A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, set in the early 1900s, has enthralled readers for over seven decades. Its appeal lies in a deft combination of the quintessential American themes of traveling the landscape and the immigrant experience. Author Betty Smith threw curve in her novel, however. Instead of taking off for parts west in pursuit of self knowledge, Francie Nolan takes readers on a journey through an interior landscape experienced as the grandchild of immigrants. The novel has enthralled readers for over seven decades.
Betty Smith wrote A Tree Grows in Brooklyn as a memoir, but her editors believed that it was too gritty to publish as a real account of Smith’s life. They probably reasoned that mid-century readers already had enough drama in their lives; after all, they had been through two world wars, a depression, and a post-war economic slow down. And many people Smith wrote about were still alive. I can only imagine the reaction of her eighth-grade teacher to being painted in her real colors for all the world to see.
American life has changed since Smith’s book came out. Judging by the current fascination with evil and its attendant horrors, early twenty-first century readers feast on drama. Understanding the trends, James Frey’s editors reversed Smith’s and published Frey’s fiction, A Million Little Pieces, as a memoir. The dishonest ploy worked; for a while, anyway. The book shot to the top of the seller lists, and Frey was touted as both an author and a survivor until the truth came out. Unsurprisingly, A Million Little Pieces quickly fell along the wayside. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, however, is as fresh now as the day it was published in the 1940s.
When I took my father back to a hospital in New York City for his post-op check, I gave his nurses a copies of A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. All of them were immigrants, and although Dad’s nurses didn’t come from Germany or Ireland, like Smith’s family, they brought with them the same strength of character. As I watched them take wonderful care of my father, I was so very glad they had come to add their American experience to ours.
