The Giving Tree

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Don't do it, Giving Tree!

"Once there was a tree... and she loved a little boy." —Shel Silverstein

A selfless tree falls in love with a boy and sacrifices everything she has to make the boy happy.

One of Shel Silverstein's best known works from an anthology of stories from a book of the same name. It is widely believed to be a metaphor for human, and especially parent-child, relationships.

This story is absolutely made of Applicability and even young children at barely the required reading level can recognize this. In fact, if read without regards to the symbolism, the story is disturbingly laden with Fridge Logic and Fridge Horror. For this reason the examples are split into three sections.

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If read as a metaphor this work provides examples of

• Happiness in Slavery
• Heroic Sacrifice: The Giving Tree, of course.
• I Just Want to Be Loved
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy
• Love Makes You Crazy
• Parental Substitute
• Rule of Symbolism: Things like the tree being able to talk as well as being alive even after being cut down are easy to Hand Wave if you take this story as an allegory.

If read without metaphor this work provides examples of:

• Axe Crazy: The boy.
• Just Eat Gilligan: Why don't you just get a friend that doesn't want to kill you, Giving Tree? Why don't you cut down a tree who can't talk, or at least one that's not your friend, little boy? This is spoofed hilariously here.
• Karma Houdini The brat..er kid
• Kick the Dog: Every time the boy takes wood from the Giving Tree.
• Plant Person
• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: If the tree was a human woman this story wouldn't have worked. After all, dismembering your mother and making her into gristly flesh contraptions tends to make you cross the Moral Event Horizon rather quickly... even if she says go ahead.

Read either way this work is an example of:

• All Take and No Give: The first variety is this story in a nutshell.
• Extreme Doormat: Poor Giving Tree.
• No Name Given: The tree is never named, nor is the boy. This has a purpose.
• Vicious Cycle: One of giving and then being asked for more, and more... and more...