To Kill A Mockingbird Coming Of Age Analysis

Since the first spark of human life, coming-of-age has even occurred at the time of Adam and Eve. Many people think that the only part of maturing is puberty. However, one of the greatest parts of growing up is not, surprisingly, going through puberty. Coming-of-age involves recognizing different perspectives.

As people get older they go through experiences in their life that can change them in bad ways or most of the time change them in good ways.This good change occurs usually by the experiences teaching them important lessons they should know in life.These changes are very important in ones life because it matures them into an adult. This transformation happens to certain characters in every novel and it is called coming of age. In the novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, both Jem and Scout go through this coming of age and learn what it means to be courageous, the unfairness of the world, and to look at other people's perspective before judging them.

Although the main theme is “coming of age”, there is a secondary theme or subplot that should not go unnoticed. It is a more basic concept that could be simplified as whether or not people are essentially good. In the beginning of the story, most of the characters are seen as good people. This was because of Scout’s childhood innocence as she had not been exposed to all of the evil that one would notice with an adult perspective. One of the conflicts, the trial, is a catastrophe and changes the children’s viewpoint on life. As Tom Robinson is wrongfully accused of raping Mayella Ewell, Scout and Jem witness first-hand how the jury was influenced by the evil of racism even though the facts did not support the verdict. “A jury never looks at a defendant it has convicted, and when this jury came in, not one of them looked at Tom Robinson.”(282) Scout and Jem were in shock after Tom was condemned because although they were young, they understood that he was innocent. This passage contained significant exposure of corrupt human nature. Jem was victimized by witnessing the evil of racism during the trial and retreated to a state of disillusionment. Later in the story, Atticus follows this theme to teach Jem that people can contain good and evil within them. This was the case with Mrs. Dubose as she fought her morphine addiction as Jem read to her despite her constant deploring of racism.

Harper Lee, in the realistic-fiction novel To Kill A Mockingbird, uses a variety of literary elements to aid in the overall development of the theme. All of the characters are going through some sort of coming of age experience or enhancing someone else's experience as well as their lives all the while being greatly impacted by the racial discrimination and injustices that occurred all around them. An event in the novel that expresses this is the court case of Tom Robinson, or more specifically, Atticus’s, Tom Robinson’s attorney, closing argument. During this Tom Robinson is wrongly accused of raping a white girl in their town of Maycomb, and Atticus decides to defend him as his attorney despite the town's clear racial biases and preconceived stereotypes on people of color; this greatly impacts Atticus’s daughter, Scout. To show this Harper Lee uses setting, plot and conflict to enhance the development of the novel and put forth the theme. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee uses these literary elements, plot, conflict and setting to develop the idea that the presence of racial inequality leading to the undermining of justice impacts the coming of age for Scout on a variety of levels.

Throughout the book To Kill A Mockingbird Lee discusses the effects of ignorance and the toll it takes on people such as Tom Robinson, Boo Radley, Scout herself, and many more. Through her examples of sexism, prejudice, and racism, from the populist of poverty stricken Southerners, she shows the readers the injustice of many. The victims of ignorance are the ‘mockingbirds’ of the story. A good example of this injustice is the trial of Tom Robinson, who is falsely accused of raping a white girl and is found guilty. The book is from the point of view Scout, a child, who has an advantage over most kids due to her having a lawyer as a dad, to see the other side of the story. Her father tells her in the story, “you never really know a man until

“Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win.” (Lee 101) In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, a black man named Tom Robinson is being accused of raping a white woman, Mayella Ewell. White man, Atticus Finch, was given Tom Robinson’s case and was determined to fight for Tom’s innocence. Even if fighting for Mr. Robinson meant putting his children Jem and Scout in danger, he would still be teaching them right from wrong.

“People take different roads seeking fulfillment and happiness. Just because they’re not on your road doesn’t mean they’ve gotten lost.” Many people get interpreted and read differently than what they truly are on the inside because we don’t have the mindset to understand their way of looking at life. The fundamental and often universal idea shown throughout To Kill A Mockingbird is coming of age, which is depicted through many incidents that occur. In a world full of standards Jean Louise is the only one noticeable because she doesn’t blend in with the rest of the girls her age. She is very outgoing and adventurous which gives her the name of a tomboy. Just because she seems tough doesn’t make her cold hearted because on the inside she is

To Kill a Mockingbird has a ”coming of age” theme set to it through everything that the protagonists experienced. The events in both the book and movie impacted the characters in both fortunate and unfortunate ways, which made them mature. The youngest protagonists were the ones who mainly experienced this, for the older characters already went through their Coming of Age. Jem had the most Coming of Age experiences in the whole story since he was on the borderline of becoming a teenager and taking on more serious responsibilities. Jem had to take responsibility and take care of his sister when while his father took Calpurnia home.

Coming of age is the process a character goes through in order to mature. Scout and Jem both go through this process. Scout tells the story of To Kill a Mockingbird through the eyes of her 6 year old self. In chapter 10 Scout has an intervention with Miss Maudie about what her dad told her, it is a sin to kill a songbird. Miss Maudie agrees with Atticus' saying and this opens the eyes of Scout. Then, later in chapter 25, Scout reads Mr. Underwood's editorial on how the conviction of Tom Robinson is like the slaying of a songbird. This makes Scout understand more about why it is a sin to kill a mockingbird, but still does not understand fully. Finally, in chapter 30, Scout finally fully understands why it is a sin to kill a mockingbird. She

“Shoot all of the Blue Jays you want, if you can hit them, but Remember it’s a sin to kill a Mockingbird.” That was a major quote in Chapter 10. I chose Chapter 10’s Rabid dog scene from the book To Kill A Mockingbird as my Coming of Age scene. Let’s talk about three literary elements from that one particular scene/chapter.

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee is about a little girl nicknamed Scout and her older brother Jem. Scout and Jem mature over the course of this novel. They go through many ups and downs that come with life in the 1930s the time of the Great Depression. It is set in a fictional town by the name of Maycomb, Alabama. They have to ignore prejudice and criticism throughout the trial their father is working on for Tom Robinson.

Everyone has their own way of explaining things to understand what is being done or said. In the coming-of age novel “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, the novel is written from a narrator's’ point of view. The narrator, Scout, is the younger sibling of Jem Finch. She is only six years young.Scout like everyone else, has her own way of telling this novel, she has her own way of telling her it. She experiences events that other characters don’t and she gives us an idea of what may be coming up. Ask any characters in the novel to write this story as the narrator, it wouldn’t be the same.

Shelby moody Schneider Pre IBDP English 9 January 12 2016 Coming of age This universal theme coming of age definition is socially, physically, or psychologically growing up. Coming of age is something that people understand and experience during their childhood. It is a universal theme because all cultures have experience coming of age in some form.

Did you know in the book to kill a mockingbird jem had many coming of age moments?In the novel has many moments were the children had shown that they are becoming mature.

During the coming of age process, one must learn to see things from the point of view of others. In “To Kill A Mockingbird”, a Southern Gothic novel by Harper Lee, Scout and Jem, children that are growing up in the racism-filled American South, mature as they experience the social prejudices around them. In chapters 12-14, Scout and Jem experience events, such as visiting a black church, while slowly beginning to understand the racism behind their father’s Tom Robinson case. In the chapters 12-14 of “To Kill A Mockingbird”, through the experiences of Scout and Jem, the characters and events reveal the message that coming of age involve recognizing different perspectives and learning from them. Scout and Jem’s experience when visiting the Black