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The Secret Garden
Nora Shunia
Dr. McGee
ENGL 1190
28 October 2021
The Secret Garden
The Secret Garden, by Frances Hodgson Burnett, is set in the cold Misselthwaite manor during the Victorian era in England. Mary Lennox, a spoiled and greedy 11-year-old, is the protagonist. At the beginning of the novel compared to the end, Mary Lennox is portrayed as a completely different character. The author takes on a journey about how environmental factors can play an important role in our life. Throughout this essay, I will use quotes and examples at what factors contributed to the change of Mary Lennox.
Mary is described as the “most disagreeable-looking child ever seen.” She was always sick one way or another, so her face was always yellow, as well as her hair. She was a child who never received any time or love from her parents. Her father worked for the English Government and never had any time for her. Her mother, who held great beauty, only cared about partying, and amusing herself with gay people. She never wanted a child to begin with. She left Mary under the care of native servants. To impress the Mem Sahib, the servants catered to all of Mary’s needs, as he refused to be disturbed by any crying. Since Mary received everything, she pleased, by the age of 6 she was portrayed as an unkind and selfish little girl. At this point in the novel, the model of childhood Mary portrays is a sinful child. A sinful child is child who is sinful and in need of correction. She is guilty of many sins. Mary is selfish, spoiled, rude, demanding and physically abusive. She dislikes everyone and everyone dislikes her.
Early in the novel, Mary’s parents and most of the servants die from a disease. Those who did not die left the house quickly and left no one to care for Mary. Mary was forgotten about and found alone in a nursery by two officers. She is sent to live with a clergyman and his family, who immediately dislike her. The children tease her and inform her of her uncle in England who she will be sent to, Mr. Archibald Craven. Mary never cared about anything or anyone, although on the carriage train ride to Yorkshire, she was amused by the stories Mrs. Medlock was telling her about Mr. Archibald and his manor. She tried hard not to display any emotions, but some were coming out involuntarily. It was also different because no one cared to talk to Mary. They were there to serve her, nothing less nothing more. While she’s at the manor she meets one of the housemaids, Martha, who was much different than her Ayah. Martha was not obligated to do everything for Mary, which left her shocked. Although Mary thought she was going to learn a thing or two doing stuff on her own for the first time. As well, Mary was never interested in anyone before, but she grew an interest in Dickon, as he had a thing for animals, and she always thought she would like animals too. As time goes by at the manor, Mary’s demeanor begins to lighten as she explores the gardens. She has a second encounter with the robin and attempts to speak to him. After Martha tells her the story of how Mrs. Craven passes, she grows a pity for her uncle, something she has never felt before. Mary grows more and more curious as the days pass at the manor. She finds a portrait of a young girl that looks like her and wishes she was there to keep her company, another thing she has never wished for in India. As she ventures and explores the gardens freely, Mary realizes that she is fond of several people for the first time in her life. Once Mary believes she found the key to the garden, she begins to feel compelled. She has always received her way with everything she desired in India, but at the manor she was not to always get her way. As she would have her Ayah dress her and always commanded people to do things for her. “I never did in my life. My Ayah dressed me, of course.” Soon after Mary finds the robin again and he shows her the way to the secret garden door. Grass was still growing in this garden; Mary begins to feel like she has her own world although she doesn’t know if anything or anyone is alive in the garden and yet and feels not lonely while in the garden. Mary begins to occupy herself all day with weeding in the garden. Mary doesn’t know much about gardening, so she asks Martha later that night for gardening tools. Martha suggests to Mary to write Dickon a letter and that he would certainly agree to buy tools for her on one of his trips. At this point in the novel, the garden and Mary are almost symbolized as there reawakening. Mary clears space in the garden, “Now they look as if they could breathe,” implying that she has been given room to breathe since her move from India.
Leslie Chang, the author of the book Factory Girls
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“Factory”
According to Leslie Chang, the author of the book Factory Girls, the so called “Floating population” are the workers from the villages who have no skills in any work and have come to the city where they are discriminated upon by their employers. The reason for such mass movement by many young people from the rural areas to the urban town is the search for jobs because the villages around Dongguan do not offer any meaningful employment for the young men. Another reason for the migration is poverty, thus many tend to move in to Dongguan in order to get some money and improve both their lives and the lives of their close relatives. Some characters in the book move to Dongguan, the urban center, to try their luck after hearing about the success stories of people in towns.
According to the book, Don Guan’s mainly depicts that the city is polluted, chaotic, and above all corrupt. It is a place where people arriving from the village can double or even triple their income by simply learning English and taking some computer lessons. The city is also a major black spot for fake documents such as Identification cards and driving license.
The factory girls described in the book endure a myriad challenges. The girls are compelled to stretch themselves by doing anything within their power in a bid to survive in the city, even if it means lying. On a lighter note, these girls, just like many other migrants who move to towns, enjoy some time out partying in clubs thus in some aspect it can be said that their life is fun. They also live in fear because many people are not sure of the jobs they do and they risk being fired from their current positions, yet jobs are not easy to find.
The life of the factory girls is not any different from the lives of any migration workers anywhere in the world. The only difference between the older generation migrants and the new generation is that the former group moves to towns mostly after being invited by another person to fill a job vacancy, whereas latter group moves to towns without even knowing where to stay or start. This is the reason why many young people suffer in the process of trying to adopt in the big cities.
The Yue Yuen factory makes shoes for the Adidas and Nike shoe companies. It has over 70,000 workers, but does not provide favorable working conditions for the employees: they work for long hours, discrimination is rife, and the management team ignores the workers’ interests. Being a factory that produces shoes for some of the leading shoemakers in the world, whatever goes in the factory is outright exploitation. This desperate situation is evident owing to the overwhelming pressure from politicians for the factory to produce more with the least expenses in order to generate money for them.
China has an education system established and run by the government but some differences abound in the way the commercial schools conduct their teaching. The schools incorporate other extra subjects such as computer studies in order to prepare their students for the future. Their approach is also different as they put more emphasis on religious education as a way of molding the students.
The Second Amendment
The Second Amendment
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The Second Amendment
The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution states that a properly controlled militia is essential to ensure a free state’s safety (Halbrook, 2019). In other words, the amendment protects US citizens’ rights to keep and bear arms, and those rights should not be infringed. The amendment was ratified in December 1991 (Halbrook, 2019). My opinion on the Second Amendment is the government should control citizens against firearms possession. Gun control means legal jurisdiction in an attempt to restrain the use or possession of munitions. The vast majority of the developed nations have strict gun laws and are not controversial. In the United States, gun control is a fraught political matter. It has somewhat resulted in conflict between those who view it as a prerequisite for their safety against those regarding it less significant and dangerous infringement of personal liberty.
Between the years 1999 to 2016, the United States registered 572,000 deaths directly linked to gun deaths. The numbers represent 336,000 cases of suicides, 213,000 homicides, and 11,000 unintentional deaths. The leading cause of homicide and suicide deaths was guns, representing 67% and 51% of all homicides and suicides, respectively (Steelesmith et al. 2019). Those for strict gun laws believe that enacting laws restricting civilians against possession of firearms will significantly mitigate such deaths (Wozniak, 2017). It is estimated that restricting civilians from ammunition purchases would substantially reduce gun violence deaths by approximately 80%, not to mention that the gun identification necessity could reduce it by about 82%.
Those against gun laws ratification and some have studied, have stated that banning of assault weapons had no impact on the rate of murder at the state level. The US had seen Gun ownership increased since the 20th century, and still, those numbers are skyrocketing, and so do the murder rates is decreasing. Offenders will be more fearful of targeting armed individuals, thus reducing the rates of crimes. I think having strict gun control is right since some civilians always think of assaulting others on the advantage that they have guns. Gun laws will always be a controversial issue in the US due to the vast cultures and how some communities view others as threats.
References
Halbrook, S. P. (2019). The Founders’ Second Amendment: origins of the right to bear arms. Rowman & Littlefield.
Steelesmith, D. L., Fontanella, C. A., Campo, J. V., Bridge, J. A., Warren, K. L., & Root, E. D. (2019). Contextual factors associated with county-level suicide rates in the United States, 1999 to 2016. JAMA network open, 2(9), e1910936-e1910936.
Wozniak, K. H. (2017). Public opinion about gun control post–Sandy Hook. Criminal justice policy review, 28(3), 255-278.