Education In A Tree Grows In Brooklyn By Betty Smith

In Betty Smith’s A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Smith focuses on Francie Nolan, a young child suffering the hardships of poverty in the streets of Brooklyn. In the exposition, Francie lives with her mother, Katie, brother, Neeley, and father, Johnny, in a small tenement. Johnny earns money for the family waiting tables and singing at restaurants, but he is an alcoholic, which makes it difficult to provide a steady income. Katie is forced to work as a janitor to pay off rent, while the children collect pennies by selling junk. The narrative hook occurs as Francie visits the library. There, it is revealed that she has been “reading a book a day in alphabetical order and not skipping the dry ones” and plans to read every book in the entire library (Smith 22). This illustrates Francie’s desire to learn and demonstrates the importance of education in the Nolan family. Education is a core value that repeats throughout the novel, influencing the entire Nolan family. …show more content…
This is a drastic change from their earlier years of private schooling, for at school, Francie learns the difficulty of making friends while also experiencing the difficulties of education. Francie’s first encounter with a sex offender occurs soon after, and she is left with the image of her mother shooting the criminal. When Johnny, overcome with the effects of alcoholism, is found “huddled in a doorway…unconscious,” he dies from pneumonia. Soon after their father’s death, Francie and Neeley both graduate from grade school. Without the sufficient money to go to school, Francie applies for a newspaper job, and Katie’s life earnings send Neeley to school. Francie’s new income helps sustain the lives of her, Katie, and Francie’s new younger sister, who was born a few days after Johnny’s death. While Francie meets and falls in love with Ben Blake, Katie herself starts meeting Sergeant McShane, a handsome, strong-willed