Abstract
This paper discusses the symbolism of the Black Madonna as it is used in Sue Monk Kidd's novel "The Secret Life of Bees." The paper examines the history behind the Black Madonna and then discusses the plot of the book, showing how Kidd uses the Black Madonna as an important symbol of women leadership within the "The Secret Life of Bees."

From the Paper
"The Secret Life of Bees uses the Black Madonna as an important symbol of women leadership. As August tells Lily, "Our Lady is not some magical being out there somewhere, like a fairy godmother. She's not in the statue in the parlor. She's something inside you" (Kidd, 288). This statement is the most important words of wisdom Lily receives throughout the entire novel. The statue in the parlor of the Boatwright home is just that: a statue. Lily learns that it isn't the statue that she needs to give her strength, but the idea it represents. It tells the story of a woman who broke chains, who escaped fate and inspired generations to come. These are the exact things that Lily does to find her new family and break away from T. Ray. "I leaned into them, felt them close around me. One thing is beautiful beyond my words to say it; August holding you" (Kidd, 238). Lily spends the whole novel on a search for her mother's story, as well as her own. She wanted to know the reasons why her mother left, and realized how unprepared she was for the truth when August told her. Lily is too wrapped up in the idea of her biological mother, she forgets about what a mother really is. The Virgin Mary, the Black Madonna's other form, is history's example of a mother. She is sensitive and firm, relatable and Divine. The Black Madonna is who teaches Lily that she has mothers all around her. Rosaleen's protection, May's caring, and August's love, Lily finds a mother in everyone around her, including herself. As stated at the end of the novel, "She is a muscle of love, this Mary" (Kidd, 302)."

Tags:symbolism, plot, character, strength

Abstract
This paper shows how Sue Monk Kidd's "The Secret Life of Bees" uses themes such as racism, egality and the relationship between nature and spirituality to portray a journey that enables Lily, the main character, to establish self-identity and grow into womanhood. The paper focuses on how the natural world, and in particular the life of bees, play a significant role in Lily's journey into womanhood.

From the Paper
"Central to "The Life of Bees" (2002) is Lily's motherless state and the way in which this has left her with "unmistakeable signs of queenlessness" (p.1). The loss of her mother, which is one of the most profound traumas a child can face, is compounded not only by her father's unloving and insensitive nature, but also by the knowledge that she was somehow responsible for her mother's death. As such, Lily exists in a barren wilderness in which she creates elaborate fantasies about her mother, which are primarily based on receiving her mother's forgiveness, but which also portray her need for a mother's tender love. When dreaming of seeing her mother in heaven, for example, Lily longs for her mother touch: " ... and she would kiss my skin til it grew chapped, and tell me I was not to blame. She would me tell me this for the first ten thousand years" (Kidd, 2002, p. 3)."

Tags:mother, identity, nature, spirituality, self-forgiveness

Abstract
This paper reviews Sue Monk Kidd's 2002 novel, "The Secret Life of Bees". The paper summarizes the novel, set in the racially conflicting era of the 1960's, about the 14 year old protagonist Lily's journey to discover herself beyond the world she has known her whole life. The author praises the simplistic manner that Kidd uses to bring about the vividness of the characters in the novel and also discusses the bees' use as another character in the story to add a special note to the spirituality of the book.

From the Paper
" The journey the fourteen year old Lily undertakes in the novel is a journey that mirrors the transformations society in her time underwent. The contemporary reader is fascinated with the simplicity of this story while immersing in a world of phantasm and realism at the same time. Lily's imagination discovers new worlds and helps her have a better grasp of reality. The narrator's voice, Lily herself, tells the story of her life. She lives with her father and Rosaleen, her black caretaker, on her father's peach farm. Her mother died when she was four and the reader is allowed to guess that Lily accidentally killed her while her parents were engaged in a fight over her mother's immediate intention to leave."

Tags:racism, kinship

Abstract
This paper relates that, throughout "The Secret Life of Bees", the life of the protagonist Lilly makes many transformations as she learns more about her past and thinks about the future to come. The United States is also transforming as a result of the painful happenings of the 1960s, such as President Kennedy's assassination and the important and historic events leading to the passage of the Civil Rights Acts. The author points out that Lilly realizes, for the first time in her life, "just how much importance the world had ascribed to skin pigment, how lately it seemed that skin pigment was the sun and everything else in the universe was the orbiting planets." The paper reveals that, at the end of the book, when Rosaleen comes home after finally succeeding as a certified voter, she proudly talks about how she will cast her vote for President Johnson and Hubert Humphrey; she has achieved one of her greatest goals in life.

From the Paper
"Taking place in the South during the summer of 1964, Secret Life begins with Lily and her African-American housekeeper/nanny Rosaleen heading to a voter's rally. After a run-in with some of the town's bigots, Rosaleen gets thrown in jail. The taunting by these three men, "Did you hear that? We got ourselves a model citizen," typified many Southerners who did all they could to keep the blacks from voting. Lilly springs Rosaleen, and the two set out in search of Lilly's past. The only clue to follow is a label Lilly found in a box with her mother's meager belongings."

Tags:voter, skin, color, housekeeper, emotions

Abstract
In this article, the writer looks at the book, 'Queen Bees and Wannabes' and notes that author Rosalind Wisemer argues that for parents to be successful in helping their daughters through the difficult adolescent years, they must understand the meaning of "girl world". The writer explains that this is the secret world of girls and their friendships. The writer points out that this is an entirely separate environment from the adult world, that is filled with different rules, expectations and values. The writer maintains that "girl world" is a place that is ruled by relationships, the pecking order and group membership, and is also a world where girl friendships can cause tremendous psychological damage.

From the Paper
"The need to be accepted, to be included within society, to be recognized as having at least some of the required assets that determine social status and the failure by the majority of people to do so, ensures that most teenage girls suffer terribly throughout adolescence. A period during which children begin to move away from parental guidance, and start looking towards other members of society as vehicles of allegiance, it is a time that produces the most conflict within families throughout the United States as girls begin, either rightly or wrongly, to assert their independence."

Tags:adolescence, girl, world, independence

Abstract
This paper discusses Sue Monk Kidd's book, "The Secret Life of Bees". The paper introduces the characters of the story and describes how Rosaleen and the 'Calendar sisters' have an impact on Lily by acting as mother figures to her. The paper contends that one of the most powerful aspects of the book is that it does not provide perfect or traditional images of motherhood or female religious faith. The paper illustrates how the book also offers an image of feminine solidarity and strength in a religious fashion as well as in a political fashion.

From the Paper
"The central protagonist of Sue Monk Kidd's The Secret Life of Bees is a motherless young girl in the American South named Lily. Instead of her natural mother, an African-American woman named Rosaleen brings up Lily in a difficult household. This fact might seem to plant Sue Monk Kidd's saga squarely in the tradition of Gone with the Wind, and other tales of proud, defiant Southern women raised by complacent and maternal black 'mammies.' But Lily is not 'to the manner born,' like Scarlet O'Hara. Her home is a home of pain rather than comfort and Rosaleen is defiant rather than submissive to the racism of the world around her."

Tags:lily, rosaleen, calendar, sisters

Abstract
This paper provides an analysis of Sue Monk Kidd's book, "The Secret Life of Bees." Set in the early 1960's, at a time when civil rights were just becoming popular and significant in American culture, the paper shows how important the ideas in the novel are for this time period. The paper includes direct quotes from the book.

From the Paper
"Because of where she lives, Lily could easily have slipped into a more regional speech pattern. But there is nothing here to indicated Lily lives in the Deep South. Perhaps her use of the word lack, instead of a phrase to indicate the condition of motherlessness, is a hint. It is certainly not the way most girls would say it. So it may be regional. Or it may be the author's way of pointing out that Lily was bright and thoughtful and could spare herself the pain of talking about or thinking about her dead mother by referring only to a lack, not a death."

Tags:literature, english, black, south, african, american

Abstract
This paper analyzes the symbolism contained in Mikhail Zoshchenko's short story, "Bees and People". Zoshchenko skillfully created a political satire that was able to slip through the cracks of Stalin's scrupulous censorship. The writer argues that each character represents a historical figure and presents a theory and proof, piecing together the historical puzzle.

From the Paper
"Joseph Stalin was a man of steel, in the sense of barriers, that is. During his prime in the 1940s, Stalin was a master of secrecy. He kept missions as significant as the "Manhattan Project" under wraps. His main medium of secrecy was censorship. After carefully selecting his censors, they were made well acquainted with a book called An Enumeration of Information Prohibited for Publication in the News Media. This clearly defined what was permitted and what was to be banished. Mikhail Zoshchenko was one such writer who passed Stalin's examination. His short story, "Bees and People," outlines just how Stalin's "community" works."

Tags:communism, literature, Russia, Stalin, censorship

Abstract
This paper reviews Sue Monk Kidd's popular novel, "The Secret Life of Bees". The paper describes the book as a coming-of-age narrative that involves a girl in search of her mother and ultimately her identity. The paper explores the main themes of this story: home and the need to belong. The paper contends that Kidd also brings up critical elements that define the book, such as racism and prejudice towards other people, in particular, African-Americans and people of color.

From the Paper
"Lily Owens, the main character, is a teenage girl who lives with her abusive father. She is not very outgoing and does not have many friends. This is because she has no female support except for her African American housekeeper, Rosaleen. Another reason is that she accidentally killed her mother. Lily calls her father T. Ray because, in her words, "T. Ray just ain't the type of person you'd call daddy". T. Ray Owens is the hateful, peach-farming antagonist. When T. Ray is feeling particularly mean towards Lily, he pulls the Martha White grits down from the pantry and pours an anthill-sized pile on the kitchen floor for Lily to kneel in. There is no evident love in his heart for Lily whatsoever, and living with him only deepens the ever-present pain of her motherless existence."

Tags:lily, owens, ray, rosaleen

Abstract
This paper explains that Sue Monk Kidd's book, "The Secret Life of Bees", is a testament to the healing power of love in a young girl's life. The author points out that the book reinforces the understanding of the important role a mother plays in her child's growth. The paper relates that one of the most significant events in the book occurs when Lily's mother dies because the loss of Lily's mother is crucial to the plot and theme of the rest of the book; it is the loss of her mother that leaves Lily motherless and alone.

From the Paper
""The Secret Life of Bees" tells the story of Lily Owens, a young woman reeling from the death of her mother at the age of four. Lily lives with her ornery and dismissive father, and blames herself for her mother's death. She is largely alone in the world, with only the company of a black woman, Rosaleen, who her father has hired to keep up the house, and who ends up being Lily's "stand-in mother". Rosaleen, who has gone into town to register to vote against T. Ray's wishes, insults three of the town's biggest racists by spilling spit onto their shoes. Rosaleen is mistreated by police, and Rosaleen is sent to jail. Lily decides they must escape, and the two women make their way to Tiburon, South Carolina, guided only by the fact that this name is on one of her mother's pictures."

Tags:hair, death, relationship, love, motherless