realiz wrote:All my kids loved this book and I think that they get more out of it than the superficial level you speak of here even if they cannot define what it makes them feel. It is what makes good children's literature good, the different levels that can be introduced and begun to be understood by kids even before they have the ability to completely grasp these concepts.

What I meant was that The Secret Garden is not really a dramatic work, in the same sense as your earlier comment here that the book is rather dull without surprises. It depends whether you read mainly to learn or for entertainment. It is more beautiful and educational than gripping. I think it is great for kids to read as a parable that will help them think about harmony with nature. I thought Colin was going to be a ghost, and there is the background tension of Mary behaving in a transgressive way by entering the garden and developing a counter-culture mentality, with the question whether she will be ripped back into conformity. But these dramatic devices are so loaded, obviously designed just as vehicles to convey a spiritual message about natural magic.

Oh, I never thought of that . . . she could have written Colin as a ghost, I suppose.

But the ghost was already there and Burnett did a marvelous job - brought her into the story without making too heavy an issue of her.

It depends whether you read mainly to learn or for entertainment. It is more beautiful and educational than gripping.

I would call the Secret Garden an entertaining 'feel good' book. It is not really all the deep, it doesn't make you think too much, you know where it is going and pretty much how it is going to get there. Everybody ends up becoming better people, everybodies happy, and we close the book with a smile.

I think this book demonstrates very well, how we influence one another.

Little grumpy Mary - was influenced by Martha and Dickon - who had grown up in a large family, surrounded by love and affection.

Mary hadn't experienced love and affection but she was 'infected' by the natures of Martha and Dickon. The family may be sentimentalised, but none-the-less - love is infectious. This does happen.

Mary then went and infected Colin......love, I think, is just infectious.

Penelope wrote:Mary then went and infected Colin......love, I think, is just infectious.

Well, unfortunately anger, hatred, and depression are infectious too. Now, which spiritual force could be stronger? Milton seems to think they're almost balanced -- win some, lose some.

Do I dare, do I dare to turn again upon the stair........

Who am I do disagree with Milton.....

But I don't see hatred and depression as equal to the power of love....

It is like lighting a small candle in a dark cave. The cave may be a huge area of darkness.....but that little candle will create light, none-the-less.

If we don't see love and affection demonstrated, we don't know how to do it or even feel it.

Hatred and depression seem to be natural to us.....we don't need to learn it.

The nature/nurture debate....innit?

Thanks Tom.
Love Pen

I have alot of friends who come from families who have never heard or understood the word "broke". Mom and Dad bought them whatever they wanted such as that shiny new toy that hit the market, their first car, their first house, their college education, etc. I come from a family with five children with one income under $20k. We knew what the word "broke" meant. It wasn't less than $3k in the bank, it was under $20 or sometimes overdrawn. But we always had something they didn't...love. My friends were always shocked that no matter what happened my family stayed together. My parents emotional adopted alot of my and my siblings friends because of the lack of love in their life. I currently have six to seven adopted brother and sisters in my extended family.

I think that Mary, who was given whatever her heart desired, saw that material things to not matter when it comes to family. She saw that with Martha and Dickon's family. She extended that love to the garden and later to Colin, who through sheer love and will to have his father see him through different lovely eyes. Love, I believe, is richer and more desirable than money.

Well, I think I have seen love at work in wealthy families as much as in poor families.

Although sometimes wealthy people think they can fill up the emotional gap with material 'things'.

There is an emotional gap- a feeling of emptiness - a feeling of lack......until we encounter the people who show us how to give in order to receive........and then there is a feeling of abundance......

How difficult.....this is to put into words.......but this authoress did it......beautifully.

Thomas Hood wrote:

Penelope wrote:Mary then went and infected Colin......love, I think, is just infectious.

Well, unfortunately anger, hatred, and depression are infectious too. Now, which spiritual force could be stronger? Milton seems to think they're almost balanced -- win some, lose some.

How nice to mix Paradise Lost with The Secret Garden. Tom, I disagree with you here on Milton. There is the tradition via Blake which sees Satan as like a secret hero, but this is superficial and wrong. Milton presents a seductive and fascinating portrayal of the power of evil, as part of a broader deep cosmology that says this wicked temptation is hollow and can never provide a sustainable basis for life. Hence at the moment of Satan's announcement of triumph to the demons in hell, Satan and his minions are turned into hissing snakes and left with ash in their mouths to illustrate that God has all the real power. The question gets back to the ancient debate between Christianity and the Manichean religion, which held that there are two equal cosmic principals at war with each other, good versus evil. However, as Augustine noted in his conversion from Manichaeism to Christianity, evil is not itself a sustainable original cosmic principle, but only exists as a corruption of something already existing that is naturally good. Evil can amass immense power, but is always pointed towards a path to destruction, whereas good is pointed towards a path to creation. So, it may appear that good and evil are almost balanced, or even that evil is triumphant, but the real final triumph can only be with a principle that is in harmony with the universe, ie good. The problem for humanity is that evil may well have the power to cause our extinction, in which case the triumph of good would occur in the silence of the graveyard. Christianity holds out the hope that the material world is good and can be redeemed and transformed into unity with the divine spirit of love. This sense of redemption through nature is perhaps the most beautiful lesson of The Secret Garden. It does though open a problem for Milton, in that the snake as a good natural creature is badly slandered by his use of it, pace Genesis, as a symbol for evil. Theosophy departed from Christianity on this score, seeing the church tradition as infected by fallen false consciousness and recognising that dominion over nature requires humble love of nature.