Keeps On Giving

Shel Silverstein, the late great children's author extraordinaire, showed his sensitive side in this beautiful book illustrated by him as well. With gentle simplicity, he begins the story: "Once there was a tree..."

In the beginning pages of "The Giving Tree," he sets up the blissful friendship between the tree and a little boy. The boy climbs up her trunk, swings on her branches, picks her apples...even immortalizes their love in her bark by carving "Me & T" with a heart around it. But as too often is the case, the child grows up and loses interest in his childhood friend, much like Jackie Paper in "Puff the Magic Dragon".

While the boy grows into a man, the tree continues to see only the boy who she loves so much. When he is a young man, he remembers the tree long enough to complain to her that he wants to start a life for himself but has no money. The tree generously gives up her apples so he can sell them, and she is happy because she was able to help her friend.

But he stays away for a long time, and the tree grows lonely. Then, one day, he comes back. This time he wants to settle down and start a family, but he needs a place to live. So the tree offers her branches so he can build a house. Once again he leaves, and she is happy to have helped him.

But he stays away even longer this time, and when he returns he has grown much older. The tree doesn't notice, however, and she listens as he expresses his wish to travel the world. This time she tells him to cut down her trunk and make a canoe out of it. So he does, and he paddles off into the sunset. And the tree is happy, "...but not really."

She has been reduced to a sad old stump. The wind can no longer whip through her branches, she can no longer gaze out upon the world from high in the sky...but most of all, she has nothing left to offer her friend. He stays away a long, long time, and the tree begins to think he will never return. Then, one day, he comes back, an ancient man who has withered away to practically nothing. She is so happy to see him that she can scarcely contain her joy. But she is old, too, and just as weak as he is.

She turns to him sadly and explains that there are no branches left to swing from, no apples left to eat, not even a trunk to climb. The boy -- for he will forever be so in her mind -- replies that he is too old to do those things, that he is sad and tired, that all he really wants now is a place to sit and rest. And the tree straightens herself up proudly as she realizes that an old stump is good for something. So the boy sits on the tree, and the tree is happy.

It is a beautiful story about growing up and about the value of friendship. And it comes full circle when at last, after a long, hard life, the boy returns to the tree to live out the rest of his days by her side. For she has remained faithful to him to the end, and the sacrifices she has made for him allow their friendship to survive all of the years of separation.

Other books by Shel Silverstein are also thoroughly enjoyable, though generally more for their comedic value. This book is probably the most thoroughly moving thing he ever wrote. If you enjoy the themes of this book, keep an ear out for the following songs: "Old Friends" (Simon and Garfunkel), "Puff the Magic Dragon" (Peter, Paul and Mary), "Biff, the Friendly Purple Bear" (Dick Feller), and "Little Boy Blue" (The Irish Rovers).