To Kill A Mockingbird Power Essay

In Harper Lee’s, To Kill a Mockingbird, a young white woman from Maycomb, Alabama, named Mayella Ewell is charging Tom Robinson a black man of rape. Mayella Ewell is not powerful in the sense that she is classified within class, race, and gender.

In the small town of Maycomb, Alabama lives Miss Mayella Ewell. She is a smart but helpless teen that accuses Tom Robinson of rape to escape from her father's abuse. In “To Kill A Mockingbird”, Mayella is powerful, as defined by class, race, and gender. All though in many circumstances, Mayella's class and gender make her less powerful than most, her race makes her more powerful than substantially all negroes.

Mayella is powerless because of her class. From a Document: At the beginning of Tom Robinson’s trial, Scout describes Mayella’s home, "Against the fence, in a line, were six…jars holding brilliant red geraniums, cared for… tenderly…. People said they were Mayella Ewell’s.” (Document A). According to the quote, she wants people to see that she is not like her father. The public does not care about her family and they

As a result of the Ewell’s living behind the Maycomb county dump, Mayella is looked down on. “We’ll convict this Negro but get back to your dump (Doc A).” This quote shows that though Mayella had won the case against Tom Robinson, the Ewells were still thought of as nothing. “White people wouldn’t have anything to do with her because she lived among pigs; Negroes [the Ewell’s nearest neighbors] wouldn’t have anything to do with her because she was white (Doc E).” Powerful white people looked down on Mayella because she lived in filth; black people would not either because she was white. “Long as he keeps callin’ me Ma’am and sayin’ Miss Mayella, I don’t hafta take his sass (Doc C).” Mayella is not used to being respected as she is poor and is not treated fairly. This shows how Mayella’s class ties with her power.

Strength doesn’t come from what you can do. It comes from overcoming the things you once thought you couldn’t.”

Do you know what it feels like to be powerless? A white nineteen year old woman named Mayella Ewell falsely accuses a black man of raping her in Maycomb, Alabama, in the 1930’s, and rendering her powerless comes from being recessive in her social class, race, and gender. She accuses Tom Robinson of rape in hopes of escaping her abusive father, and a chance to have a better life. Although Mayella is white, African Americans and other white people shun her throughout To Kill a Mockingbird. Mayella is a very young woman that does not own anything nice, nor clean, besides geranium flowers. During the 1930’s, men were the dominant sex, as a female, Mayella has to obey her father, Bob Ewell. As a result, Mayella is mistreated and abused.

In To Kill a Mockingbird, Mayella is powerful based on class, gender, and race. The book shows us how she does have power, and gives supporting evidence. In this time period, in a small racist Southern community during the 1930’s, all of the categories listed are very important and contributes a lot to a person. Each category has its own reasoning why Mayella is powerful. Mayella has much more power than the other person in their situation, because of all of the listed evidence. Mayella is in a trial up against a black male, Tom Robinson, who she accused of trying to rape her. They were also caught by Mr. Ewell, Mayella's father. Therefore, Tom Robinson has little to no chance of winning the case based off class, gender, and race especially during this time period.

Mayella Ewell is often mentally, physically, and sexually abused by her father Bob Ewell. Even though Mayella takes care of her siblings each day, she is lonely most of the time, considering nobody wants to be around her. Her father abuses her and beats her often, and Mayella wants the abuse to come to an end. Mayella comes up with and fulfills a plan to end the abuse coming from her father. Her plan involved a Negro man named Tom Robinson. Mayella accuses Tom of beating and raping her, and brings Tom to court, and goes up against him in a trial. Her plan was successful and came out in her favor because she was manipulative, and she knew what it took to win the trial. Mayella Ewell, a poor, white woman, who lives on a dump, is seen as

In the book “To Kill A Mockingbird”, Mayella Ewell is the conflict of the story. To challenge herself to see if she is powerful based on class, gender, and race. Mayella is powerful due to her race; however, she would not be powerful due to her class and gender. One might think she is powerful over all; however, she does not have power in the eyes of some readers. Proceeding on to see if Mayella has power in race.

Mayella Ewell’s race significantly contributes to the reason why she has power. Mayella is white, which in Maycomb makes her better than Tom Robinson since he is black. Mayella accused Tom of raping her, even though Tom testified that Mayella tried to make a move on him, but since Mayella was a white woman it made Tom look guilty, and he knew that. During the trial when Mr. Gilmer who is the prosecutor, is interrogating Tom Robinson, he asks Tom why he had fled the house so fast Tom answered that he was scared to be in a “fix” like that. Mr. Gilmer keeps insisting that Tom was afraid because he was guilty, “No,suh, scared I’d have to face up to what I did not do.”(DBQ The”evil assumption”19), Tom knew that just by being in the wrong place at the wrong time he was going to be blamed for something he didn’t do. The

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view . . . until you climb into his skin and walk around in it”. Discuss this quote from Atticus in relation to 3 characters from the novel.

First of all, Mayella is extremely poor. Maycomb’s Ewells lived behind the town’s garbage dump in what was once a Negro cabin (Doc A). Mayella was very low for being a white woman when it came to class. She was living behind a dump and her windows were open spaces in the wall. She was shunned on because of her class. Mayella’s lower class status also shows when Atticus calls her “ma’am” and “miss” because she takes it as an insult (Doc C). She was so low in class that her own race insulted and shunned her. She and her father were told to go back to their dump (Doc E). Mayella’s class is powerless due to how poor she is.

Mayella Ewell is not powerful dues to her class. Scout described the Ewell's house when she said “ Maycomb's Ewells lived behind the garbage dump”(Get Back To Your Dump). Scout is saying that the house of the Ewells compares to the City dump. Scout said ”White people wouldn't have anything to do with her because she lived amongst pigs”(The loneliest person in the world). Even people of her own race were against her because of her class. Mayella's low class makes her unrespected, even by blacks and upper class whites.

In Harper Lee’s novel: To Kill A Mockingbird, Mayella Ewell does not have power because of her gender and lack of class power. Even though some may say Mayella is powerful because of her race, that is not true. Just because Mayella is white, does not mean she is powerful because being a woman set a certain expectation for how she should act: “She should be courteous and kind to everyone. And she should learn the art of listening as well as the art of conversation” (Document IV).

In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird a major theme is the loss of innocence. Whether from emotional abuse, racial prejudice or learning, Boo, Tom, and Scout all lose their innocence in one sense or another. The prejudice that each character endures leads to their loss. Through the responses of Boo, Tom, and Scout, Harper Lee shows how each character responded differently to their loss of innocence.