A Tree Grows In Brooklyn Chapter Summary

A tree grows in brooklyn

Chapter 1-9

A special kind of tree grows in a neighbourhood called williamsburg , which is in brooklyn new york. This special is called many names but the most common name the tree goes by is the tree of heaven. This tree sprouts wherever its seeds land. The tree only seems to grow in poor districts.francie nolan, a resident in williamsburg, has one those special trees in the yard it's saturday and francie and her brother neeley got to the junkyard where francie sells any kind of metals to carney the junkie . with the money neely goes to candy store only for boys and buys candy and francie goes to another store and buys peppermint.france later on goes and buys bread and sees a disfigured man who scares her.then francie follows neeley and him & his friends harras a jewish boy.francie loves reading books she wants

to read all the books in the world. Johnny nolan is francie's father and hes irish and has a drinking problem and he's a waiter and a proud of the union. Francie likes her father better than her mother. Flossie gaddis is works at a factory turning gloves, in order to support her mother and brother who is dying of consumption . flossie designs costumes .aunt sissy comes to visit francie and nolan. Then francies and her mom plan what their weeks meal is gonna be with the loaf of bread francie bought.francie and her brother them go buy the meat . and after supper francie and maudie go confess.then night comes and francie sleeps in the front of the room and she hears her drunk father come up the stairs and then all of the family gets up and eat together at 2am and francie falls asleep listening to her parents remember the time they met. There's a flashback all the way to 12 years ago when katie and johnny first met . at first they went on a double date with each other and their dates but were smitten with each other and marry new years day in 1901 and they've only known each other for 4 months. Katies dad because she married someone who wasn't from austria like them. Sissy , katie's sister didnt go to school because she didn't realize education was free in america and she married twice and had many dead babies.eliza katie's other sis became a nun, and evy the last sister married and had 3 children and wanted to be talented musicians.johnny is from ireland and he has 4 other sibling and they were all well dressed singing waiters and they all died before they were 30.johnny and katie at were happy and so in love but when katie got pregnant they worried constantly.when katie's in labor he gets so worried he goes back to his family and misses his child birth and job. Katies mom then gives katie good advice on how to save her money
This chapter has shown me that many immigrants come here seeking something better for themselves and their children just like katie and johnny.

Both of their parents came here wanting a better life for them but unfortunately they weren't able to get out poverty and so now they want their children to do better than.but this book has made me realize that things aren't always as easy as they seem. Francie has to deal with an alcoholic father and her mother is constantly working to make ends meet. These chapters made me realize that imagination plays a role in creating some kind of dream. For example francies dream was to read all the books in the world and her great imagination helped her get through some really rough times. These chapters have also made me realize that some of the ethnic groups are still divided and don't exactly like each other.franice is both austrian and irish because her parents and grandparents are from ireland and austria. So francie might feel like she doesn't fit in because of the 2 ethnic group she's part of . these chapters made me realize that many people like francie have financial and family

struggles
Author's background
Betty smith wrote the book a tree grows in brooklyn. Her original full name is elizabeth lillian wehner.she was born on december 15 1896 in williamsburg section in .brooklyn new york. Her parents john and catherine where were german immigrants.she began calling herself betty in 1938.she went to school up to 8th grade and left to go work in factories at the age of 14. She attend a girls high school from 1915-1917. She then enrolled to univrsity if michinagan from 1937 to 1930.betty smith won an award the avery hopwood award for hel play jonica starrs.she attended yale drama school as welll.in addtion betty smith is an award winnner for many of her books and plays shes written. She had managed to and graduate from a university despite all the financial and family problems she faced. This book fits in her career because she makes plays and tells stories and this book is her story of how all the things she went through helped her get to where she is now. This book even went on to be a movie. This these foretells the statement in the book because this background info helps to see all the difficulties she had to go through to achieve what she wanted and it's foretells that she perhaps will tell the story of how she overcame these adversities
Cultural context analysis
The book is set back in 1900s in brooklyn , new york . the town where the characters live is williamsburg and they live in a tenement. The characters live in poverty and struggle financially. They have trouble just getting enough food and making ends meet with the money they have. In other workds the characters social classs is the poor.in adddition the typical concerns of the popele living in that typical is money and mainting a job and education.many of the poel lving their have jobs that pay much so people their already stuggle enough with jujst paying rent . some also worry about being laid off or fired and often times the eldest kids would have to stop going to school to work and help out the family.for example francie was only able to go up to grade 8 because she need to work in order to help her mother and father out. During this era amny of the ethinc groups remained divided and hostile towards one another.so becuase of this many people with 2 different kinds of backgrounds probably didnt feel like they belonged anywhere becasue they couldnt fit in perfectly with just one ethnic group. For example the character francie had both german and ireland backgrounds and so she didn't quite feel like she belonged anywhere. Some of the social norms in this book is that much of time the parents worked and the children would help around and go get the food and some the residents living within the same building became role models to some of the children.

A tree grows in brooklyn
Chapters 10-19
When katie first had francie she would often get sick and her mother ended up comparing her the the tree of heaven , because just like her struggled to keep living when neely was born she found herself loving neely more than francie. The father just become more and more worried the narrator then says how they were doomed from the start because they had children and were frankly too poor to properly give them all the necessities. The difference between katie and johnny is that he accepts the doom while she does not . in addition when johnny get drunk for 3 day katie call her sister , sissy to come and help and she ends up going to the room with him and talking and holding him like a ,other would. She then proceeds to tell katie that she has to overlook the johnnys weakness which is alcohol.. Katie them know that katie is a good person but eople overlook that becasue eof her promiscuous habits.in additon becuase of this driking problem they had to move homes and katie knew she could no longer depend on johnny to support the familly.she found a place to live rent free as long as she cleaned the building.time goes on and the nolans like their new home but katie is now doing more work and johnny even less . francie read shakespear and often has a tough time making friends because all the shakespearen jargon she uses.in addition frnacie likes life out on streets especially when street musicians play. One of francies dream was to an organ grinder but her mother dismisses that dream of hers.however despite all the happy music and dancing there was sadness behind it.the sadness was that all the children had to care for themselves at a young age and care for those who couldn't make their lives better. The nolans now had to move tenements again because of 2 incidents with sissy . one where she was accused of being a robber and the second for letting the children play with condoms. They move to a new apartment on grand street williamsburg. They have a roof top this top and johnny says this will be his last home.every time they have katie hsas to give up saving. Johnnys weakness si alchohol but despite that he give francie the ability to wonder and appreciate the beautiful things johnny makes francie feel comforted and happy but at the same time hurts her with his neglect. Moving on their new apartment is humble and has piano , which johnny at times plays and sings. Francie then goes out see the stores around her new home and her favorite turns out to be the pawnshop.miss moore teaches katie and her kids to play the piano .it's time for the kids to go to school but they have to get vaccinated first.every time they go the doctors always make comments on how filthy poor they are and francie hears this and makes her feel ashamed when francis shot get infected her dad comforts her so she won't worry.francies 1st day of school starts off bad everyone favors the rich over the poor , thiers bullies and cruel teachers. These chapters have shown me all the struggles that immigrants and their children went through. I was surprised to find that francie's mother resented francie a little . she favored her brother neely more because he didnt get sick as much as francie.here i also see that johnny has given he basically lost most of his hope because hes accepted that hsi familly is doomed and katie is still trying and working hard becuase her hope hasnt beeen lost yet.in additoin while johnny migth be the best father in the worl but he still cares for his chldren and tries to confrot them when ever he can
A tree grows in brooklyn