact of the matter is she gave her whole being for a Boy that didn’t love her back nearly as much. Relationships in life can rarely be simplified to “good” or “bad”; there are complications, doubts, fears, resentments and lopsided loves.
Children will learn this more in depth as they get older, but The Giving Tree is an important preview that gets them thinking at a young age that the world is not all black and white, and relationships certainly aren’t.
As a children’s book, perhaps it is a bit too adult in its themes, but as a work of art, no one can doubt the cultural impact The Giving Tree has had, hate it or love it.
However, there’s no doubt some kids also had problems with the book due to the incredibly unflattering and frankly frightening photo of Shel Silverstein on the back, to which I have no defence for.