She had learned to dress herself by this time and she put on her clothes in five minutes. “I can’t wait! I am going to see the garden!” ‘A sudden thought made her scramble to her feet. Mary’s temperament improves over time, and Colin finds himself beginning to heal, and is eventually able to walk and run. Tending to the garden and planting flowers, they spend every day there amongst nature. Mary manages to get Colin down into the secret garden, and along with a local boy Dickon and their collection of animal friends, they begin to resurrect what was lost for so long. The pair become the most unlikely of friends, tied together by interest and love for the secret garden. Colin, who she finds out is her cousin, is bed-bound due to a spinal injury which means that he cannot walk. Her discoveries do not stop there though, as shortly afterwards, she finds a sickly young boy in a hidden room within the mansion. This mystery piques the interest of Mary, and so with her new friend, a Robin, they discover the key buried in the soil, and then the following day they find the hidden door to the secret garden. Left by her self-involved parents to be raised by their servants, she arrives in England as an aggressive, rude and petulant young girl.Īs she relaxes and warms to her new home, she explores her new surroundings, learning of a forgotten walled garden within the grounds, of which the key is said to be buried but lost. The story follows a young orphan named Mary Lennox and a sickly boy who become unlikely friends.Īfter her parents die, Mary is sent from India to live with her uncle in a manor house in Yorkshire. “I am sure there is Magic in everything, only we have not sense enough to get hold of it and make it do things for us” Frances Hodgson Burnett – The Secret Garden In celebration of this true children’s classic, we’ve had a look at the story of The Secret Garden and the lady behind it. It’s quite simply filled with its own innocent magic. It’s not just the beautiful writing, imagery and themes that make us love this book so much. First published in 1911, this charming tale has warmed the hearts of readers since its release over a hundred years ago. This sense of British superiority over India can be seen in the way that the novel implicates India itself for Mary's sickliness, while the fresh moor air of England is the most prominent cure.The Secret Garden is a beautifully written, endearing children’s novel by American author Frances Hodgson Burnett. Mary's family was likely one of the many wealthy English families that colonized the country and, in the decades before World War I, maintained order in light of the frequent uprisings staged by rebel revolutionary groups. Also present in the novel are indicators of England's colonial rule over India and specifically, the racist views about India and Indian people.

This is why Colin can get well when he decides to do so, and his conception of Magic positions it as a God-like entity. Christian Science, which was developed in the mid-nineteenth century alongside the American Spiritualism movement, states that illness isn't actually real or physiological it's something that takes place in the mind and can be cured through prayer.

She lived in England at a manor house that inspired Misselthwaite Manor (and very briefly remarried) until 1907, when she returned to the New York area, continued to write, and lived lavishly until her death in 1924.īurnett's interest in Christian Science plays a major role throughout The Secret Garden. The two agreed to live separately for two years so that Burnett could list abandonment as a legal reason for divorce, though this earned Burnett scorn in the papers. Burnett and her husband divorced in 1898. In the 1880s she became interested in Christian Science, Spiritualism, and Theosophy, which influenced her later works and especially, The Secret Garden. While her husband worked on getting his medical practice started in Washington, D.C., Burnett published her first novel, That Lass o' Lowrie's, to positive reviews in 1877. The couple moved back and forth across the Atlantic several times.

They lived in Paris for two years while he finished his medical schooling, and Burnett gave birth to her two sons there. As a young woman, Burnett began publishing stories in magazines to help support the family. Her father died when she was only four years old, and her mother moved the family to the U.S. Burnett was born in 1849 to a wealthy merchant father she was the third of five children.

Frances hodgson burnett secret garden