… Mary turned down the walk which led to the door in the shrubbery. She could not help thinking about the garden which no one had been into for ten years. She wondered what it would look like and whether there were any flowers still alive in it. When she had passed through the shrubbery gate she found herself in great gardens, with wide lawns and winding walks with clipped borders. There were trees, and flower-beds, and evergreens clipped into strange shapes, and a large pool with an old grey fountain in its midst. But the flower-beds were bare and wintry and the fountain was not playing. This was not the garden which was shut up. How could a garden be shut up? You could always walk into a garden.
The Secret Garden – F H Burnett (1911)
First published in 1911, The Secret Garden has been a childhood favourite for many readers. It tells the story of Mary Lennox who is sent to live with her uncle after the death of her parents in India. An unhappy and lonely child, the discovery of a secret walled garden sets Mary on a journey towards friendship and transformation. With the help of Dickon, her servant’s young brother, and her cousin Colin, Mary sets out to bring the garden back to life. While there are aspects of the story that modern readers will find uncomfortable, such as racism and imperialism, the beautiful theme about the capacity for nature to bring about healing is still pertinent to our times.
Frances Hodgson Burnett (1849-1924) was born into poverty in Manchester and by the time she was eighteen had lost both parents and was responsible for the care of her four younger siblings. As many women with limited options did, she turned her hand to writing. Some of her most well known titles besides The Secret Garden include Little Lord Fauntleroy (1886) and A Little Princess (1905). Burnett actually spent much of her life in the United States however she did return to live in England for a while in the late 1890s, residing at Great Mayhem Hall in Kent. This is where she found inspiration for The Secret Garden, discovering an overgrown and neglected walled garden which she restored to its former glory to become an outdoor writing retreat.
Burnett introduces the central theme of the relationship between humans and nature right from the beginning. Mary displays an innate relationship with nature long before she arrives at her uncle’s manor on the moors. At both her home and the clergy house, Mary creates miniature flowerbeds, sticking “big scarlet hibiscus blossoms into little heaps of earth” and “making…paths for a garden.” Once she arrives in England, Mary spends almost every minute of every day outside in the garden, skipping, running and digging. From the moment she wakes up she is eager to be outside to witness the changes taking place in her secret garden. And the changes taking place within Mary are quite evident too.
She went from place to place, and dug and weeded, and enjoyed herself so immensely that she was led on from bed to bed and into the grass under the trees. The exercise made her so warm that she first threw her coat off, and then her hat, and without knowing it she was smiling down on to the grass and the pale green points all the time.
Mary does not just passively enjoy the beauty of the gardens though, she is actively involved in a reciprocal relationship with the natural world, nurturing and caring for the plants, while learning to pay attention to the signs and seasons. In return she receives enormous joy in witnessing a garden come to life again. Perhaps after witnessing the rapid urban growth of the industrial revolution, and the pollution, environmental degradation and poor health that ensued, Burnett is urging readers to reconnect with nature. She suggests that it is only through a right relationship with the natural environment that people can enjoy a happy and healthy life. It is a surprisingly modern theme which has particular relevance in the midst of a housing crisis. As we strive to house our growing population by building more medium density housing, the need to provide green space will become increasingly important. Not just to avoid the creation of an austere concrete jungle, but to ensure that everyone has safe green places for leisure activities and maintaining a connection with nature.
Disability is Everywhere
One of the disturbing elements of the book that is worth commenting on, is the negative depiction of disability. It wasn’t something that I remembered from my childhood reading, but then as children, many things can go over our heads. We might be tempted to think that disability within literature is a modern preoccupation, however I am reminded of the words of American disability historian Paul Longmore who said “Disability is everywhere in history, once you begin looking for it…” And so it is with literature, although not in the most flattering of ways. Colin’s suspected disability is assumed to be a thing of horror and dread; that it would be better to be dead than be a hunchback. In keeping with the times, Colin is hidden away, leading the locals to believe he was a “cripple an’ half-witted.” That conflation of physical disability with mental incapacity led many children with disabilities to be institutionalised for their entire lives. Even worse, this sense of fear and dread is instilled in Colin who regards his supposed infirmity with hatred. In the end, there is no physical disability and with exercise and fresh air Colin becomes a healthy and handsome boy. While we often need to keep in mind the historical context, the ending does kind of rankle a little, because the association between health and attractiveness and its path to love and acceptance underscores the undesirability and exclusion of disability which continues to this day.
On a more positive note, Burnett’s inclusion of the nursery rhyme “Mary Mary Quite Contrary” in the early part of the book provided an opportunity to disappear down the historical rabbit hole. I was surprised to see the last line written as: And marigolds all in a row. I had never heard this version before. Have you? I always knew the last line as: And pretty maids all in a row. While the first three lines have remained pretty constant over the decades, there is, however, quite a list of different last lines including:
- And so my garden grows
- Sing cuckolds all in a row
- Cowslips all in a row
- With lady bells all in a row
Of course, Nursery Rhymes aren’t just innocent rhymes for the young as many of the original meanings have been lost over the years. There is some speculation the rhyme was an allegory for catholicism, while others suggest it has something to do with either Mary I or Mary, Queen of Scots, but since there doesn’t seem to be much evidence for the rhyme prior to the 18th century that might be a bit dubious. Anyway, the image for the rhyme below, created by William Wallace Denslow in 1901, is quite sweet whatever the original meaning.
In case you don’t remember or have not yet read The Secret Garden, the nursery rhyme is used by some children to taunt Mary about her “contrary” nature and I have noticed a common practice for Mary to be described as a “disagreeable little girl,” however I think this is somewhat unfair. True, she is a bit cantankerous to start with, but considering she was neglected and rejected by her parents, who themselves were not particularly likeable, she had few positive role models and no one to provide some loving parental discipline. Who knows, in those circumstances any one of us might have turned out to be a disagreeable and cantankerous child too. I do wonder if there is a bit of sexism involved here. Is Mary considered disagreeable simply because she does not fit society’s expectations of little girls to be “sugar and spice and everything nice?” Colin isn’t exactly overflowing with charm either at first, but given that he too has been ignored and rejected by his father, excluded from the world outside his room and, due to his station in life, allowed to treat people however he wishes, is it any wonder that he too is somewhat “disagreeable?” But is Colin’s disagreeability more tolerated because he is a boy? What do you think?
Happy Reading
Living on the Downs 