To Kill A Mockingbird Analysis

The intriguing novel, To Kill A Mockingbird is written by the prestigious author Harper Lee. Lee has utilised the lifestyle and attitudes towards ‘African-Americans" in the 1930's to create a novel which presents the reader with Lee's attitudes and values. The dominant reading of the novel is focused on the issues of racial prejudice, but there are also a number of other alternative and oppositional readings. Examples of this are the Marxist and feminist readings which can be applied to the text.

As the famous American author, Nerburn, says,“It is much easier to become a father than to be one”(http://www.wiseoldsayings.com/fathers-quotes). Nerburn writes about how hard it is to be an eligible father .He proposes the question, “Do people think their father is the person who is able to provide them a lot of guidance or help? In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Jem and Scout live with their father, Atticus, who is a lawyer, and regard him as an excellent example. However, Scout and Jem don’t value Atticus as a father with full diligence because he is elder than most of other students’ father and he is not able to do any sports. Due to the accident with the mad dog, atticus’s educations and the case of Tom Robinson, Jem and Scout come to understand, respect, and finally admire their father.

The ambition of oneself to pursue justice and righteousness may result in prosecution. In the novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, and movie "A Time to Kill" by Joel Schumacher, each demonstrate one’s open-mindedness and forward thinking leads to penalization through protagonists Atticus Finch and Jake Brigance. Both egalitarians take the position as an attorney for an African American and are prosecuted in the process.

Mockingbirds will only sing their hearts, not cause any damage or give their lives to pleasing others. Throughout To Kill a Mockingbird great examples are shown of different types of mockingbirds. Atticus Finch, Tom Robinson, and Arthur (Boo) Radley are great examples of representing a mockingbird.

“It's right hard to say," she said. "Suppose you and Scout talked colored-folks' talk at home it'd be out of place, wouldn't it? Now what if I talked white-folks' talk at church, and with my neighbors? They'd think I was puttin' on airs to beat Moses, "But Cal, you know better," I said. “It's not necessary to tell all you know. It's not ladylike—in the second place, folks don't like to have somebody around knowing more than they do. It aggravates 'em. You're not gonna change

“Morals, Manners, Customs, and Public Perception” by Judge Paul Heath Till uses the theme of Southern Civility to express the change and influence our fast-changing society plays in the reconstruction of the Southern culture. Judge Till’s explanation of the Southern Civility can also be reflected in Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird”, who uses the culture of the South to emphasize the conflicts and the expectations that the family must live up to be accepted into the community. The Southern civility is presented in both texts through the understanding and importance of family and the basic concept of values and mannerism.

“Its a sin to kill a mockingbird” (Lee 103). This familiar statement expresses the meaning of the word mockingbird that is in the title of the novel. Arousingly touching the hearts of others, Harper Lee displays the innocence of a mockingbird and people who compare to a mockingbird. Maycomb county, a fictional setting in the book where innocent people were accused of wrongdoings and sometimes punished for crimes they did not commit or things they could not help. In To Kill a Mocking, Harper Lee used symbolism to compare Tom Robinson, Boo Radley, and Jem Finch to a mockingbird.

Mayella Ewell is an abused young woman in Maycomb, Alabama who accused an African American man Tom Robinson of rape during the Great Depression in the early 1930’s. Mayella took advantage of the Jim Crow laws so she could end the mental and physical abuse her father caused. Since Mayella is white and female, she has power. Although she lives behind a dumpster this still provides a significant amount of power for her. In the book “To Kill A Mockingbird” Harper Lee shows Mayella’s power for class during the trial.

“Courage doesn’t mean you don’t get afraid. Courage means you don’t let fear stop you,” stated Bethany Hamilton, an American professional surfer, who survived a shark attack, when she was only 13 years of age. This quote relates to the book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, on account that plenty of people in the book had fear, but did not let it stop them from doing what they needed to do. A few of these courageous people were Mrs. Dubose, Atticus, and Boo Radley.

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel that takes place throughout the 1930s in a small town in Alabama called Maycomb. During this time period, people dealt with large amounts of discrimination, along with the effects of the Great Depression. Harper Lee is able to develop various themes using this setting, such as the stereotyping of gender roles, loss of innocence, excess violence, superstition, and prejudice. Some readers believe that the theme of innocence is most relevant to the novel as its message directly relates to Scout and Jem Finch, two major characters in the story. However, the theme of prejudice and superstition is more prevalent. This theme creates a well-developed storyline for the different “mockingbirds” in the novel while also projecting the actual struggles that came with living in the 1930s. Readers should understand these themes because it is important for them to realize that prejudice leads to injustice, negatively affecting society as a result. Not only that, readers will become more aware of the fact that these problems are still impacting people to this day. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee expresses the theme of prejudice and superstition through several characters, including Tom Robinson, Dolphus Raymond, and Boo Radley, to reveal how these judgements ultimately lead to the downfall of Maycomb.

As children, we often copy our parent's values and beliefs. In the novel ”To Kill a mockingbird” by Harper Lee the author demonstrates that parents pass down their ideals and values to their children through their actions . This leads to their children inheriting their character traits. In the novel, Atticus and Bob Ewell demonstrate their kind and abusive parenting style through their actions that influence the values and beliefs of their children.

Harper Lee shows us how broken or “fallen” the adult world really is in her novel To Kill a Mockingbird. The adults in the novel are responsible for their children and how they grow up, so they have to change to make a better future for them. Unfortunately, most of the adults in Lee’s novel continue on with their discriminatory and unruly behaviour and proceed to teach their children the same unjust and immoral ways of life they were taught. Lee feels that if adults continue to be closed-minded to new, better ways of life, to keep demonstrating racism and unfairness, and to keep teaching their children to have certain views for certain people such as women or “negroes”, then nothing is going to change and the new generation will be just as broken as the adults.

“Remember, it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird,” (Lee 119). In To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, this is the quote that Atticus, one of the main characters, says to his kids. Atticus is a lawyer who takes on a tough case in his town, Maycomb. His kids are Scout, and Jem. Throughout the book, they grow and mature. They don’t mess around with their neighbor, Boo, as much as they used to. But, luckily because of him, they live to see the next day. In To Kill a Mockingbird, it shows that because of prejudice, innocent people can be harmed. This is shown through Tom Robinson, Boo Radley, and Jem.

Prejudice, an unfavorable opinion or feeling formed without knowledge, thought, or reasoning based off of people’s racial, social, religious or ethnic group. In the book To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, there were many different things that Jem and Scout learned about ways that their town is prejudice, and how it impacted the town as a whole. Scout wasn’t able to notice it as much as Jem because she was younger, so Jem tried to teach it to Scout, but it didn’t always work. Since this book was taking place in Maycomb, Alabama during the Great Depression, there were more families that were affected than others with how they were living. Their father, Atticus, decided to take one of the toughest trials that Maycomb had ever seen, and that helped create more of a separation between the people over time. Throughout To Kill a Mockingbird, prejudice showed that it can separate groups of people within a town. This is shown through race, class, and gender.

The story, in the eyes of two innocent children Scout and her brother Jem, of the discrimination and hypocrisy throughout the town. Maycomb County, Alabama, faces an African American’s injustice while the children learn valuable lessons from their father, Atticus and their housemaid Calpurnia, during the Great Depression. All the while, we are learning from it. To Kill a Mockingbird teaches us the lessons of morale, justice and equality.