Don’t even get me started on Hop On Pop!
Well, he could CALL every once in a while. I mean, it IS his tree. One day, it’s going to be DEAD, and then he’ll really regret not CALLING every once in a while!
The tree just seems like an extreme co-dependent, to me. Not in a cutesy-wutesy sacrificing-parent way, but in a freaky “this is how nature works, if trees were sentient they would be stupid as fuck” way. I dunno, I always thought the story was depressing as hell. I don’t have kids, so maybe that’s why I really can’t relate to the alleged allegory. But if I ever had a kid who got lumber from a *talking tree *for such frivolous reasons, I’d be sending him back to the tree to pick a switch!
I’ll just leaf you here to figure that out.
Maybe you should branch out into some of Shel Silverstein’s other works.
There’s been a lot of threads on the board about the Giving Tree, and how many people don’t like it. I absolutely agree - it’s not about the generosity of the tree that I’m left with, it’s about the selfishness of the boy. I hate it.
Amen, brother!
This is one of my two least favorite stories of all time. The other is Jack London’s To Build a Fire, whose protagonist is merely an idiot…
You’ll look forward to the sequel, The Angry, Bitter Tree With An Asshole ‘Son’ And Goes Off On What A Little Shit The Kid Is
I’m buying my children two copies, just to make sure they learn these valuable childhood lessons early.
The Sassy Gay Friend video regarding The Giving Tree always slays me.
The premise, for those not familiar with the video, is that if only the Giving Tree had a Sassy Gay Friend, he would have set her straight on giving everything to a stupid, jerkface boy.
Is The Giving Tree a Chump?
The Giving Tree is a twisted book
The Giving Tree&mysogyistic messages. What was Silverstein thinking?
and loads of comments in various books that left one cold type threads.
If I had a tree that I loved and played on and climbed as a child, I’d be upset to find out somebody chopped it down to build a house or a boat out of it. Good climbing trees are hard to find.
It wouldn’t even occur to me to chop it down myself.
Holy crap, I hate that over-rated steaming pile of poo too!
mmm
Wood you do that?
A tree was planted just the other day
It came to the world in the usual way
There were planes to catch, and bills to pay
It popped its first leaf when I was away
And it was autumn ‘fore I knew it, and as it shed
I said, “I’m gonna use you up, bitch
Ya know I’m gonna use you up…
mmm
I guess I’m selfish because I don’t do shit for… trees?
Now your Sassy Gay Friends set you straight? I don’t think so…
I’ve not read the book, but from what I gleaned from this thread, the moral is to not anthropomorphize non-sentient objects. Because that way leads to much misguided compassion and empathy.
What if you try doing that with your toilet? Hmmm, Mister Toilet ingests all your waste, what a selfless commode it is! Well, guess what? Toilets don’t have brains or taste buds.
[QUOTE=Jack Handey]
If trees could scream, would we be so cavalier about cutting them down? We might, if they screamed all the time, for no good reason.
[/QUOTE]
I’m curious about this. You hate it because it’s the story of a selfish boy and a co-dependent tree, and that sort of story bores you? Or you hate it because you think book was trying to teach you a didactic message about how you should be giving like the tree?
I guarantee you that Shel Silverstein, the guy who wrote the book, did not write the book to teach kids about the virtues of selflessness.
Stop! You must not hop on Pop!
This.
In fifth grade, the school had some trees on our playground cut down. Unfortunately, they did this during recess, so I got to witness it. Imagine my disappointment, when I went running out for recess to go climb my tree – same tree I climbed every day during recess all through fourth grade and halfway into fifth – and they were cutting it down. Despite being made fun of by pretty much all the boys in my class, I cried the rest of the day.
Count me in as another Giving Tree hater. I remember being very uncomfortable about that tree, “Why does it keep giving up bits of itself to this selfish asshole who never sticks around to hang out with it?” Now, of course, the tree is just a stump, so no future generations of kids can enjoy climbing it either. What a waste of wood. 
The parent-child relationship analogy is completely lost on me. My parents would sooner gnaw their own legs off than sacrifice something personal for one of their kids.
I agree, but it is still a miserable story. If it isn’t teaching the lesson to kids that they should take, take, take, it is laying a guilt trip on them for taking anything from their parents at all. And yeah, whether you are identifying with the boy or the tree, it is depressing.