To Kill a Mokingbird

7/29/2019 To Kill a Mokingbird

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People are people anywhere you put them,Nelle Harper Lee

Harper Lee [then at 9]

Does Harper Lee speak the truth while penning the 20th century sensational

novel To Kill a Mockingbird?

To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) is not only

the sole published novel of Harper Lee, in many ways, it is her soul also.


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Probably it is the most widely read book dealing with race in America, and its

protagonist, Atticus Finch, the most enduring fictional image of racial heroism.

"The novel had an effect of a duel faced knife. It made her a remarkable

writer on the one hand and ended her career in putting her into the centre of

a very sensitive and oft dared-not to be spoken even by the most outspoken

social thinkers social issues of Race andRape on the other.

Lee began To Kill a Mockingbird in the mid-1950s, after moving to New York

to become a writer. She completed the novel in 1957 and published it, with

revisions, in 1960, just before the peak of the American civil rights

movement.


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Garden of Radley Palace

When he was thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm broken badly at the

elbow, thus begins the novel. And the title of the novel proves justified when

we read Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy ...

they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin

to kill a mockingbird. [page.103]

The mysterious knothole


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The novel begins in a happy and to some extent frivolous mood of a child with

the presentation of a schoolboy delight in cruelty; secret adventure for

collecting various pleasing goods from the knothole of an old tree; loosing pant

while trying to escape and some other childish jovial activities. But the tune

gradually grows serious and ultimately becomes solemn and bleak when the

children grow young and experience the social prejudices and evils fostered

and nourished by the prestigious social institutions and their so called dignified

associates. The novelist gets so deeply involved in the theme that she fails to

revive the initial mood and cant help ending the novel with a note of all

pervasive despondency. However, as an end note it tries to affirm that human

goodness can withstand even the harsh assault of evil.

It appears that the protagonist, a nine year old girl, Scout, is

none other than Lee herself. Scout is a very unusual little girl, both in her

own qualities and in her social position. She is unusually intelligent (she learns

to read before beginning school), unusually confident (she fights boys without

fear), unusually thoughtful (she worries about the essential goodness and evil

of mankind), and unusually good (she always acts with the best intentions). In

terms of her social identity, she is unusual for being a tomboy in the prim and

proper Southern world of May comb. This unusual Scout is the daughter of a

prosperous lawyer named Atticus in the sleepy village of May comb. She grows

up with her brother Jem. In the Fall (autumn) they are joined by another boy

named Dill. The trio starts to act out stories of their mysterious neighbor and

his spooky house called Radley Palace together. The owner of Radley Palace is

Boo Radley, who lives alone in the house without any attachment with anybody

in the locality.


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Scout Harper Lee Cottage

Childish frivolity makes Dill curious to sneak into the Radley Palace.

Meanwhile, on her way back home from a detested school-day, quite by

chance, Scout and Jem detect some funny gifts in the knothole of an old tree

in the garden of the Radley Palace. This acts as an incentive and they begin

frequent night-adventure to the garden. In the next summer, Dill joins again

and the three venture a special expedition to act out the story of Boo Radley

and compel him to come out of his house. But, they are quite unaware of the

fact that meanwhile Boos brother Nathan has come to live in that house.

Suspecting them antisocial, Nathan fires at them. While trying to escape, Dill

loses his pant and detects the other two fallen into the fence. However, the

knothole does not betray and they got a number of funny gifts before being

fired at by Nathan.

Scouts father comes to know the incident and asks them to look at

things from a new perspective.

But their happy and easy-go-lucky life gets a serious turn when a

white lady of the locality is reportedly raped by a black man named Tom


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Robinson. Tom is arrested. Tom tries to get a pleader to fight for his case

but no one dares to take the side of a black and go against the whites. At

last Tom solicits Atticus to plead for him and prove that the whole affair is a

conspiracy and pack of lies. Even knowing full well that he will have to suffer,

Atticus agrees to plead for Tom, in order to be true to his profession and also

for his knowledge of Tom to be an innocent man while the white lady basically

immoral. The whole of the sleepy village gets awaken all on a sudden. Scout

supports her father although both Jem and she got the defamatory names of

nigger-lover from the fellow children of the neighbourhood. The children

sneak secretly into the forbidden incident and become mature overnight.

In the first session of the court Atticus gets a little advantage. Atticus

succeeds in establishing that the accusersMayella and her father, Bob Ewell,

the town drunkare liars. It also becomes clear that the friendless Mayella

was making sexual advances towards Tom and her father caught her and beat

her. All the three children watch the court room activity secretly from the
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_drunkhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Town_drunk


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coloured balcony as they are not permitted to enter the court room. But,

despite significant evidence of Tom's innocence, the jury convicts him. At this

both Jem's and Atticus faith in justice is badly shaken. Then the tragedy

concludes when hopeless Tom is shot and killed one day while trying to escape

from prison. The furious Bob Ewell feels humiliated and vows revenge to

Atticus and his family.Atticus is threatened of similar consequences. He spits

in Atticus' face on the street and tries to break into the presiding judge's

house. He also menaces Tom Robinson's widow. Finally, he attacks the innocent

children Jem and Scout while they are walking home on a dark night from the

school Halloween pageant. Jem's arm is badly injured but the mysterious

intervention of someone saves the children from death. Scout later realizes

that the rescuer is none but Boo Radley. She also comes to know that it was

Boo who covered her with a blanket when there was a devastating fire in the

nearby house. The mysterious gifts in the knothole are also speculated to be

kept by Boo Radley.

But, in the street-brawl Bob Ewell dies.The Maycomb Sherrief saves Jem and

Boo by inventing a tactful story. Boo asks Scout to walk him home. He

disappears in his usual manner when Scout says goodbye reaching the door of

Radley Palace. And standing alone in the porch of Radley palace, Scout

realizes the justification of viewing life from Boos point of view. The novel

ends with a tortourous gloom overpowering the once prosparous and happy

family as well as the sleepy village. But,Scout and Jem realizes the meaning of

their Fathers erstwhile ignored advice of the necessity for viewing life from

a different perspective.


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Although Lee never acknowledged that it was her autobiographical novel,yet a

close look at the biography of Lee shows clear evidences of personal

happenings narrated in the story.

In her childhood,her native village was ravished by a sensational case of gang

rape of two white ladies by nine black man coming from outside.Her fathers

newspaper scooped the hidden truth of the incident and earned enmity from

the whole of the white community of the locality.The accused offender in that

case met with the fate similar to that of Tom in the novel. Lee had a four

years older brother named Edwin, who is none but the fictional Jem. Dills

character is modelled on Lees childhood friend, Truman Capote known then as

Truman Persons who came to live with his aunt in Scouts village. Tom is

modeled after Walter Lett who was accused like Tom in the story and met

with a Tom like fate. There was also a house similar to that of Radley palace

in May comb. Harper Lee was born at Monroeville, Alabama, a sleepy small

town similar in many ways to May comb, the setting of To Kill a Mockingbird.

So, a careful reading of both Lees girlhood days and that of Scout in the

story establishes the truth of Lees statement with which the article is

initiated i.e. People are people anywhere you put them.

Harper Lee (now at 88)


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References, Links and Acknowledgements:-

i.To kill a Mokingbird-by Harper lee

ii.www.wikipedia.org

iii.www.sparknotes.com

iv. www.bookrags.com

v. www.gradesaver.com

vi. www.classiclit.about.com/od/tokillamockingbird

vii. www.biography.com/people/harper-lee-9377021

viii. topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/l/harper

ix. www.picsearch.com/Harper-Lee-pictures

x.www.creativecommons.org
http://www.bookrags.com/http://www.gradesaver.com/http://www.classiclit.about.com/od/tokillamockingbirdhttp://www.biography.com/people/harper-lee-9377021http://www.picsearch.com/Harper-Lee-pictureshttp://www.picsearch.com/Harper-Lee-pictureshttp://www.biography.com/people/harper-lee-9377021http://www.classiclit.about.com/od/tokillamockingbirdhttp://www.gradesaver.com/http://www.bookrags.com/

To Kill a Mokingbird

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