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Courage in To Kill a Mockingbird

Decent Essays

An idea that recurs in or pervades a work of art of literature can be referred to as a “Theme”. Themes often explore timeless and universal ideas and may be implied rather than stated explicitly. Theme is an important part of fictional stories. Several themes are presented in the novel to kill a mocking bird. One of the reoccurring themes in to kill a mockingbird is courage. Courage is when you know you’re beaten. The character Atticus, for instance, who was a seasoned lawyer acted courageous defending Tom Robinson. Tom Robinson was a black man who was accused of raping a white girl. Atticus was appointed to defend him. Jem was happy because he thought his father had won the case but Reverend Sykes loathed telling …show more content…

Boo Radley is a character in the novel that lived in a world of his own and was often berated and neglected by people of Maycomb. He never came out and always minded his business. Boo was a pauper often misconstrued. Through what Jem and Scout had heard around Maycomb, they described Boo to Dill as a “malevolent phantom”. (8) The children were credulous. Dill made a bet with Jem that challenged Jem’s courage. The bet was to get Jem to touch the Arthur’s house. The children’s had not lost their childhood innocence so this was some sort of courage to them. Jem touching the house served as a courageous act. Another type of courage as portrayed by Jem was sneaking into the Boo Radley house to deliver the note they had written for Boo. The note was written to encourage Boo to come out of his home. They promised him an ice cream cone, just so they could hang out with him. This can be considered as a courageous act because no one has ever been to the Radley house because of the things they had heard about Boo. Some of the things they heard was that Boo stabbed his father in the leg with a pair of scissors. Everyone was scared to approach the Radley house nevertheless he was brave enough to go and drop the note even though they were some circumstances that included Jem’s pants getting stuck in the fence of the Radley house. Jem crept to get his pants from the Radley fence was an act of courage. Although Jem was scared to go

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