The Secret Garden
Colin Craven
Mary's cousin
A pale, fearful boy kept in his room at Misselthwaite, who believes he will grow a hump and die, until Mary and the garden prove otherwise.
Colin Craven is the son of Archibald Craven, and no one has told Mary he exists. He lives in a large bedroom with a four-poster bed and a portrait of his mother hidden behind a silk curtain. He is proud, fragile and hysterical, convinced he will grow a crooked back and die young, and he screams until he gets his way.
Underneath the tantrums he is lonely and scared. He thinks his father hates him because he makes him think of his mother, who died when he was born. Colin has been told so many times he is ill that he cannot picture himself being well. He is also clever and curious, and he grows into an enthusiastic, scientific-minded boy.
“I shall get well! I shall get well!”
In the story
Contains spoilers.
Mary hears Colin crying and meets him. She is not afraid of him, and soon he asks for her every day. When he has a fit and says he feels a lump, she checks his back and says there is nothing there but backbone and ribs. He meets Dickon's lamb and brings the smell of spring into his room.
Colin is wheeled into the Secret Garden and cries that he shall get well. When Ben Weatherstaff calls him a poor cripple, he stands up and demands to be looked at. He walks, plants a rose tree, and exercises daily with Mary and Dickon. At the end he runs into his father's arms and tells him the garden made him well.
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