I Never Promised You a Rose Garden
Author: Hannah Green (real name: Joanne Greenberg)
Published in 1964
Film version released in 1977, play version released in 2004
Book report by Sara Hoogakker (V5b)
2017-2018
About Joanne Greenberg
, Joanne Greenberg, born in Brooklyn in 1932, is an internationally renowned, award-winning
Jewish-American author of 12 novels and four short story collections. Her best-selling novel,
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, is a semi-autobiographical account of a teenage girl's
three-year battle with schizophrenia. After her own battle with mental illness, Greenberg
went on to earn a B.A. in anthropology and English from the American University of
Colorado, where she became interested in Native American culture. The short stories she
wrote based on her time living on a Navajo Reservation are often used for anthropological
study.
Throughout her life, Greenberg has tried to garner respect and empathy for individuals
suffering from physical and mental handicaps. During her years as a public school teacher,
she helped develop programs for mentally ill deaf students. Her novel In This Sign chronicles
the struggles of a deaf couple and their hearing daughter. Greenberg is currently an adjunct
professor at the Colorado School of Mines where she has been an instructor since 1983. Her
most recent novel, Where the Road Goes, deals with the impact of domestic violence on the
victim's family. The idea for the novel was inspired by the murder of a former student by the
student's estranged husband.
Main characters
Deborah Blau
Deborah is the protagonist of I Never Promised You a Rose Garden. She is an attractive,
blonde, sixteen-year-old Jewish teenager who has just been admitted to a mental hospital at
the start of the novel. She is diagnosed with schizophrenia. With the help of her dedicated
therapist, Dr. Fried, Deborah finds the courage to emerge from the Kingdom of Yr, a world
Deborah created as a defense against a confusing, frightening reality.
She is an unusually intelligent, creative girl, gifted in drawing and in languages. Most of her
creativity, however, is devoted to her own inner world of Yr, which has a well-developed
language of its own. Several “gods,” both male and female, inhabit this world, initially
delightful creatures who offer her companionship when she feels lonely and desolate. There
is a Censor, who effectively blots out uncomfortable knowledge, but also the Collect, who
curses and criticizes her unmercifully, apparently representing all the negative judgments
which she has collected through the years. As her illness deepens, what began as escape
becomes a nightmare world where her delightful dream companions can engender pain and
terror. Her intelligence and creativity, then, are not unmixed blessings, yet without these
gifts, she might never have come to understand her illness well enough to withdraw from it.
Although very disturbed, Deborah is nevertheless smart and precocious, with a sarcastic,
superior manner. Her insults and snide remarks often contain clever wordplay. Her hunger to
learn is genuine and divorced from her mental illness: Even when she is most ill, she thirsts
for knowledge and cajoles a fellow patient into teaching her Greek and Latin. Her artistic
ability also is real, and despite prohibitions against possessing pencils and paper, she
manages to find ways to draw. Deborah carries deep within herself the strength and the will
to live in the outside world.
Aside from Deborah herself, there is little depth of characterization in this novel. Deborah’s
father, mother, and sister receive some attention, though not enough for the reader to be
entirely certain of their motivations.
Jacob Blau
Author: Hannah Green (real name: Joanne Greenberg)
Published in 1964
Film version released in 1977, play version released in 2004
Book report by Sara Hoogakker (V5b)
2017-2018
About Joanne Greenberg
, Joanne Greenberg, born in Brooklyn in 1932, is an internationally renowned, award-winning
Jewish-American author of 12 novels and four short story collections. Her best-selling novel,
I Never Promised You a Rose Garden, is a semi-autobiographical account of a teenage girl's
three-year battle with schizophrenia. After her own battle with mental illness, Greenberg
went on to earn a B.A. in anthropology and English from the American University of
Colorado, where she became interested in Native American culture. The short stories she
wrote based on her time living on a Navajo Reservation are often used for anthropological
study.
Throughout her life, Greenberg has tried to garner respect and empathy for individuals
suffering from physical and mental handicaps. During her years as a public school teacher,
she helped develop programs for mentally ill deaf students. Her novel In This Sign chronicles
the struggles of a deaf couple and their hearing daughter. Greenberg is currently an adjunct
professor at the Colorado School of Mines where she has been an instructor since 1983. Her
most recent novel, Where the Road Goes, deals with the impact of domestic violence on the
victim's family. The idea for the novel was inspired by the murder of a former student by the
student's estranged husband.
Main characters
Deborah Blau
Deborah is the protagonist of I Never Promised You a Rose Garden. She is an attractive,
blonde, sixteen-year-old Jewish teenager who has just been admitted to a mental hospital at
the start of the novel. She is diagnosed with schizophrenia. With the help of her dedicated
therapist, Dr. Fried, Deborah finds the courage to emerge from the Kingdom of Yr, a world
Deborah created as a defense against a confusing, frightening reality.
She is an unusually intelligent, creative girl, gifted in drawing and in languages. Most of her
creativity, however, is devoted to her own inner world of Yr, which has a well-developed
language of its own. Several “gods,” both male and female, inhabit this world, initially
delightful creatures who offer her companionship when she feels lonely and desolate. There
is a Censor, who effectively blots out uncomfortable knowledge, but also the Collect, who
curses and criticizes her unmercifully, apparently representing all the negative judgments
which she has collected through the years. As her illness deepens, what began as escape
becomes a nightmare world where her delightful dream companions can engender pain and
terror. Her intelligence and creativity, then, are not unmixed blessings, yet without these
gifts, she might never have come to understand her illness well enough to withdraw from it.
Although very disturbed, Deborah is nevertheless smart and precocious, with a sarcastic,
superior manner. Her insults and snide remarks often contain clever wordplay. Her hunger to
learn is genuine and divorced from her mental illness: Even when she is most ill, she thirsts
for knowledge and cajoles a fellow patient into teaching her Greek and Latin. Her artistic
ability also is real, and despite prohibitions against possessing pencils and paper, she
manages to find ways to draw. Deborah carries deep within herself the strength and the will
to live in the outside world.
Aside from Deborah herself, there is little depth of characterization in this novel. Deborah’s
father, mother, and sister receive some attention, though not enough for the reader to be
entirely certain of their motivations.
Jacob Blau
