Literature 2B: The Selfish Giant (Literature)

The Selfish Giant

Exposition:

Children playing in the garden after school
Children were playing hide and seek and heard a great voice boom out
Children peered out of their hiding places to see a very angry giant
The Giant decided to come home after living for seven years with his friend, the Cornish ogre
The Giant doesn't want to see the children laughing and shouting
Children ran away

Characters

Setting

Conflicts:

The Giant decided to build a high wall with spikes around the garden
Every day the children poked their noses through the bars of the gate and looked longingly at the garden and sadly they wandered off to play on the hard, dusty road
The Winter came. Snow covered the ground with a thick white mantle and Frost painted the trees with silver
The giant wanted the Spring to come
Spring came, the Snow and Frost disappeared and flowers pushed their heads up against the ground and birds sang merrily but in the giant's garden the Snow, the Frost, the North Wind still danced through the bare branches of the trees
Spring refused to come to the giant's garden

Climax:

The Giant was lying in the bed one morning, feeling sorry for himself.
Heard blackbird singing
Giant lept over to the window and beamed with pleasure.
The Snow and Frost were gone
Every tree had burst into blossom
Every tree held one of the children whom the giant frightened away
The children crept into the garden by a hole in the wall
The Spring rushed in after the children
One child was standing on the ground
The child was crying bitterly as he was to small to reach even the lowest branch of the smallest tree
Giant moved to pity
Giant knew why the Spring would not go to his garden
The giant knocked down the walls and turned it into a children's playground

Falling Action:

Every day after school the children came to play in the giant's beautiful garden
Every day the giant ask them the same question whether the little boy was with them
The children do not know where to find the boy and the only time the saw him was when he knocked down the walls
Giant felt sad because he loved the little boy very much and only the sight of the children playing made him happy
Giant grew old and weak and could no longer play with the children

Resolution:

A winter morning the giant was sitting by his bedroom window and saw the most beautiful tree he had ever seen
The tree's golden branches were covered with delicate white blossom and silver fruit and underneath it stood the little boy
The giant was happy the boy came back
When he reached the little boy, the boy's face was red with anger
The giant was angry
The child smiled gently and asked the giant to follow him
The child told the giant to play in his garden which was called Paradise
That afternoon the children ran into the garden to play in the snow and found the dead giant lying peacefully under a tree, covered with white blossom

Notes:

The Snow, Frost and the North Wind may represent the coldness inside the giant's heart
The Spring may represent the warmth inside the giant's heart
The boy may represent a religious being

Literature 2B