Rpt. in Contemporary Literary Criticism. Ed. Jeffrey W. Hunter. Vol.
With the time period of when the story takes place, you can imagine the dangers of this scenario. For this purpose, as you spend your time reading the book in the narrator's shoes, Scout, you too can see good and evil. 2 What on earth does the title of this book mean? Examining these four words, "to kill a mockingbird", the literal meaning is "to destroy innocence". To kill is to destroy and a mockingbird is a symbol of innocence.
The name “nigger” was used commonly as if it had no pejorative signification. Furthermore, when Tom Robinson is being interrogated by Atticus in court, Scout states with surprise that “… [his] manners were as good as Atticus’s” (260). Even if Scout is not racist herself, she is exposed to all sorts of opinions coming from racist people in Maycomb. Her affirmation shows that she has been influenced by other people’s sayings. The fact that she has been influenced means that other individuals believe not possible for a black person to share the same manners and values as them (black people’s manners and values were not as worthy as white people’s in Maycomb at the time).
For it is a natural human instinct to stereotype. For centuries, we have been stereotyping different races such as the blacks. The whites used to see them as evil doers, but now we realize that it is not true. In the book, Tom Robinson was killed because he was stereotyped. If he had an impartial jury, he would have been a free man.
Detroit: Gale, 1998. 319-330. Literature Criticism Online. Gale. Amarillo College.
Woodbridge, Suffolk: Boydell Press, 2004. Bentley, J., Ziegler, H., and Streets, H. (2008). Traditions and encounters: A brief global history (3rd ed.). New York : McGraw Hill. ISBN: 9780073534534 Joseph P. Byrne, The Black Death (London: Greenwood Predd, 2004) Sanders, T., Nelson, S., Morillo, S., and Ellenberger, N. (2006).
N.p., n.d. Web. 24 July 2013. . "Bookshop Talk: Does TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD deserve to be Banned?." Bookshop Talk.
Because of indifferent jurors and career-motivated prosecutors, the self-serving and groundless accusations of a single women were allowed to change forever the lives of nine black teenagers who found themselves in the wrong place at the wrong time (Linder). In To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, Tom Robinson, a black man, was found guilty of raping Maya Ewell, a white woman. Even though he didn’t commit the crime, they didn’t want to believe him because they have to rule with the white person. This shows how unfair and racist the court system was in the twentieth
I was also made aware of the world when Atticus told his children that everyone has a story and “you never understands a person until you consider things from the person’s point of view”. The characters in the story seemed believable. I could relate to them because my uncle and I were pulled over by white cops during my short stay in the United States simply because we were people of color. I especially liked Atticus because He portrays decency and goodness while protecting his innocent children. The story has a good theme” to Kill a Mockingbird” because Jem, Tom Robinson Dill, Boo Radley, Mr. Raymond) can be identified as mockingbirds-innocents who have been injured or destroyed through contact with