I've been thinking a lot about the book "The Giving Tree" a lot lately. The kid in the book is such an greedy shit. That fucking tree gives him everything and the kid only stops by to kick it when he needs something. He even let the kid, as an old ass man sit on him. Who the fuck wants some crusty ass dude sitting on him? Especially after he take you for everything you got. That kid is going to fucking die, and leave the fucking tree a stump.
wow I think you've missed the point then. The tree wanted nothing more than to give the kid everything it had, and everytime he'd return it gave the tree a sense of purpose. Without the boy, the tree wasn't anything more than just another tree in the woods. and without the tree, the boy wouldn't have had what he needed. Some relationships in life are mutually beneficial on the same levels, but some are a little more complicated than a 1 for 1 exchange. Everybody on earth gives and takes, some people feel love by giving and don't need reciprocation, others feel love by being helped when they need it even when they dont have much to offer the other person.
Your "selfish" interpretation is the one I've heard most from other people, but thats probably because it's the most surface level observation of what was going on in the book.
Anyways, it's interesting at how such large and sometimes indefinable things get tackled by children's books. But then again, if you look at it as the stories you'll have known longer than any others through out your life, it makes sense to have them take on larger and loftier concepts. And sometimes the "simplified" delivery system of a book easy enough to read as a child means that interpretations can vary wildly or get lost in the boiling down.
My folks read it to me as a kid a lot, and I read it on my own even more later on. Eventually I came to realize why it resonated with me so much, I started to recognize that everyone is both the boy & the tree, some more one than the other, but being equalized in the great balance of humanity.
Now I have the cover tattoo'd on my left arm and the last page when the boy is old and sitting on the stump on my right. It reminds me of my folks, and of everything I've taken, and everything I have to give.
Topic: Things You Pondered Today (Read 718930 times)