To Kill a Mockingbird 701Brady thinks he hears the voice of God, but that
Brady seems to think it impossible that anyone
else—including Cates and Darwin himself—can
hear God speak too.
“The Bible is a book. A good book. But it’s not
the only book,” Drummond insists (emphasis in
original). And though Hornbeck calls him a fraud
for sustaining faith alongside his skepticism, Drum-
mond shows his satisfaction with his many-booked
view of the world by placing the Bible next to his
volume of Darwin in his briefcase as the curtain
falls.
Todd Pettigrew
LEE, HarPEr To Kill a Mockingbird
(1960)
A classic since its publication in 1960, To Kill a
Mockingbird is now considered an essential part of
the American literature curriculum. Harper Lee
was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for her portrayal of
the American South and the effects of intolerance.
Drawing upon autobiographical elements of her life
for her only novel, Lee tells the story of a young Ala-
bama girl who learns her world is far more complex
than she ever imagined.
Jean Louise “Scout” Finch is the main character
of To Kill a Mockingbird, a preteen tomboy whose
education in the world comes from Atticus, her
father, Jem, her older brother, and Charles Baker
Harris, her friend known affectionately as Dill. Atti-
cus, with the help of Calpurnia, his cook, does his
best to raise his children. A lawyer by trade, Atticus
often helps Scout with her understanding of the
world, though his lessons do not always agree with
Scout’s reality. Observing the lives of Tom Robin-
son, a black man accused of raping a white woman,
and Boo Radley, the town of Maycomb’s mysterious
recluse, leads Scout to the bitter understanding that
terrible injustices exist despite the efforts of truly
good people such as Atticus. In her novel Lee exam-
ines such themes as race, childhood, justice,
parenthood, social class, and prejudice.
To Kill a Mockingbird challenges readers to see
the world from the perspective of the less fortunate.
Scout exchanges her naïveté for wisdom, using both
tragedy and triumph to help her transition. Accord-
ingly, Lee’s novel is a poignant yet uplifting depic-
tion of the journey from innocence to experience.
Chris Gonzalezchildhood in To Kill a Mockingbird
It is fitting that a novel that depicts so many fac-
ets of childhood should be narrated from a child’s
perspective. To Kill a Mockingbird is the recounting
of several formative childhood events by an adult
woman named Jean Louise Finch, who was known
as “Scout” during those years. Child figures domi-
nate the list of characters, each of them with their
own set of circumstances through which they must
navigate. Scout and her brother, Jem, differ from the
other children in Macomb in that they are fortunate
to have a parent who truly has their best interests
at heart. The rest of the children in the novel all
have parents (or parental figures) who overlord or, at
worst, endanger their charges. Scout slowly begins to
recognize that not all children have a parent like her
father Atticus, and that this key ingredient dictates
not only a childhood but also an entire lifetime, as
the tragic lives of Boo Radley and Mayella Ewell
exemplify.
Scout’s first perception that her childhood is
not the norm comes when Walter Cunningham is
a guest in her home. A boy whom Scout has fought
with on the school playground, Walter cannot help
but pour syrup on every bit of his food while at
the Finch house. Displaying her innocence, Scout
cannot fathom why Walter does this to his food,
ridiculing him to the point of shame. And although
Calpurnia scolds Scout for this, telling her if Walter
“wants to eat up the tablecloth you let him,” there is
more to this moment than mere gentility and eti-
quette. Scout cannot perceive that Walter is a child
who does not have the luxury of syrup as a regular
part of his dinner table, that he is less fortunate
than she. This episode initiates a series of lessons
for Scout on the subject of childhood. Scout discov-
ers, for example, that Dill’s childhood is not what
it seems. Though he insists he comes from a loving
home, his reality is exposed when Scout and Jem
find him hiding under a bed in their room, starved
and wild-eyed, having run away from home. Dill’s