Character Growth in The Secret Life of Bees Essay

In the book, The Secret Life Of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, main character Lily Owens is a very scared, emotional young girl. In the beginning of the book, Lily is just a frightened young girl who is just trying to find out more about her mother. Throughout the book she changes by her relationships with Zach, August, and her father TRay. At the end of the book, Lily begins to in fact see her true self, as living with the Boatwright sisters and working with the bees.

In the beginning, Lily learns how to have a friendship through her relationship with Zach. He teaches her that she can have friends and she learns to eventually love him after time passes by. He first helps her bee keep. She likes the way that she can be with Zach and talk to him and not have a care in the world. When he gives her the notebook, she is ecstatic because she feels it is a heartfelt gift from him, and it means the world to her. She immediately feels to need to write stories about Zach and her beekeeping. In the middle of the book, he tells her that she can be anything that she wants to be if she just sets her mind to it and works hard for it. She tells him that she wants to one day grow up to be a writer. He loves the fact she aspires to do something that other people dont think that she is capable of doing. He then lets her know that he one day wants to be a lawyer, the first black lawyer around. Zach helps Lily to relax and be herself around him.

Lily also learns how to love and be loved through her relationship with August. She shows her through the ways of beekeeping, by telling her to love the bees with all the love that she has got inside of her. August begins to fulfill the role of the mother figure Lily has always wanted in her life, by being there when Lily needs it most. Whenever Lily needs to talk, August always seems to have the right thing to say to make Lily feel relieved of her problems and worries. For example, when Lily finally gets up enough courage to talk to August and question her about her mother, August opens up to Lily and tries to be as honest and as open as she can. Lily appreciates how August let her into the Boatwright home, and how August and the other sister made Lily feel like she was right at home, even though she stuck out like a sore thumb since she was white. However, Lily also says that by living with August and the others sisters, they have made her forget about the color difference, and have made her feel right at home by including her in their home and work schedules/life.

Lastly, Her relationship with her father, T-Ray, really shows Lily that her life would be totally different if her mother were still alive. T-Ray views Lily as a worthless young child, and treats her as if she is not really worth anything to him. An example of this would be when Lily asked him for the simple silver charm bracelet for her birthday. T-Ray brushed the idea of her getting the bracelet off by playing it as if he did not remember it was her birthday and not talking to her and ignoring her as if she was not presently there in front of him. Lily knew that even though he had not given her an answer, she felt he had already given his answer. It caused a kind of sorrow in Lily which made her feel like her and T-Ray had such a distance between them, that it was like Lily was not even in the room. Lily also had a lot of regret built up inside of her caused by T-Ray. He constantly blames her mothers death on Lily, sending her on a guilt trip. T-Ray often looks at Lily like she is her mother, which ultimately sends him on rampages about how she left him. T-Ray is a ruthless man that uses his tyrannical ways to try and hide his pain of losing his wife, Rebecca and in turn takes his frustration out on poor Lily. At the end of the book when T-Ray finally finds Lily at the Boatwright sisters house, Lily really shows him that she is her own person, and that she is not to blame for her mother running away, and that it is not fair to be blamed for her mothers death, for she was only a young child when she killed her. T-Ray helps Lily to realize she needs to come across someone that can offer her the kind of love and affection that she yearns for.

Lily is overall juts a young emotional girl who is in great need of a mother figure, and for someone to come along that loves her greatly. Throughout the book, her relationships with Zach and August help her to gain this love, and realize she does not need a non-loving, ignorant man like T-Ray in her life. At the end of the book, Lily has become the person she has always aspired to be, loved and happy in a home where she will always be welcomed.