...Who are the Mockingbirds? As Graham Greene once said; “Unfortunately the innocent are always involved in any conflict. Always, everywhere, there is some voice crying from a tower”. A mockingbird symbolizes innocence. In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, there are a few characters who strongly represent mockingbirds due to being targeted or even killed, but are innocent people. The three people that strongly symbolize mockingbirds are Tom Robinson, Boo Radley and Atticus Finch. Tom Robinson represents a mockingbird because he is an innocent individual who is targeted by the town of Maycomb and eventually killed for a false accusation. Boo Radley represents a mockingbird because he is a an innocent and brave character, but feared by the people of Maycomb due to rumours. He is kept inside his house for years which is why nobody knows what he is actually like. Lastly, Atticus Finch is another character that represents a mockingbird because he has never done anything to harm anyone and is liked by many, but that all changes when he begins to be targeted because of his decision to defend a black man....
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...Task 2: Critical Analysis Ngien Sing Jier For this semester, we are analysing a novel entitled ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ written by Harper Lee. I find this novel very meaningful and interesting to read as well. After reading and analysing the novel a few times along with the teachings of my lecturer, I can differentiate the story told from different perspectives, parts when Scout was young and parts when she was an adult. It is about the life and happenings in Maycomb County. The story is told in the first person point of view whereby Scout as the narrator, is a character in the story who tells us everything she has experienced. She can reveal only personal thoughts and feelings and what she sees and is told by other characters. Harper Lee wrote this novel based on her real life experience during childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it. “Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ takes readers to the roots of human behavior namely innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humour and pathos.” Theme is the main idea or underlying meaning of a literary work. A theme may be stated or implied. Theme differs from the subject or topic of a literary work in that it involves an opinion or statement about the topic but not every literary work has a theme. Themes may be major or minor. A major theme is an idea the author returns to time and again, becomes one of the most important ideas in the story...
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...such would be Arthur (Boo) Radley in the book To Kill A Mockingbird. Boo Radley is a secluded mysterious figure who never comes out of his house. Scout and Jem (who are young children) are fascinated with the stories and rumors of Boo radley and hope to meet him one day. In the book To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee represents the theme that rumors do not define a person through Arthur (Boo) Radley and his relationship with Atticus’s children (Scout and Jem) and how their relationship changes from the beginning to the end of the book. An example of Harper Lee using this theme would be at the beginning of the book. During the summer, in a small town called Maycomb, Scout and Jem meet a new...
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...novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee uses Tom Robinson, Mayella Ewell and Boo Radley as human “mockingbirds” to contribute to the overall theme of innocence. The first character Harper Lee uses is Tom Robinson.Tom Robinson is an poor black man with an wife and three children. He is 25 years old and is known as a respectable kind young man. His left hand was crippled and caught in a cotton gin when he was a young boy. In the begin, Lee uses Tom Robinson as a mockingbird because he was innocent man who was accused of raping a young woman named Mayella Ewell.And he was shot seventeen times.Atticus...
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...paralleled by her view and opinion on Boo Radley. Throughout the book she changes her views on Boo from an unsightly monster to a kindhearted gentle man. While scout starts to understand Boo over the course of the book, her maturity also develops and she starts growing into an adult. In the very beginning of the book when Scout and Jem first meet dill, Scout says this to Dill about the Radley residence, “Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom. People said he existed, but Jem and I had never seen him” (Lee 7.) As the quote shows Scout views Boo Radley as a monster who has no care for anyone. At this point in the book Scout is six years old. When scout is at school she picks fights with teachers and other kids. One of the best examples of this in the beginning of the book is when Miss Caroline tries to give Walter Cunningham a quarter to buy lunch when he forgets his lunch. Scout tries to explain to Miss caroline that his family is poor and cannot pay her back. After Scout is punished she goes home and whines to Atticus about what happened. This situation is a representation of her immaturity at the beginning of the book. The rest of the year goes by, Scout and Jem both finish up their school year, but Scout’s developments in her maturity and her understanding of Boo Radley don't show until the summer. During the summer Dill returns to Maycomb to see Jem and Scout. One of the main things they do in the summer is play the “Boo Radley game”. Not very soon into the summer...
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...shouldn’t know how to read and write yet. Scout works through her problems and adapts to her new teaching ways. Chapter 3: “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view - until you climb in his skin and walk around in it.” Pg.30 Reason: I liked this passage because this is when Scout learns that you have to give people chances. You can’t judge someone by what’ s on the outside, but by what is in the inside. Chapter 4: “It was the kind of box wedding rings came in, purple velvet with a minute catch. Jem flicked open the tiny catch. Inside were two scrubbed and polished pennies , one on top of another. Indian Heads.” Pg.34 Reason: I picked this quote because I liked how they described what they found. The Indian Heads were one of the things that they found in the Radley tree. Chapter 5: “There are some kind of men who - who’re so busy worrying about the next world they’ve never learned to live in this one , and and you can look down the street and see the results.” Pg. 45 Reason: This...
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...novel by assuring that the reader is engaged. For a young reader, Scout’s humor makes reading novels from the Great Depression substantially less like a hassle. For example, while Jem, Scout, and Walter were walking home for lunch, and passed by the Radley House, Scout teases Jem. “Anybody who went up to the house once oughta not to still run every time he passes it” (31). This quote allows the reader to experience the humor that Scout claims. Scout’s humor is one of her strengths because, one, it is funny for the reader,...
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...locale full of kindness and courtesy, but also one of hatred and prejudice. Scout and Jem are growing up and learning from the adults in their community, meaning that they are not only learning kindness- they are also learning judgement. Chapter one of To Kill a Mockingbird sets the scene of the town specter, Arthur “Boo” Radley. Scout, Jem, and Dill sit in awe of the Radley household, reflecting over Boo’s story- and the conspiracies surrounding him. The passage that begins the subplot surrounding Boo Radley shows that prejudice can happen within close communities. Jem, Scout, and Dill’s childish fears toward Boo Radley symbolize the town’s feelings toward the Radley family. The passage that symbolizes this is as follows: “Inside the house lived a malevolent phantom. People said he existed, but Jem and I had never seen him. People said he went out at night and when the moon was down, and peeped in windows. When people’s azaleas froze in a cold snap, it was because he had breathed on them, Any stealthy small crimes committed in...
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...Harper Lee, Lee reveals Scout's empathetic tone toward Boo Radley through details and diction. Throughout the novel Boo protects Scout frequently(Pattern A). Toward the end of the novel(pattern B) Boo saves Jem and Scout from Bob Ewell and Boo brought them back to their house, Lee uses diction to describe Scouts tone toward Boo. “I looked from his hands to his sand-stained khaki pants; my eyes traveled up his thin frame to his torn denim shirt” (270). This quote talks about how his clothes are torn and stained. This could make someone, like Scout, feel empathetic because his clothes got ruined by protecting the kids like he has done many times before. In some cases words like “torn” and “sand-stained” might give off a negative tone but in this...
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...the book To Kill a Mockingbird people judge others before they truly have a right to judge. In the town of Maycomb, Alabama many individuals make judgements about Boo Radley and Tom Robinson before they know the truth. Scout Finch is a rare breed in this time, with her father defending Tom Robinson and her brother Jem and her interested in finding more about Boo Radley she constantly gets a chance to make unprejudiced judgements on people. Harper Lee helps the reader better understand prejudice using symbolism , imagery, and metaphors throughout the story. Prejudice was common throughout the story To Kill a Mockingbird, this could be seen through symbolism. It is a sin to kill a mockingbird, this is explained when Miss Maudie says “they don’t do one thing...
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...innocence but is later attacked. Tom Robinson is an African American man who was convicted of rape. A crime he did not commit, which he was sentenced to death for and killed for running away. Boo Radley is a man who was said to be a monster but in reality saved scout and her brother Jem. In the book,...
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...difficult to defend or to protect others through Boo radley saving the children and Atticus finch defending Tom Robinson. Arthur Radley or Boo proves what courage is because he saved the kids from getting attacked by Bob Ewell,”His arms were like steel. He slowly squeezed the breath out of me. I could not breathe suddenly, he was jerked backwards and flung on the ground”(Lee 351). This quote suggest courage because Bob Ewell was trying to choke Scout to death until Boo flung him to the ground to protect or save scout from dying by Bob Ewell. Finally Boo saves the kids with a devastating blow to Bob in order to protect these kids from ever getting harmed again.”Bob Ewell's lyin’ on the ground under that tree down yonder with a kitchen knife...
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...She was so scared of the Radley house from hearing all the stories, and ended up not being scared of it anymore because nothing happened.When school started up again Scout and Jem walked by the Radley place everyday “The Radley place had ceased to terrify me”(Lee,324). Scout walks by it everyday, and because nothing has happened when they walk by it, it doesn’t scare her anymore. She learns to get over her fears, and not listen to stories that other people tell her. Scout started feeling bad for Boo and always thinking the worst of him when she didn’t even know him. “We never put back into the tree what we took out of it: we had given him nothing, and it made me sad” (Lee,373). This quote shows that Scout took those things from the tree, and now that she has met Boo she feels bad she didn’t give them back to him, because he saved their lives and they gave him nothing in return. She understands people and feel bad for them and isn't a child anymore because she shows Boo she acts more like an adult, by helping escort him to his...
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...Harper Lee the three characters that symbolize the mockingbird are Tom Robinson, Atticus Finch, And Boo Radley. The character Tom Robinson was a black man who was poor and ended up being a victim of prejudice and racism. Heck Tate was on Atticus's front porch . Heck Tate said “There’s a black boy dead for no reason, and the man responsible for it’s dead…(Lee317)” Tom Robinson is dead for being accused for rape and Boo Ewell was responsible and he is now dead. Tom Robinson was a black, innocent man who did not deserve to die for a false accusation....
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...There are many animals in the world that are used to convey positive values. Mockingbirds are a species of birds that are emphasized for their positive values in To Kill A Mockingbird. Mockingbirds are symbolized as an example of peace and innocence in the story. “Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy”(90). There are multiple characters in the story that have committed no crime but are still questioned for their actions. Two of these characters would include Boo Radley and Tom Robinson. Boo Radley would be a good example of a mockingbird as he has shown peace and innocence throughout the story. Miss Maudie explains to Scout in the exposition of Chapter 5 that “ Arthur Radley just stays in the house, that’s all” (44). Therefore, Boo Radley must have stayed in the house to isolate himself from friends and family. Consequently, if he wasn’t in contact with anyone, it would be unlikely that he would be capable of destroying peace. Miss...
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