... the child must have a valuable thing which is called imagination. The child must have a secret world in which live things that never were. It is necessary that she believe. She must start out by believing in things not of this world. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination. . .
Mary Rommely is a woman who has lived a very hard life and has earned a lot of wisdom through her pain and experience. When life becomes unbearably difficult, an imagination gives someone an escape. In their imagination, children can find peace, hope, and beauty, which the children living is poverty often have a hard time finding.
Francie is entitled to one cup each meal like the rest. If it makes her feel better to throw it way rather than to drink it, all right. I think it's good that people like us can waste something once in a while and get the feeling of how it would be have lots of money and not have to worry about scrounging.
This quote comes early in the book, when Evy, Katie's sister, chastises her for giving Francie a cup of coffee, even though she throws it out and does not drink it. While they may be poor and cannot afford to waste anything, Katie Nolan know that small luxuries are important. Francie loves the smell and warmth of the coffee, and Katie is unwilling to take that away from her. Katie is meticulous in her accounting and spending. She has determined that the cost of the coffee Francie wastes is next to nothing. Therefore, the Nolan's can afford the negligible cost if it means having a small luxury for her child.
The one tree in Francie's yard was neither a pine nor a hemlock. It had pointed leaves which grew along green switches which radiated from the bough and made a tree which looked like a lot of opened green umbrellas. Some people called it the Tree of Heaven. No matter where its seed fell, it made a tree which struggled to reach the sky. It grew in boarded-up lots and out of neglected rubbish heaps and it was the only tree that grew out of cement. It grew lushly, but only in the tenement districts.
In the first chapter of the novel, before we meet anyone in the Nolan family, we learn about the tree, known as the Tree of Heaven. This, in fact, is the tree that relates to the title of the book, and it is an important symbol throughout the novel. First of all, since it only grows in the tenements, the tree is something that poor people have and rich people cannot. Furthermore, the tree is a metaphor generally for the lives of the people in the tenement and specifically for Francie, the protagonist of the story. No matter how hard life is in the tenements, both the tree and Francie find a way to not only survive, but to thrive. Finally, the tree represents the hope pf the poor, that they can succed even in neglect and poverty.
A person who pulls himself up from a low environment via the boot-strap route has two choices. Having risen above his environment, he can forget it; or, he can rise above it and never forget it and keep compassion in his heart for those has left behind him in the cruel up climb. The nurse had chosen the forgetting way.
This quote is important to how Francie sees the world, and is very important foreshadowing. From the wuote, we can assume that if Francie pulls herself by her bootstraps, like the nurse did, she will take the route of compassion. Furthermore, this also shows the loss of innocence as Francie grows up and loses her naivete and realizes the truth of her world.
The secret lies in the reading and writing.
Again, Mary Rommely is the voice of wisdom in the novel. Katie does not want her daughter to stay in poverty-- she wants better for her children. Therefore, she goes to her mother for advice. In this quote, Mary is demonstrating that the way to leave poverty is through education. She tells Katie that she must read the children a page of Shakespeare and a page of the Protestant Bible every day. By reading these works to the children, they will expand their imagination and their minds and learn how to improve themselves and raise their expectations. Katie takes this advice to heart, and it is crucial in Francie's development. Through this reading, Francie learns to love reading, appreciate the beauty found in poverty, and embrace books during her times of loneliness.
