The Bean Trees Themes

Barbara Kingsolver’s The Bean Trees follows Taylor’s attempts to raise her adopted daughter Turtle, focusing on what it takes to be a family and the alternative forms that family can take in the absence of the traditional mother-father-children family model. Taylor is fiercely protective of the small family she forms with Turtle, her best friend Lou Ann, and Lou Ann’s son Dwayne Ray in Tucson, Arizona as they all help each other…

The Bean Trees, like many of Barbara Kingsolver’s novels, deals in an almost exclusively female world. These strong, complex female characters drive the plot forward on their own, with little need for male characters. Indeed, the only male characters treated with sympathy are Estevan and Dwayne Ray—Estevan because he is emotionally sensitive and profoundly respectful of women and Dwayne Ray because as a baby and toddler he is too young to have internalized…

Though disasters and tragedies loom large in The Bean Trees, the novel also includes the ever-present hope of survival. Characters in the novel across all social, economic, and political divides struggle with all manner of disasters, ranging from the personal loss of a family member, to the failure of national institutions, to the high number of natural disasters occurring with greater frequency around the globe. Kingsolver does not blame her characters for the disasters…

The theme of belonging and homeland works on two levels within the novel. On a small scale, the novel’s plot follows Taylor’s struggles to find her true home. Unhappy with the classism and sexism of her rural Kentucky hometown, Taylor searches for a place that feels more comfortable. Through this search, Kingsolver points out that the place where a person is born is not necessarily where that person belongs. When Taylor settles in Arizona…