M Annette Magid

The Giving Tree is an American children's picture book written and illustrated by Shel Silverstein. First published in 1964 by Harper & Row, it has become one of Silverstein's best-known titles, and has been translated into numerous languages. This book has been described as "one of the most divisive books in children's literature" by librarian Elizabeth Bird; the controversy stems from whether the relationship between the main characters (a boy and the eponymous tree) should be interpreted as p…