English Classics / The Secret Garden

The Secret Garden is a novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett first published in book form in 1911 following the publication in 1910 of a serial version in a US magazine. Set in England, it is one of Burnett’s most popular novels and is considered a classic of English children’s literature. Several stage and film adaptations have been made.

The plot centers round Mary Lennox, a young English girl who returns to England from India, having suffered the immense trauma by losing both her parents in a cholera epidemic. However, her memories of her parents are not pleasant, as they were a selfish, neglectful and pleasure-seeking couple. Mary is given to the care of her uncle Archibald Craven, whom she has never met. She travels to his home, Misselthwaite Manor located in the gloomy Yorkshire, a vast change from the sunny and warm climate she was used to. When she arrives, she is a rude, stubborn and given to stormy temper tantrums. However, her nature undergoes a gradual transformation when she learns of the tragedies that have befallen her strict and disciplinarian uncle whom she earlier feared and despised.