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Essays on To Kill a Mockingbird

To kill a mockingbird essay topic examples.

You can analyze its themes in argumentative essays, compare and contrast characters or themes, describe the book's settings, persuade readers about certain points, or narrate personal experiences related to the novel's themes. These essay ideas allow you to dive into the world of "To Kill a Mockingbird" from various angles, making it easier to understand and engage with the story.

Argumentative Essays

Argumentative essays require you to analyze and present arguments related to the novel. Here are some topic examples:

1. Analyze the portrayal of racial injustice in To Kill a Mockingbird and its relevance in today's society.
2. Argue whether Atticus Finch is an ideal role model for modern fathers.

Example Introduction Paragraph for an Argumentative Essay: Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird shines a spotlight on the persistent issue of racial injustice in the American South. This essay delves into the novel's portrayal of this injustice and its enduring relevance in the contemporary world, examining the lessons it offers for addressing social inequality.

Example Conclusion Paragraph for an Argumentative Essay: In conclusion, the analysis of racial injustice in To Kill a Mockingbird underscores the novel's power to inspire meaningful conversations about equity and justice. As we grapple with these issues today, we are reminded of the importance of empathy and compassion in fostering positive change.

Compare and Contrast Essays

Compare and contrast essays enable you to examine similarities and differences within the novel or between it and other literary works. Consider these topics:

1. Compare and contrast the characters of Scout and Jem Finch, exploring their individual growth and experiences.
2. Analyze the similarities and differences between the themes of racial injustice in To Kill a Mockingbird and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas.

Example Introduction Paragraph for a Compare and Contrast Essay: Siblings often share profound bonds, yet their experiences can be remarkably distinct. This essay embarks on a journey to compare and contrast Scout and Jem Finch, the young siblings in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird , exploring the unique paths they navigate and the growth they experience throughout the novel.

Example Conclusion Paragraph for a Compare and Contrast Essay: In conclusion, the comparison and contrast of Scout and Jem Finch offer insights into the complexity of individual growth and sibling dynamics in To Kill a Mockingbird . As we consider their journeys, we are reminded of the transformative power of empathy and understanding in family relationships.

Descriptive Essays

Descriptive essays allow you to vividly depict settings, characters, or events within the novel. Here are some topic ideas:

1. Describe the atmospheric details of Maycomb, the fictional town in To Kill a Mockingbird , and its impact on the story.
2. Paint a detailed portrait of Boo Radley, focusing on his mysterious nature and significance in the narrative.

Example Introduction Paragraph for a Descriptive Essay: Maycomb, the setting of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird , is not just a backdrop but a character in its own right. This essay embarks on a descriptive journey to capture the atmospheric details of Maycomb, immersing the reader in the town's unique ambiance and its profound influence on the story.

Example Conclusion Paragraph for a Descriptive Essay: In conclusion, the descriptive portrayal of Maycomb in To Kill a Mockingbird not only sets the stage but also evokes a sense of nostalgia and reflection. Through this exploration, we are reminded of the power of place in shaping our narratives and perceptions.

Persuasive Essays

Persuasive essays involve arguing a point of view related to the novel. Consider these persuasive topics:

1. Persuade your readers that Atticus Finch's defense of Tom Robinson is an act of moral courage.
2. Argue for or against the idea that To Kill a Mockingbird should be a mandatory part of high school curricula.

Example Introduction Paragraph for a Persuasive Essay: Atticus Finch's unwavering defense of Tom Robinson in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird resonates as a symbol of moral courage. This persuasive essay asserts that Atticus's actions embody the essence of moral heroism, inviting readers to reflect on the qualities that define true bravery.

Example Conclusion Paragraph for a Persuasive Essay: In conclusion, the persuasive argument regarding Atticus Finch's moral courage underscores the enduring significance of his character in To Kill a Mockingbird . As we contemplate his actions, we are compelled to consider the qualities that inspire us to stand up for justice and equality.

Narrative Essays

Narrative essays offer you the opportunity to tell a story or share personal experiences related to the themes of the novel. Explore these narrative essay topics:

1. Narrate a personal experience where you encountered prejudice and discrimination similar to the themes in To Kill a Mockingbird .
2. Imagine yourself as a character in Maycomb and recount your interactions with the Finch family and Boo Radley.

Example Introduction Paragraph for a Narrative Essay: Prejudice and discrimination are unfortunately common experiences in our world. This narrative essay delves into a personal encounter with these themes, drawing parallels to the themes explored in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird .

Example Conclusion Paragraph for a Narrative Essay: In conclusion, the narrative of my personal encounter with prejudice and discrimination underscores the enduring relevance of the themes in To Kill a Mockingbird . As we reflect on the challenges of our own lives, we are encouraged to confront injustice and champion the values of empathy and equality.

To Kill a Mockingbird Essay Thesis

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Atticus Finch: a Character Analysis

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The Prejudice of Race, Gender and Social Class in The Novel "To Kill a Mockingbird"

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To Kill a Mockingbird: is Mayella Powerful

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July 11, 1960, Harper Lee

Novel; Thriller, Southern Gothic, Domestic Fiction, Legal Story, Bildungsroman

Atticus Finch, Scout Finch, Jem Finch, Dill Harris, Calpurnia, Aunt Alexandria, John Finch, Arthur Radley

It is partially based on Lee Harper's childhood, which is why the story is told by the child protagonist.

The loss of innocence, prejudice, racial challenges, honor, childhood, friendship, loss of innocence. The most powerful aspect is the very meaning behind "to kill a mockingbird", which means to destroy the innocence. It is made clear by Scout when he asks to "remember [that] it's a sin to kill a mockingbird". The flowers also symbolize patience and understanding, which are reflected by the white camellia flower.

To Kill a Mockingbird is not an easy book to read, yet it quickly became a symbol for the Civil Rights Movement all over the world. It teaches us about being brave, about injustice that must not be ignored, inequality around us, poverty, racism, corruption, anger control, innocence, oppression, hatred, and judging others. Reading this book reminds us of hope, patience, being equal to each other, and fighting for being brave and true.

The story starts when Tom Robinson, an African American male is accused of raping Mayella Ewell, a white woman, the local lawyer called Atticus agrees to defend Tom even though he receives threats from the community. Even when things are quickly getting dangerous, Atticus refuses to leave his client. His young son Scout unwittingly helps to settle down the challenge.

The book has almost been called "Atticus" instead of the famous title that we know so well. Harper Lee was writing only one manuscript page per day even though she worked for about 12 hours a day. The character of Atticus Finch has been inspired by Lee's father who also worked as the lawyer and defended African American clients. The book has helped to create a cottage industry in the author's hometown, which has started with a museum. Lee Harper decided to choose her middle name instead of "Nelle", which she was afraid could be mispronounced. To Kill a Mockingbird became one of the most beloved books in the American literary history. The character of Dill has been based on author's childhood friend Truman Capote who has also used her personality's character in his "Other Voices, Other Rooms" novel that has been published in 1948.

"The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience." "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it." "Mockingbirds don't do one thing except make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up people's gardens, don't nest in corn cribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." "It's never an insult to be called what somebody thinks is a bad name. It just shows you how poor that person is, it doesn't hurt you." "I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what."

The main factor in To Kill a Mockingbird is teaching one's children and reminding each other about the dangers of prejudice and judging others. Providing an example of defending a black male in the American South shows that one must always keep the faith and seek the truth regardless of the conditions.

It is one of the most influential civil rights movement works in English literature and a symbolism of social challenge, culture, courage, defense of truth, and justice. It is also an essay topic where a person learns about prejudice and understanding that one has to be in another person's shoes to see and understand what it is like. Choosing this book as an essay topic, middle school, high school, and college students learn about justice, honor, and courage.

1. Macaluso, M. (2017). Teaching To kill a mockingbird today: Coming to terms with race, racism, and America's novel. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 61(3), 279-287. (https://ila.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/jaal.678) 2. Tanış, A., & Cengizhan, L. (2010). Analyzing the novel “to kill a Mockingbird” in literature class. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2(2), 4387-4391. (https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S187704281000738X) 3. Al-Mamoory, S., & Witwit, M. A. (2021). Critical Discourse Analysis of Opression in''To Kill a Mockingbird''. Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Research, 9(02), 11-24. (http://journals.researchub.org/index.php/jsshr/article/view/1243) 4. Stiltner, M. A. (2002). Don't put your shoes on the bed: A moral analysis of “To Kill a Mockingbird”. East Tennessee State University.(https://www.proquest.com/openview/fa19ac9b0047942ce79bc14a55116582/1?pq-origsite=gscholar&cbl=18750&diss=y) 5. Khokhar, M. I., & Mashori, G. M. (2018). Marxist Analysis of to Kill A Mockingbird According To Peter Barry. Journal of Grassroot, 52(2). (https://www.prdb.pk/article/marxist-analysis-of-to-kill-a-mockingbird-according-to-peter-2526) 6. Shackelford, D. (1996). The Female Voice in" To Kill a Mockingbird": Narrative Strategies in Film and Novel. The Mississippi Quarterly, 50(1), 101-113. (https://www.jstor.org/stable/26475781) 7. Sastrawijaya, M. D. (2021). The Character and Moral Values in “to Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee. INFERENCE: Journal of English Language Teaching, 3(1), 81-87. (https://journal.lppmunindra.ac.id/index.php/inference/article/view/6070) 8. Winarni, B., Nugroho, A., & Fatimah, S. (2013). Affection And Prejudice In To Kill A Mockingbird Novel By Harper Lee (1960): A Psychoanalytic Approach (Doctoral dissertation, Universitas Muhammadiyah Surakarta). (http://eprints.ums.ac.id/26577/)

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101 To Kill a Mockingbird Essay Titles & Examples

If you struggle to find “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay topics on prejudice, race, the characters’ courage, or any other issue, look no further. Our team has prepared a list of titles and essay writing tips for this book.

🏆 Best To Kill a Mockingbird Essay Topics & Examples

📌 most interesting to kill a mockingbird essay titles, 👍 good to kill a mockingbird research topics, ❓ to kill a mockingbird essay questions.

Before we will talk about the do’s and don’ts in essay writing, let’s clarify the types of essay.

When working on “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay thesis, you can focus on the facts of the book or concentrate on your attitude towards its key issues and characters. According to your approach, we can divide essays into two main areas:

Objective essay: you set out your personal thoughts on a chosen issue and provide supporting arguments and evidence;
Subjective essay: you express your point of view on a specific topic without claiming the truth and strengthening it with facts.

For example, when you choose a “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay topics on goodness, you will state that Atticus is a kind and fearless. No doubt that this character has a positive role.

On the other hand, when you describe Mayella, you will have to choose: will you condemn her or express pity.

As for the essay content, it can be divided into many subcategories:

Philosophical essay
Critical essay
Literary analysis
Historical essay, etc.

There are also a few key literary types:

Feature article, etc.

Do’s & Don’ts When Writing To Kill a Mockingbird Essays

Now, it’s time to talk about what you should write and what to avoid in your paper. First of all, you have to remember that all “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay titles should reveal the essence of the issue.

Recommendations for essay writing:

Do mark your essay subject at the beginning of the text. “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay hooks will help you to catch the reader’s attention. Don’t forget to emphasize the central issue in the conclusion.
Do support the style of presentation by your emotions, vision, and opinion. Use the “question-answer” in paragraphs. Make the transitions between paragraphs harmonious and smooth.
Do use quotes, historical facts, and observations to argue the thesis statement, solve the main issue, and describe the key subject of the paper.
Do stick to the central thesis of your essay. Avoid deepen into philosophical reflections — tell about concrete facts and examples. Here’s an example: don’t include the facts from the author’s biography if you focus on the events of the book and factors that affect discrimination.
Do proofread the paper. Read carefully your essay several times and think if your readers will understand your expressions.
Do not use specific terminology in “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay. For example, when you write about discrimination, you don’t necessarily have to provide its dictionary definition or use complex law, historical and psychological literature, and samples. Just your own language. However, it doesn’t mean that your opinion should seem ungrounded.
Do add your emotions to the paper. Let your readers feel that you believe in your ideas when defending the essay thesis.
Don’t choose the header before you write an essay. First, you should write an essay, and only then compile the title of your paper.

Well, now you know about the essay types, what to do, and what to avoid in your essay. Of course, you may ask: “What to write in my own essay?”

The key to success is to start. Check “To Kill a Mockingbird” essay examples on our website to get inspiration. Even the topic seems to you too complicated, start your research, and then you will be able to express new and original thoughts.

Slavery in To Kill a Mockingbird Novel The introduction of Tom by the author is a plot device to represent the plight of the slaves in the state.
“To Kill a Mockingbird”: Book and Movie Differences It is important to note that the film, To Kill a Mockingbird entails most of the aspects depicted in the novel.
To Kill a Mockingbird Main Themes The main themes of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird cover both adult and children’s concerns, including the dignity of human life, the importance of truth, the rights of people to be different, the need […]
“To Kill a Mockingbird” (1962) by Robert Mulligan This movie presented a timely reflection of the extent of deep racial problems and social injustices existing in the southern part of the US in the early 60s.
Novel Appreciation: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee The contemporary discussion of this novel is often tied to the question of racism; nevertheless, I am convinced that this book can be of great interest to modern readers, and I would like to discuss […]
To Kill a Mockingbird: Movie Analysis Speaking of the movements which convey the essence of the film without any speech “intrusion”, it would be a good idea to drive the example of Boo Radley standing in the darker corner of the […]
Nelle Harper Lee and Her Reflection in “To Kill a Mockingbird” The author perfectly reflects her life in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird as her father played an essential role in creating the story.
The Title of Lee’s “How to Kill a Mockingbird” Book The novel’s core topic is the disappearance of innocence and the influence of bias on the lives of the novel’s characters.
Empathy and Racism in Stockett’s The Help and Li’s To Kill a Mockingbird To start with, the first approach to racism and promoting empathy is to confront prevalent discrimination and racism, which was often shown in The Help. Another solution to racism and the possibility of promoting empathy […]
Systemic Racism in Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” & Whitehead’s “The Nickel Boys” Racism in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird is pronounced and presented as the natural habitat of the town of Maycomb.
Reflections of Harper Lee’s Life in “To Kill a Mockingbird” Nelle Harper Lee wrote a book, “To kill a Mockingbird,” this novel is one of greatest in the history of world literature, but the author would never have written the book without the best friend […]
Themes in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird, in its imperfection, is a testament to the march of progress in social justice and racial equality.
Lift a Ban on “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Lee Understanding different activities have remained vital in society.”To Kill a Mockingbird” is a book that explains the problems of the United States and promotes people to be just and respect human rights.
“To Kill a Mockingbird” Drama Film The plot proves to be logical and consistent throughout the movie, motivating the audience to watch till the end of the film.
Understanding Other Perspective: To Kill a Mockingbird The literature portrays the actual happenings in the society in an educative and corrective manner that is acceptable to both sides of the victim and perpetrator of injustices.
“To Kill a Mockingbird”: The Novel by Harper Lee Scout does not realize the severity of many of the events of the book as they are taking place, and as such she is an innocent.
American History in “To Kill a Mockingbird” Book & Film Racial attitudes and the dominance of white men over the black ones in the USA are the central ideas of the movie and the novel.
Racist Trial in the Novel “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee For the purpose, evaluation would be made in the context of utilization of events, time and culture of the book and compare it to today’s society, culture and racial attitudes.
Racial Prejudice in Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird” Paul Lawrence Dunbar in his poem, “Sympathy” has vividly portrayed the pangs of a caged bird and likens it to the collective pain that colored people have felt like victims of racial prejudices.”And a pain […]
“To Kill a Mockingbird” Novel by Harper Lee It is one of the main characteristics of the mockingbird includes its innocence and imitation of the songs of other birds in a loud voice.
“To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee In consequence, the book became a model source of reading that inspired people to further take on the issues of race in the USA and throughout the world.
Analysis of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird Although the innocent black man is killed while attempting to break out of prison when he might have gone free had the case proceeded to a higher court, Atticus and the town’s sheriff conjure a […]
American Novel: “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee It is also worth to mention that the novel is indeed relevant to its readership because it mirrors the nature of society affected by racism and inequality. Through the act of inclusiveness, I am in […]
What It Takes to Kill a Mockingbird: In Search for the Differences Between the Novel and a Movie The characters both in the novel and in the movie were often pushed to the breaking point; however, one of such moments described in the book was left out of the movie.
The Problem of Racism and Injustice in To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee In the novel, Harper Lee demonstrates her vision of the question of the social inequality with references to the problem of racism in the society based on prejudice and absence of actual principles of tolerance […]
Social Issues in the “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee The phrase ‘to kill a mocking bird’ stands out as a metaphor in the book To kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.
Moral Principles in Harper Lee’s Novel To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee explores a great number of themes in the first chapters of the novel, for example, integrity of a person and his/her ability contradict the norms, adopted in the community.
To Kill a Mockingbird The author, in the novel To Kill a Mocking Bird presents a deeper understanding in relation to events occurring in her novel. To enhance understanding of the novel, the author has widely embraced symbolism in […]
“To Kill a Mockingbird” and the Techniques Used: Characterisation, Structure, Point of View, and Language
The Different Types of Families Represented in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Atticus Finch’s Views on Race and How They Change Throughout “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Racist Attitudes of the People in Maycomb County in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
“To Kill a Mockingbird”: How Symbolism Reinforces Important Ideas
The Supproting Character of Boo Radley as a Hero in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Unjust Persecution as a Major Theme in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Significance of the Title of “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Use of Symbols in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Trial of Tom Robinson and Its Role in Exploring the Issue of Racism in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Violence and Alienation in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
“To Kill a Mockingbird”: The Importance of Understanding Individual Differences
True Courage in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Two Types of Underprivileged People in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Influences Parents Have on Their Children in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The References That Suggest to Boo Radley and Tom Robinson in Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Tom Robinson and Boo Radley as Mockingbirds in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Southern Gothic Elements in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Resemblance Between Tom Robinson and Boo Radley in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Themes of Childhoods in “Jane Eyre” and “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Role of Family in Shaping the Characters in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Affects of One’s Surrounding Environment on Their Personality and Morals in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The True Heroic Qualities of Atticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Theme of the Loss of Childhood Innocence in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Town of Maycomb’s Role in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Different Types of Prejudice Represented in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Atticus Finch as a Moral Compass for His Children in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Moral Development of the Characters in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Impact of Cowardice on the Characters in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Mrs Dubose as an Example of Courage in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Impact of Scout’s Family on Her Development in “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Victims of Stereotyping in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Atticus Finch as a Father Figure in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Tragic Hero in “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “The Crucible”
The Themes of Racism and Fear of the Unknown in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Hidden Symbols in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Value of Informal Education in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Tom Robinson’s Trial as a Central Part of “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Unarmed Bravery in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
Use of Piaget’s Theories of Child Development in Analyzing “To Kill a Mockingbird”
The Tolerance Level of the Characters in “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee
The Use of Symbolism and Irony in Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird”
Tom Robinson’s Conviction in Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird”
How Old Is Atticus Finch in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Does Mrs. Maudie’s Nut Grass Symbolize in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Does Scout Describe Dill in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Is the Theme of Femininity and the Power of Women From “To Kill a Mockingbird” Still Relevant Today?
Who Are the Radleys in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
Why Does Scout Have That Nickname in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Are Fathers Presented in the Novel “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Is the Main Meaning of “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Does Author Present Racial Issues During the 1930s in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Are the Two Main Plots in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Is the Irony in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Is the Most Important Lesson in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
Is “To Kill a Mockingbird” Still Relevant Today?
How Does Lee Make Atticus Finch a Heroic Figure in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What “To Kill a Mockingbird” Teaches Us?
What Are Some Life Lessons From “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Is the First Turning Point in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What’s the Climax of “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Are Some Symbols in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Are Prejudice and Hypocrisy Explored in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Does Harper Lee Build Up Tension Throughout the Novel “To Kill a Mockingbird?
How Has “To Kill a Mockingbird” Changed the World?
Why Should Students Read “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Does Harper Lee Use Minor Characters in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
How Does “To Kill a Mockingbird” Connect to the World?
What Does the Reader Learn About the Social Setting in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Are the Most Important Quotes in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
Who Is the Protagonist in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
Who Lost Their Innocence in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
What Does the Mad Dog Represent in “To Kill a Mockingbird”?
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To Kill a Mockingbird

Everything you need for every book you read..

Welcome to the LitCharts study guide on Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird . Created by the original team behind SparkNotes, LitCharts are the world's best literature guides.

To Kill a Mockingbird: Introduction

To kill a mockingbird: plot summary, to kill a mockingbird: detailed summary & analysis, to kill a mockingbird: themes, to kill a mockingbird: quotes, to kill a mockingbird: characters, to kill a mockingbird: symbols, to kill a mockingbird: theme wheel, brief biography of harper lee.

Historical Context of To Kill a Mockingbird

Other books related to to kill a mockingbird.

Full Title: To Kill a Mockingbird
When Written: 1950-1960
Where Written: New York City and Monroeville, Alabama
When Published: 1960
Literary Period: Modernism
Genre: Bildungsroman; Social Novel
Setting: The fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama during the Great Depression
Climax: The trial of Tom Robinson; or when Bob Ewell attacks Scout and Jem
Antagonist: Bob Ewell; more broadly, racism and mob mentality
Point of View: First Person

Extra Credit for To Kill a Mockingbird

“Dill” Capote. The character of Dill is based on Harper Lee’s real-life childhood friend, Truman Capote, who went on to become a national literary star in his own right. He wrote the bestselling true crime book In Cold Blood .

Atticus in Real Life. Harper Lee became close friends with Gregory Peck, the actor who played Atticus in the Academy Award-winning film adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird . She remained close with his family after Peck died, and Peck’s grandson is even named Harper after her.

To Kill a Mockingbird Harper Lee

To Kill a Mockingbird essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

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To Kill a Mockingbird Essays

The good, the bad, and the deep south: character analysis of aunt alexandra anonymous 9th grade, to kill a mockingbird.

The novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee explored the racist south during the Jim Crow era through the lense of a girl, Scout Finch. Through the novel, we learn of the experiences of the people living through this time, and how racism was...

Walk in Their Footsteps: The Importance of Empathy in To Kill a Mockingbird and A Time to Kill Kristin Virginia Freitas 10th Grade

In the novels To Kill a Mockingbird written by Harper Lee and A Time to Kill by John Grisham, the towns of Maycomb and Clanton Mississippi have two men accused and most people already know who they are voting guilty. Their outlooks on each other...

To What Extent Do To Kill a Mockingbird, The Help, and Get Out Engage with White Poverty in their Depiction of White Women? Summer Jade Dolan College

With the defeat of Jefferson Davis’ confederacy in 1865, the American South became a region marked by poverty. The Civil War not only destroyed large amounts of Southern infrastructure, but also devastated the demographic that would typically be...

The Impact of Class Structure John Florio

The rigid class structure and social stratification of Maycomb County had a profound effect on the events in the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The impact of this class structure and the underlying prejudice was especially evident in...

Justice in To Kill a Mockingbird Yiran Guo

Justice and its relationship with prejudice is the central theme of the timeless 1960 novel, Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird. Its focal point is the trial of Tom Robinson, an African-American erroneously charged with the rape of a white girl,...

The Journey Motif in Works of American Literature Anonymous 10th Grade

The journey motif is one of the most widely used elements in American literature. The journey is a powerful symbol often used to represent a character’s adventure leading to an epiphany, or some sort of self-realization. This literary device can...

Prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird and Goin' Someplace Special Anonymous 10th Grade

Prejudice is a pre-judgement formed about something or someone - but it is more than this as well? This complex idea is highlighted in the novel, To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee and the picture book Goin’ Someplace Special by Patricia...

Character Analysis in To Kill A Mockingbird Katherine Dufour 10th Grade

While most people in society strive to have moral attributes, not everyone understands what traits are important in achieving this goal. Often, people attempt to model themselves after another’s example. In the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, by...

Through Scout's Eyes: The Concept of Perspective Kyle R. Keenan College

“To Kill a Mockingbird” by Harper Lee is one of the greatest works of American literature of all time. It has been reprinted again and again, and is a staple in almost any writing or history class. There are a number of reasons why it can be...

Scout’s Perception of Truth and Reality Anonymous 10th Grade

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it” (Lee 33). Atticus Finch tells this quote to the main character, Scout Finch, in the book To Kill a...

Mayella Ewell Anonymous 12th Grade

In the coming of age novel, To Kill a Mockingbird , Harper Lee portrays many characters in various ways, but none more insidious than Mayella Violet Ewell. Mayella is the story’s boldest antagonist. She is a static character who undergoes no inner...

The Key Influences in Scout's and Jem's Lives Anonymous 9th Grade

The course of growing up is always influenced by the people around you, since the people in your environment are vital in shaping the person you will become. Harper Lee demonstrates this reality in the classic tale To Kill a Mockingbird , through...

Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird: Farewell to Childhood Anonymous 9th Grade

Often, there is no greater power that influences an individual’s development than his or her surroundings. It is one’s society that establishes what is generally accepted and how one comes to act within that society. In the novel To Kill a...

Who's Afraid of Boo Radley?: An Essay on To Kill a Mockingbird Mahyar Mirrashed 9th Grade

Throughout the novel To Kill a Mockingbird , Scout’s feelings and notions regarding Arthur “Boo” Radley change from her initial preconceived impression that he was a monster, to accepting Boo as a person and empathizing his perspective of the...

Jem the Visionary: Characterization in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 9th Grade

In Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird , Scout's (the narrator's) older brother, Jem, plays an ironically important role. He may seem similar to other boys in Maycomb given his brotherly characteristics, but there is more to his character. Jem is a...

Irreality in‭ ‬To Kill a Mockingbird: An Overview of Scholarly Perspectives Anonymous College

Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) is commonly understood to be a coming of age story that deal with the theme of racial discrimination in the American South during the Great Depression. Close inspection of the novel reveals many...

Bob Ewell: A Journey into the World of an Alcoholic Christopher J Parsick 10th Grade

To Kill a Mockingbird is many things: just to name a few, it is a comment on racism, class, and the mob mentality. In this brilliant novel, there are a lot of well defined characters whose goings on in the fictional Maycomb County help to propel...

Understanding the Meaning of the Books Mentioned in Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" Amotz Fraenkel 11th Grade

In To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, a variety of allusions to other works of literature arise, suggesting to the adept reader their significance to the plot and in our understanding of many characters and themes. Two books of special...

Influences of Society on Gender in The Color Purple and To Kill a Mockingbird Zaneb Mansha 11th Grade

Gender roles are learned mainly through social interaction rather than biologically. When people are born, they are supplied with very little knowledge of gender. Certain behavior is taught by means of social interactions and through relationships...

Jem and Gender, Calpurnia and Race: Challenging and Defying Stereotypes in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 10th Grade

In Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird , multiple characters defy stereotypes made about them and are even able to change opinions and lifestyles of people around them. The book takes place in Maycomb County, Alabama during the 1930s. The book...

The Standards of Love Anonymous 9th Grade

Every society has unwritten rules that everyone respects, and it is momentous when these boundaries are crossed. In To Kill a Mockingbird , Harper Lee develops the argument that love creates a loyalty that can overcome any standards. The author...

A Comparison of Justice in Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ and Charles Dickens’ ‘Great Expectations’ Anonymous 12th Grade

While both Harper Lee and Charles Dickens have parallels in the way they portray justice and the legal system in their respective novels, there are contrasts in the way they portray both Victorian London and the Deep South in the 20th Century....

Discrimination to Destruction: The Impact of Individuals on Communities in Harper Lee and Anne Frank Anonymous 8th Grade

Throughout history, racism has been the cause of thousands of historical events that have ripped populations apart. To be more general, the discrimination of individuals always leads up to the split of the community itself. Within Harper Lee’s To...

Unexpected Models: The Importance of Neighbors as Seen in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 10th Grade

The main focus of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) is that neighbors are, and always will be, the essence of a town and that they are important in many respects. Neighbors not only being those that live directly next to you but also those...

To Kill a Mockingbird

By harper lee.

'To Kill A Mockingbird' is a coming of age story where a child discovers that white and black belong to two unfairly different worlds in her society.

About the Book

Article written by Onyekachi Osuji

B.A. in Public Administration and certified in Creative Writing (Fiction and Non-Fiction)

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee tells the story of a child whose carefree relish of her childhood is given a rude awakening by the realization that she lives in an unjust and racist society when she witnesses the unfair conviction of a black man wrongly accused of raping a white woman.

’Spoiler Free’ Summary of To Kill a Mockingbird

The novel begins with the character of Scout describing her brother Jem’s arm injury that happened years earlier. Jem and Scout have several theories about what led to the injury and argue about it, then to settle the argument, they seek their father’s opinion, and their father tells them that they are both right.

Scout then begins to narrate the events of the years before Jem’s injury. They live in a nice residential area of a town called Maycomb County. It is a small town where everyone knows everyone else down to their ancestry, and the people are accustomed to social interactions with each other. However, there is a house in Scout’s neighborhood that is of interest to the people of the town because the house is always shut and the inhabitants of the house never socialize with neighbors.

The inhabitants of this house are the Radleys and their youngest son Arthur Radley who is never seen outside is nicknamed Boo Radley and described as an awkward monster in children’s imagination.

One summer, Scout and Dill meet a new boy in the neighborhood called Dill. Dill lives in another city but would be coming to Maycomb County every summer to stay with his relative. Scout and Jem become friends with Dill who is fascinated with the legend of the never-seen Boo Radley. Dill begins to formulate dares and plots to get them all to go to the Radley house in the hope of seeing Boo Radley. But they never succeed in seeing him.

Scout’s father is a lawyer called Atticus. One time in school, other pupils begin to taunt Scout for having a dad who is a ‘’nigger lover’’. Scout tells her father about it, and her father tells her about a client he has been assigned to defend in court. The client’s name is Tom Robinson and he has been falsely accused of raping a white girl named Mayella Ewell. Atticus tells Scout that the case is not until the next summer but that she must stay strong and be prepared to resist such taunting with grace.

Summer comes, and Tom Robinson is tried in court with Atticus as his defense attorney. Scout and the other kids have high hopes that Tom Robinson would be freed. But the outcome was not as expected.

Events take a turn for the worse as lives are lost and endangered by some people who nurse racism and hatred in their hearts.

Complete Plot Summary of To Kill a Mockingbird

Scout is a girl of six who lives in a nice neighborhood with her brother Jem, her father Atticus, and their cook Calpurnia. Scout and Jem play together and later make friends with a boy named Dill, who visits the neighborhood every summer.

A house close to them is always shut, and no one ever visits it. The occupants of the House are the Radleys, who do not socialize in the town. The youngest son of the Radleys had never been seen since years ago when he was a teenage boy, and he is rumored to be a monster and nicknamed Boo.

Dill is fascinated with Boo and devices various plots to get himself, Scout, and Jem close enough to the Radley House for them to get a glimpse of Boo. But all their childish plots fail, and they content themselves with enacting drama about their imagination of Boo’s life.

Scout begins school and their teacher Miss Caroline Fisher, an inexperienced young teacher, asks everyone to bring out their food in class. Seeing that one of the pupils does not have any food, Miss Fisher offers to lend him money to buy something to eat. Scout volunteers to explain to the teacher that the boy cannot afford to borrow money from her because they are poor but this gets her on the wrong footing with Miss Fisher and she gets whipped.

The boy concerned is Walter Cunningham whose father was once a client of Scout’s father Atticus. Scout fights with Walter at break time for being the cause of her getting whipped but later as a peace offering invites him to lunch with her at home.

Scout and Jem begin to be mocked by people because their father chose to defend a black man in a court case. Atticus explains to them that they must hold their heads high and ignore the taunts because the case of the black man is one he must defend if he wants to live well with his conscience. The case is that of a black young man who was accused of rape by a white girl and her father.

Mrs Henry Lafayette Dubose, a mean old lady that lives two houses away from Atticus’s house sees Jem and Scout and begins to taunt them for their father’s legal defense of a black man. In a fit of rage, Jem destroys the flowers in her front yard. Atticus finds out and instructs Jem to go and apologize to Mrs Dubose. Jem does as instructed and Mrs Dubose insists that Jem must come read to her every day for one month and Jem grudgingly obeys.

Mrs Dubose later dies and Atticus uses her as an example to teach Jem that people have both good and bad in them. Mrs Dubose was a mean old lady but she was courageous and chose to withdraw from her medically prescribed morphine addiction even though it caused her great pain.

Atticus travels for work for some days and their cook Calpurnia takes Scout and Jem to her church. There, the children discover that the black community is very different from their own white community. The cook, Calpurnia who speaks and writes good grammar speaks vernacular when around fellow black folks. Scout also witnesses Reverend Sykes organize a collection to help Tom Robinson’s wife and children who are left without support as his wife was finding it hard to get employment following her husband’s imprisonment.

Atticus’ sister, Alexandra moves in with Atticus. In her opinion, Atticus is not raising his children well and she has to help him teach them to behave like people from a respectable family.

Dill runs away from home and sneaks into Scout’s room. He is discovered by Scout and Jem and Scout plans to keep his presence a secret but Jem reports the incident to Atticus. After a stern warning, Dill is allowed to live with them.

The date of Tom Robinson’s trial draws near and the entire town is filled with tension. Atticus goes to stand guard at the jail where Tom is locked up. Jem, Scout, and Dill sneak out of the house and go in search of Atticus. They find him sitting at the jailhouse and shortly after, a group of men arrive asking Atticus to allow them access to Tom. Scout senses that they may harm Atticus and emerges from her hiding place. She recognizes Mr. Cunningham, her father’s former client, and the father of her classmate Walter Cunningham, among the group and begins to engage him in conversation.

After a while, Mr. Cunningham begins to feel awkward about their intention to lynch a prisoner and requests that his band leaves the scene. And so, Scout saves Tom Robinson from getting lynched without even knowing it.

The day of Tom Robinson’s trial comes and the entire Maycomb County, where nothing exciting ever happens, converges at the local court to witness the trial. The trial begins, and after a hard-fought case with a strong defense, Tom Robinson is still pronounced guilty by the jury. Bob Ewell, the father of the girl who claimed Tom Robinson raped her, threatens to hurt Atticus for humiliating him in court during cross-examination at the witness box.

Atticus assures Tom Robinson that there is still hope as they would appeal the case in a higher court. But Tom Robinson does not believe that there is any hope for a man in his position. He attempts to escape from prison but is shot dead by guards.

Months go by and the Tom Robinson tragedy is forgotten. The people of Maycomb County organise a Halloween party where children would perform on stage in various costumes. Scout is given the costume of a ham. Scout’s father and her aunt excuse themselves from attending the party and Jem is asked to accompany Scout as it is a night party. Scout makes an embarrassing flop in her performance at the party.

After the party, Scout decides to walk home in her heavy costume. As she walks home with Jem, Bob Ewell attacks them. He slices his knife at Scout but her costume protects her from getting harmed. Jem tries to fight him off but is shoved aside so violently that he breaks his arm and becomes unconscious. Boo Radley hears their screams and rushes to their defense. Boo Radley stabs Bob Ewell and carries Jem to Atticus.

Heck Tate, the sheriff of the county, is summoned. He finds Bod Ewell stabbed to death and after gathering information about the incident, he deduces that Bob Ewell was stabbed by Boo Radley. But in a bid to protect the shy Boo Radley’s privacy from public attention, he lies in his report, claiming that Bob Ewell died by stumbling upon his knife.

Scout finally sees Boo Radley in person and exchanges a few polite words with him. She walks Boo Radley to his front porch and he retires inside, never to be seen again.

Who comes and threatens Atticus?

It is Bob Ewell that threatens Atticus. Bob Ewell is a nasty man who accused Tom Robinson of raping his daughter. He hates Atticus for humiliating him in court and for choosing to defend a black man.

Why won’t Jem go home when Atticus tells him to?

Jem refuses to go home when Atticus tells him to because he is afraid that Atticus would get hurt. Atticus was facing a mob that was trying to lynch his client in jail.

How did the Radley house acquire its reputation?

The Radley house acquired its reputation because its windows and doors were always shut, the occupants of the house never visited anyone and never received any visitors. All these were unusual behavior in a small town where everyone socialized with everyone else, and for this, the house acquired the reputation of being a strange, spooky place.

Why did Scout fight Walter Cunningham?

Scout fought Walter Cunningham because their teacher whipped her in class for trying to explain his situation to her. And so, Scout felt it was Walter Cunningham’s fault that she got whipped.

About Onyekachi Osuji

Onyekachi was already an adult when she discovered the rich artistry in the storytelling craft of her people—the native Igbo tribe of Africa. This connection to her roots has inspired her to become a Literature enthusiast with an interest in the stories of Igbo origin and books from writers of diverse backgrounds. She writes stories of her own and works on Literary Analysis in various genres.

Cite This Page

Osuji, Onyekachi " To Kill a Mockingbird Summary 📖 " Book Analysis , https://bookanalysis.com/harper-lee/to-kill-a-mockingbird/summary/ . Accessed 5 April 2024.

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To Kill a Mockingbird

Author: Harper Lee

Introduction

Literary elements.

To Kill a Mockingbird book report - detailed analysis, book summary, literary elements, character analysis, Harper Lee biography, and everything necessary for active class participation.

To Kill a Mockingbird is a groundbreaking novel written by Harper Lee and published in America in 1960. The novel was one of the first of it's kind to deal with the subjects of racial inequality and rape and is still widely read in schools to this day. Harper Lee wrote the book based off of an incident that happened in her small, southern town when she was a child in the '30's. As such, the book is seen as being in the Southern Gothic genre.

The story of To Kill a Mockingbird is that of 6 year old Scout Finch, a little girl living in the small town of Maycomb, Alabama during the Great Depression of the '30's. Scout lives with her older brother, Jem and their widowed lawyer father, Atticus. In the summer of 1933, Scout and her brother befriend a boy named Dill who stays summers in Maycomb to be with his aunt.

As the children play, Dill quickly becomes fascinated with an old, spooky house on their street. Scout and Jem inform him that it's the house of a man named Arthur Radley (nicknamed Boo), who lives as a shut-in. The three children begin to tell imaginative stories about Boo Radley and start receiving presents from him the knothole of a tree in his yard.

Meanwhile, Scout and Jem's father, Atticus is called upon to defend a black man, Tom Robinson who has been accused of raping a white woman. Most of the white people of Maycomb are disgusted by Atticus' acceptance of the case and take their anger out on him and his children by shunning them and shouting abuse in the street. Atticus finds he must face down a mob of his former friends and neighbors to defend the rights of an innocent man and teach his two children a valuable lesson in the process.

Genre: bildungsroman, southern gothic

Setting: a small town in Alabama during the early 1930s

Point of view: first-person

Narrator: Jean "Scout" Finch

Tone: folksy reminiscence, foreboding, serious

Mood: humorous, light

Theme: the story about consequences of prejudice and racism

The story is narrated by a young girl name Jean Louise Finch, nicknamed Scout, who begins by telling us a little bit of back story about her family and her father, Atticus Finch. Atticus is a respected lawyer who is one of the few citizens left in their town, Maycomb, Alabama that makes a solid, comfortable living. Gripped by the Great Depression, most of the rest of the town has fallen on hard times. The Finches live in a house on the main residential street in Maycomb with their cook, Calpurnia who also acts as a housekeeper and helps raise the children.

The book begins in the summer of 1933 when Scout is almost six and her brother is ten. That summer a boy named Charles Baker Harris moves in next door to live with his aunt. The boy, who calls himself Dill, has been sent to stay the summer with his aunt, Rachel. Scout and Jem quickly take to Dill and the three children become regular playmates. One day, Dill notices a run-down, dilapidated house on their block and asks Scout about it. She tells him that it belongs to a man called Nathan Radley who lives there with his brother, Arthur who everyone calls "Boo".

Boo Radley has not been seen outside his house in years and lives as a shut-in for unknown reasons. Scout only knows the story which has been passed around the town's children, that Boo was imprisoned in the house as punishment by his father after he got into trouble with the law as a young boy. He was not seen again until fifteen years later, when he stabbed his father with a pair of scissors. The people of the town insisted that Boo was crazy and needed to be put in an institution, but his father refused and when he died Boo's older brother, Nathan came to live in the house with Boo.

Dill becomes enamored with the story and tries to convince Scout and Jem to help him lure Boo out of his house. Not making any headway there, he finally dares Jem to run up and touch the house and he does so hastily, sprinting back across the lawn afterward. Scout notes that she thinks she sees a shutter on the Radley house move slightly as if someone were peeking out.

At the end of the summer, Dill leaves Maycomb to return to his mother's house and the Finch children prepare to start school. Scout in particular is excited about starting school as it is her first year. However, she quickly finds that her teacher, Miss Caroline doesn't like children very much and seems to be openly contemptuous of them. Once she is back home, Scout tells her father that she doesn't want to go to school anymore and asks if he could teach her himself. Atticus says that it is the law that she go to school, but promises to keep reading to her and teaching her when he can.

One day while Scout is walking home from school, she passes the Radley house and notices some tinfoil in a knothole in one of the Radley's trees. Inside the tinfoil are two pieces of chewing gum. Scout chews both pieces until Jem hears of it and makes her spit them out from fear that they are poisoned. However, soon after the two children find two old "Indian-head" pennies hidden in the same knothole and decide to keep them.

Summer comes and Dill returns and the three playmates pick up where they left off. Except this time they began to play a game called "Boo Radley" where they act out the Radley clans story as they know it. Eventually Atticus see them playing and asks if their game is about the Radleys. Jem lies out of fear of getting in trouble and Atticus seems placated. But later he spots Jem and Dill attempting to stick a note onto the window of the Radley house with a fishing pole. Realizing what they're doing, Atticus orders them to "stop tormenting that man" and to stop playing the Boo Radley game. The children obey him for a little while until on Dill's last day in town, they decide to sneak into the Radley place and peek in through a loose shutter. They are successful in their game until, looking in through the windows they see a shadow of a man with a hat and get spooked into fleeing. As they run away they hear a shotgun go off behind them. In the retreat, Jem's pants become stuck on a fence and he has to kick them off to get free. Later, when Jem is able to sneak back to the house to retrieve his pants, he finds that they have been freshly mended and hung on the fence.

The next day the children find another present hidden in the knothole, a ball of gray twine. Soon more gifts begin to show up including chewing gum, a spelling bee medal, an old pocket watch and two figures carved out of soap that resemble Jem and Scout. Then one day the Finches find that the knothole has been plugged up with cement. Nathan Radley tells them that he did it because the tree is dying.

A short while later a neighbor, Miss Maudie's house burns down one night. Atticus wakes up the children and they all go out to help save what they can from the house. Scout sits down on a curb to await her father and in the confusion someone places a blanket on her shoulders to keep her warm. When Atticus asks her who did it she realizes that she doesn't know and Jem assumes that it was Boo Radley. He tells their father the whole story of the knothole and the mended pants and Atticus warns the children to keep the story to themselves. Scout is so frightened by the idea of Boo standing just behind her that she nearly vomits.

The next day, Scout nearly starts a fight with a boy when he makes fun of her for a case that Atticus has recently acquired. The case is the defense of a man named Tom Robinson, a black man who is accused of raping a white woman. Atticus tells Scout that he took the case because he believes that Tom is innocent and he feels that he must defend him to uphold his personal sense of justice. Later though, Scout overhears her father saying that Tom Robinson is probably doomed as it is inconceivable that an all-white jury would acquit him.

Soon the children begin to face comments and abuse from their former friends and neighbors about their father's defense of Tom Robinson. The town of Maycomb, whose inhabitants have thus far been painted in a positive light, begin to turn on the Finches, furious that Atticus, their best lawyer would represent a black man. Scout and Jem begin to see the town differently, now exposed to the childishness of the adults in their world and the seedy underbelly and racism of the town that they love dearly. Atticus cautions the children to avoid getting in any fights and to rise above the townspeople who are bullying them. To make matters worse, Dill does not come to Maycomb that year, instead sending a letter to say that his mother has remarried and he is living with her and her new husband. Scout is upset by this and by the fact that Jem seems to be growing up and pulling away from her.

Calpurnia, the housekeeper, decides to take Scout and Jem to her church. The children have never been to a black church before and are shocked to find that though this is the only black church in town, it only has one hymnal and that few of the parishioners can even read. However, the congregation is generally very friendly to the children and tell them that they know Atticus. After the service, Scout learns that Tom Robinson was accused by the white girl's father, Bob Ewell. Since Ewell is the notorious town drunk, Scout wonders why anyone would take his accusation seriously.

As the trial begins to take shape, Jem and Scout find that they have to endure even more whispers and disapproving glances when they're in town. With tensions high, Jem and Scout begin to argue with each other and one night after Atticus breaks up the fight and sends them to bed, they discover that Dill is hiding under Scout's bed.

Dill tells them that he has run away from his home because his parents weren't paying attention to him. He says that he took a train and covered the remaining distance from the station on the back of a cotton wagon. Jem tells Atticus and Atticus makes the boy comfortable with food and a bed before going next door to tell his aunt Rachel of his whereabouts.

A week later, a group of men come to the Finches door led by the sheriff. As his trial is getting closer, Tom Robinson is going to be moved to the Maycomb jail and they are worried about the town forming a lynch mob. The following evening Atticus leaves the house early to go into town. Jem, Scout and Dill sneak out to follow him and find him sitting in front of the Maycomb jail reading a newspaper. Jem suggests that they don't bother him. As they turn to leave, four cars drive up and a group of men get out and demand that Atticus move away from the jailhouse door. Atticus refuses and Scout races to his side, followed by Jem and Dill.

Worried for their safety, Atticus orders the children to go home but they refuse. One of the men in the mob informs Atticus that he has 15 seconds to take his children and leave. Scout recognizes Mr. Cunningham, the father of one of her classmates, in the crowd. She begins talking to him about his son and Mr. Cunningham gets so ashamed that he tells the men to disperse.

After they depart Mr. Underwood, the owner of the town's newspaper speaks from a nearby window. He tells Atticus that he: "had him covered all the time" and holds up a shotgun. Atticus and Mr. Underwood talk for a while and then Atticus takes the children home.

The next day the trial begins. Scores of people from all over the county show up in the courtroom supporting both sides. The trial is presided over by Judge Taylor a man who has a reputation for running a more informal court room. Thinking that they will sneak in, Scout and Jem arrive at the trial a bit late and are only able to find seats when Reverend Sykes from Calpurnia's church allows them to sit in the balcony where the black audience is required to sit. Mr. Gilmer, the prosecutor begins the trial by questioning the sheriff and the town doctor who both admit that the white woman, Mayella Ewell, told them that she had been raped by Tom Robinson. The doctor also says that the bruises that he found on Mayella's face were concentrated on the right side.

Next on the stand is Mayella's father, Bob. Bob Ewell is described as the town drunk and a rude, nasty little man. He testifies that on the night in question he heard Mayella screaming from inside their house and saw Tom Robinson raping her from a window. He ran in and Robinson fled, Ewell called for the town sheriff after that. Atticus has the witness write his name on a sheet of paper and notices that the man is left-handed. Therefore he would be more likely to hit someone on the right side of their face.

Mayella herself testifies next, saying that she offered Tom Robinson a nickel to break up a dresser for her and once he was inside her house he took advantage of her. Atticus asks her how it was that Robinson managed to bruise the right side of her face when his left hand is paralyzed after an accident with a cotton gin when he was a child. Atticus cross examines Mayella asking her to admit that Tom did not rape her and that her father beat her. Upset, Mayella bursts into tears, refusing to answer any more questions.

Robinson testifys next, saying that he often helps the Ewells with small chores as he passes by their house on the way home from work. He tells the court that on the evening in question Mayella asked him inside to help fix a door but when he got inside he found that there was nothing wrong with the door. Mayella then asked him to grab a box down from a dresser and when he climbed up on a chair she seized hold of his legs. This scared him so much that he jumped down at which point she grabbed him around the waist and asked him to kiss her. Before he could react her father appeared at the window calling Mayella a whore and saying that he was going to kill her. Tom fled for his life.

The defense rests and Mr. Gilmer begins to question Tom. He gets Tom to admit not only that he has a former charge of disorderly conduct but that he possess the strength to choke a woman and dash her to the floor even with only one hand. He bullies Tom into admitting that he often helps Mayella with chores only because he feels sorry for her. This upsets the audience in the courtroom as, in Maycomb black people aren't supposed to feel sorry for white people.

After Tom's questioning is over, Atticus makes a personal appeal to the jury. He points out that the prosecution has only provided two questionable witnesses and no medical evidence. Also, that the physical evidence suggests that it was Bob Ewell who beat his daughter. He begins to tell a different story, a story of how Mayella, lonely and depressed, found herself lusting after a black man and then covered her shame by accusing him of rape. Atticus begs the jury not to fall for the Ewell's lie and to see Tom Robinson for who he truly is and free him. The jury leaves to convene.

At that point Calpurnia marches into the court room and hands Atticus a note saying that his children have not been home since midday. When he notices that they are in the balcony, he asks Calpurnia to take them home. The children beg to be allowed to stay and Atticus tells them to go home and have supper and that they can return after that, knowing that the jury will probably be back before then.

Jem, Scout and Dill go home and eat dinner quickly arriving back to find that the jury is still out. The court room stays full, but the jury does not come back till after eleven that night and when they come back they deliver a guilty verdict. The courtroom begins to empty and as Atticus leaves all of the black people in the balcony rise to their feet as a sign of respect for him.

That night Jem cries over the injustice of the verdict. The following day, Maycomb's black population deliver huge amounts of home-cooked food to the Finch's house. Jem revels that he is upset by the verdict because it shattered his illusions about Maycomb and how nice of a town he thought it was. The children's neighbor, Miss Maudie points out that the jury staying out for as long as they did constitutes a sign of change in race relations in the county.

As the children leave Miss Maudie, they find out that Bob Ewella spat on their father that morning and swore revenge for ruining his public image.

Atticus tells the children that he is not worried about Bob Ewell's threat and that he assumes that the other man got it out of his system and will no longer be bothering them. Meanwhile, Tom Robinson has been sent to another prison in the next county while awaiting his appeal. Atticus states that Tom has a solid chance of being pardoned but when Scout asks him what will happen if he isn't, Atticus has to admit that Tom end up in the electric chair. Atticus echoes Miss Maudie's statement that they were lucky to have the jury deliberate for so long and that in the Alabama court of law the white man's words usually beat the black man's outright.

A few months later Atticus discovers that Tom Robinson attempted to escape from jail and was shot seventeen times. He brings Calpurnia along to tell the Robinson family of Tom's demise. Later, Jem tells Scout that he and Dill ran into Atticus on his way to the Robinson's house and convinced him to let them accompany him. He says that they saw Helen Robinson, Tom's wife collapse and start crying before Atticus could even tell her what happened. The people of Maycomb shake their heads at Tom for trying to escape and say only that it was "typical of a black man". Mr. Underwood condemns the death as the murder of an innocent man in his paper and Bob Ewell is overheard saying that Tom's death makes "one down and about two more to go".

Soon summer ends and Dill leaves. School starts again and Jem and Scout have to pass the Radley house everyday. They no longer find the house or it's inhabitants frightening, but Scout still wishes that she could see Boo Radley just once. The shadow of the trial and Bob Ewell's threat still hangs over the family. Bob begins to stalk both Judge Taylor and Helen Robinson, keeping his distance but obviously threatening them.

Scout gets cast in the schools Halloween play and Jem volunteers to walk her home after ward. On the way home, they hear someone behind them and frightened, begin to run. Hampered by her costume, Scout trips. Jem tries to help her but gets attacked by their assailant. In the confusion, Scout runs for her brother but is grabbed by someone and squeezed. Suddenly her attacker is pulled away. Scout feels around on the ground for Jem but finds only passed out body of an unshaven man who smells of whiskey. She runs home and sees a man carrying Jem toward the house. Once they reach home, Atticus calls the sheriff and the doctor, saying that someone has attacked his son. The doctor arrives and tells Atticus that Jem has a broken arm but that he will be alright.

The man who carried Jem home stays through the exam, but Scout does not recognize him. The sheriff appears and tells them that Bob Ewell was found lying dead under a tree with a knife in his chest. As Scout recounts her side of the events to the adults, she looks at the man who carried Jem home and realizes that he must be Boo Radley. Scout takes Boo out to the porch and they listen to Atticus and the sheriff argue. Atticus thinks his son killed Bob Ewell and doesn't not want him protected from the law. The sheriff insists on saying that Bob Ewell fell on his knife, knowing that it was Boo who actually killed him. Tom Robinson died for no reason, he says and now the man responsible is dead and that's good enough.

Scout walks Boo home. Once he goes inside his house she says that she never sees him again but that for a moment, she saw the world from his perspective. She returns home and finds Atticus reading a book to Jem. Scout sits in Jem's room and falls asleep to the sound of her father's voice.

Jean Louise "Scout" Finch - the main character and narrator of the story. Scout is a six-year old girl who lives with her widowed father, older brother, Jem and their housekeeper, Calpurnia in a large house in Maycomb, Alabama. She does not remember her mother, the woman having died when she was two years old.

Scout is a bright girl who loves reading and has a basic faith in people that is shaken by the town's campaign against Tom Robinson. Scout is a bit of a tomboy and possesses an angry streak that often gets her into fights in defense of her family's honor. Being so young, she is often left confused and bewildered by the Tom Robinson trial and finds it hard to follow at times, having to learn things about the law as often as she learns things about the people of the town. By the end of the book, Scout is three years older than she was in the beginning. She is both wiser and slightly more bitter. But it's clear that she still finds herself capable of appreciating human kindness.

Atticus Finch - he is one of literature's all-time classic heros. Both the father and moral center of the Finch family, he is a lawyer with a strong sense of morals and justice. He takes on the Tom Robinson case because of his commitment to racial equality and his commitment to doing whats right. Atticus stoically stands up against the outrage of the white community of Maycomb and instills these values of strong morality in his children through everyday lessons. At the end of the book, Atticus is obviously saddened by the loss of Tom Robinson's trial and, moreover his life but he does not seem to be fundamentally changed. He continues to look for the good in people, take care of his children and uphold the convictions that he holds most dear.

Jeremy Atticus "Jem" Finch - Scout's older brother and playmate. Jeremy begins the book as an innocent ten year-old boy whose biggest concern is what game to play that day and ends it as a wise young man on the cusp of his teenage years. He is perhaps even more upset than Scout by the loss of the Robinson trial and what it means for the town that he loved, but better at hiding it until they are alone. He has less of a defensive streak than Scout and constantly polices her outbursts so that she won't get into trouble. Jem clearly sees himself as Scout protector and spends most of his scenes in the book defending her both verbally and physically.

Arthur "Boo" Radley - a shut-in who has become somewhat of an urban legend among the residents of Maycomb. He is rumored to have killed his father as a young man and now lives with his brother in their run-down house.

It is clear from the beginning that he is a good man (evidenced by the gifts and food that the children find in the knothole of the tree and finally, by him saving their lives in the end of the book) although he is perhaps slightly mentally handicapped and has trouble interacting with people.

It is insinuated that Boo was emotionally crippled by his cruel father and he serves as one of the novels examples of an innocent person that was corrupted by the evil of mankind.

Bob Ewell - the father of Maycomb's poorest family and an unemployed drunk with more children than he can care for. Ewell accuses Tom Robinson of raping his daughter merely to avoid the shame of admitting that he was the one that beat her. His character is representative of the darker, racist side of the 1930's south.

Tom Robinson - the black man accused of raping Mayella Ewell. Tom is painted by the novel as the innocent collateral damage of the town's racist ways. He is another source of good in the novel that becomes corrupted by the 'bad' of the townspeople's hate. In the end of the book, Robinson attempts to escape prison and is killed by the guards.

Nelle Harper Lee was born in Monroeville, Alabama in April of 1926. The youngest of four children, Lee was the daughter of a lawyer and a homemaker and a lover of English literature and sometime law student.

Though she had only one book published, "To Kill A Mockingbird" became a smashing success immediately, winning the 1961 Pulitzer Prize and selling more than 30 million copies in Lee's lifetime.

Lee has admitted that much of Mockingbird's plotting elements were based off of her childhood in Alabama and a case her father took defending two young black men accused of rape in 1931. Other elements from Lee's life include, the character of Boo Radley, who was based off of a real reclusive man that lived on her street and Dill, the childhood friend of Scout who was based off of Lee's real-life neighbor and childhood friend, author Truman Capote.

In her lifetime, Lee faced great acclaim but also some criticism. "Mockingbird" has become a classic social commentary novel that is often read in schools to this day. Many school districts have challenged the usage of the book in their curriculum, citing it's usage of strong language and racial slurs. Lee, herself often wrote letters to schools that had recently banned "Mockingbird", defending it's relevancy and attempting to reinstate it in the libraries.

In 1962, Mockingbird was made into an Academy Award winning movie starring Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch. Lee became good friends with Peck and remained friends with his family after his death.

In 2015, Lee published a second book, "Go Set A Watchman". Originally it was thought that this book, which had been found in by Lee's lawyer in a safety deposit box, was intended to be the first novel in a series containing "Mockingbird" and a short novel set in between the two. But more recently, some critics have discovered that this is untrue and that Watchman may actually have merely been a first draft of Mockingbird. Passages in the former which are completely recreated in the latter support this theory.

In February 2016, Lee died peacefully in her sleep at the age of 89.

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Study Help Essay Questions

1. Why does Atticus choose not to reveal to his children that Judge Taylor appointed him to Tom's case? How does his decision affect Scout's perception of her father?

2. Do you think that the adult Jean Louise telling the story through Scout's eyes may have added any embellishments to the story? Think of an event from your own life that occurred at least five years ago. Do you see the event differently now? How do memory and education affect your perception of the event?

3. Read Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson. How are the stories alike? How are they different? Compare Atticus Finch and Tom Robinson with Nels Gudmundsson and Kabuo Miyamoto. Compare Scout's and Hatsue's understanding of their place in their communities.

4. If Scout and Jem's mother were still alive, how might the following people be different: Atticus, Scout, Jem, Calpurnia, and Aunt Alexandra?

5. Would Heck Tate have filed charges against Tom Robinson so quickly if Tom were white? Why or why not? Would Sheriff Tate have been so unwilling to file charges against Boo Radley if Boo was black? Why or why not?

6. Read the play To Kill a Mockingbird , by Christopher Sergel. What elements in the story are different? What limitations does the book have that the stage doesn't? What limitations does the stage have that the book doesn't? Does Sergel tell the same story that Harper Lee does? What events does Sergel highlight as important? Why do you think he made those choices? Do you agree with his choices?

7. Compare and contrast the relationship between Jem and Scout with the relationship between Atticus and Aunt Alexandra.

8. Based on what you know about Scout, describe the adult Jean Louise Finch.

9. Suppose that Mayella had admitted that she was lying when she testified against Tom. What would have happened to her? What would've happened to Tom? How would Scout, Jem, and Dill perceive the situation differently? Would the town have been willing to accept Tom's innocence? Why or why not?

10. What significance do the items that Boo leaves for the children have? What do they tell you about Boo? Why does his brother object so strongly to his leaving items for the children?

11. Read Truman Capote's Other Voices, Other Rooms. Capote based the character of Idabel on Harper Lee, his childhood friend, just as she based the character of Dill on him. Compare Idabel and Scout. Do the two characterizations give you any insight to Harper Lee? How are the characters different from each other? Compare Joel and Idabel's relationship to Dill and Scout's. What role does friendship play in each of these stories? Compare and contrast the setting in the two stories.

12. Harper Lee uses language and grammar that mirrors how the characters actually speak. Is this technique helpful in understanding the characters? Is it distracting? Could Lee have told the same story with the same impact if she'd used proper grammar throughout?

13. Read Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn. Compare the lessons Scout learns with those that Huck learns. How is Jim like or unlike Tom Robinson? To Kill a Mockingbird and Huckleberry Finn are both novels that have undergone many censorship attempts, especially in schools and public libraries. Why do you think people would want to censor these stories? Is censorship ever appropriate? Why or why not?

14. Compare the way Miss Caroline treats Scout on her first day of school with the way the town treats Mayella Ewell.

15. What, if any, prejudices do African Americans face in today's world? Have the issues that Lee discusses in To Kill a Mockingbird been resolved or are they ongoing? What forms of prejudice can you identify in your own community? Have you ever been the victim of prejudice? Did the situation end justly? Explain.

16. Why does Boo Radley stay inside all the time?

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Essay: To Kill a Mockingbird (book report)

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1. Technical information

To kill a mockingbird

c) Editor & year of edition

20th edition, 1986

d) Number of pages

e) Log: how long did it take you to read the book? A and how many hours did you spend on writing the report?

It takes me 14 hours or so to read the book and 7 hours of making the report.

a) Time: in which time is the story set’? Past, present or future?

In the past

Try to guess the year in which the story might be set.

In the time of the Great Depression and in the time that F. Roosevelt was president, so around 1929-1932. They also mention Hitler in the book, so it has to be around that time.

Give quotes of at least 3 lines from the story to prove your answers.

Well anyway, Hitler’s started a program to round up all the half-Jews too and he wants to register ’em in case they might wanta cause him any trouble and I think this is a bad thing and that’s my current event.’

b) Time: how much time does the story take? Does it take hours, months, years’? Try to guess how long the story takes. Be as exact as possible.

3 years. It starts in the summer and after that a court is taking place. Usually, that takes time. The story begins when Scout and Jem are 6 and 10 en ends at the age of 9 and 13.

Give quotes of at least 3 lines from the story to prove your answers. You need at least 2 quotes: one for the beginning of the story, one for the end.

When enough years had gone by to enable us to look back on them, we sometimes discussed the events leading to his accident. I maintain that the Ewells started it all, but Jem, who was four years my senior, said it started long before that. He said it began the summer Dill cam to us, when Dill first gave us the idea of making Boo Radley come out.

c) Place: Where is the story set’? Mention country/countries, town/towns.

Describe the surroundings: city / countryside; poor / rich, etc.

Maycomb is an old town. The people who live there are very poor or really rich.

Also state the social backgrounds; think about jobs, important events, use of language etc.

The father of Jem and Scout is a lawyer in contrast with Calpurnia, who is the black cook.

Give examples and quotes of at least 3 lines from the story to prove your answers. For each major location, you need to give a quote.

Maycomb was an old town, but it was a tired old town when I first knew it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square. Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer’s day: bony mules hitched to Hoovercarts flicked flies in the sweltering shade of the live oaks on the square. Men’s stiff collars wilted by nine in the morning. Ladies bathed before noon, after their three-o’clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum.

3. Characters

a) Main Characters:

Mention the names of the Main Characters. Mention the Protagonist, the Antagonist and at least one Third character.

Write at least five lines of information for each Main Character. Think about their role in the story, about their characters, their looks, their relationships with other characters, etc.

Protagonist: Scout Finch. Her real name is Jean Louise. She is the sister of Jem and the daughter of Atticus. She believes in the goodwill of people in their community. Though events that happen in the book, he faith will be tested. At the end, she is a more grown-up girl.

Antagonist: Jem Finch. His real name is Jeremy Atticus Finch. He is the brother of Scout and the son of Atticus. He loves to do pranks (kattenkwaad) at the beginning of the book, but in the end is he, like his sister, a more grown-up boy.

The Third: Dill. Real name: Charles Baker Harris. He is the neighbor of Jem and Scout, but he is also their friend. He is a confident boy and that is already clear at the first page of the book.

The Third: Dad: Atticus Finch. Nearly 50 and a successful lawyer. His wife died.

Also state for every character why you think it is a main character.

Scout: She tells the story.

Jem: All the things his sister does, he is almost every time with her.

Dill: He is a big part at the first chapters, later he disappeared, but he is the start of the story.

Atticus Finch: He is a big part of the family because there’s no longer a mother. He is a big example for his son and daughter.

b) Minor Characters: Write down the names of ALL the Minor Characters that play a role in the book.

Bob Ewell Miss Maudie Atkinson Calpurnia Aunt Alexandra Mayella Ewell Tom Robinson Link Deas Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose Nathan Radley Heck Tate Mr. Underwood Mr. Dolphus Raymond Mr. Walter Cunningham Walter Cunningham (the son of Mr. Walter Cunningham) Mr. Gilmer

a) Explain the title: why does the book bear this title?

The title of the book is “To Kill A Mockingbird.” The book explains that it is seen as a crime when you kill a mockingbird, because they do nothing but sing. In the story that is compared with judging a black person: they’re not different from the white people.

b) Give a quote of at least 3 lines in which the title is mentioned or in which the meaning of the title becomes clear.

Remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.’ That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it.

‘Your father’s right,’ she said. ‘Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy . . . but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.’

Shoot all the bluejays you for, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird. Mockingbirds do not do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They do not eat up people’s gardens, They do not nest in the corn cribs, They do not do one thing but sing Their hearts out for us! That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.

B: Your opinion

1. which character did you like best.

a) Mention 1 character that you found the most sympathetic.

b) Explain why you thought he/she was sympathetic.

She is just that little girl that people want to squeeze in her cheeks. She thinks that everyone is nice. In the story is becomes a real girl.

c) Give a quote of at least 3 lines from the book to illustrate your answer.

‘An’ they chased him ‘n’ never could catch him ’cause they didn’t know what he looked like, an’ Atticus, when they finally saw him, why he hadn’t done any of those things’ Atticus, he was real nice” His hands were under my chin, pulling up the cover, tucking it around me. ‘Most people are, Scout, when you finally see them.’

2. Which character did you dislike?

a) Mention 1 character that you found unsympathetic.

The father of the r**ed girl.

He is angry with Atticus and wants revenge. However, he takes revenge on the children of Atticus and I think that is not fair.

I took one giant step and found myself reeling: my arms useless, in the dark, I could not keep my balance. ‘Jem, Jem, help me, Jem!’ Something crushed the chicken wire around me. Metal ripped on metal and I fell to the ground and rolled as far as I could, floundering to escape my wire prison. From somewhere near by came scuffling, kicking sounds, sounds of shoes and flesh scraping dirt and roots. Someone rolled against me and I felt Jem. He was up like lightning and pulling me with him but, though my head and shoulders were free, I was so entangled we didn’t get very far.

3. What did you feel when you read the story?

1. Mention at least two main emotions that you felt when you read the story.

1. I actually felt distance. 2. Love

2. Explain for each of the two emotions why you felt that emotion.

1. Because the story is written a long time ago.

2. Love for each other but also just acceptance and love for the place where they live.

3. Give a quote for each of the two emotions to explain your answers (min. 3 lines).

1. Here, Calpurnia explains her understanding of different kinds of people. Cal speaks proper English in the Finch home, proves that she is educated and cares about how she is perceived. On the other hand, she also shows respect for the people at her church and in her community by speaking the way they do. Here, Calpurnia also sets an example for Scout by telling her what it means to be ladylike.

2. Look at quote favourite part.

4. What is your favourite part?

a) Give a quote of at least 5 lines of your favourite part of the book.

I ran up the steps and into the house. Aunt Alexandra had gone to bed, and Atticus’s room was dark. I would see if Jem might be reviving. Atticus was in Jem’s room, sitting by his bed. He was reading a book. ‘Is Jem awake yet”?Sleeping peacefully. He won’t be awake until morning.’ ‘ Oh. Are you sittin’ up with him”?Just for an hour or so. Go to bed, Scout. You’ve had a long day.’ ‘Well, I think I’ll stay with you for a while.’

b) Explain what happens at this particular stage in the story.

Scout comes home and asked how Jem is doing. Dad says that he is doing okay and that Scout should go to bed, because it’s already after midnight.

c) Explain why you think this is the best part of the book.

This is a situation that Scout has to go to bed, but because of the love for Jem and for the love of her father, she stays awake at the side of his bed.

The Message is the thing(s) the writer wants the reader to learn through the story. It is the underlying meaning of the book and also probably the reason why the writer wrote it. Think about what the writer wanted to make clear to his audience through this story.

a) What can you, as a reader, learn from the book?

That it is sin to kill a mockingbird. Either it is wrong to harm someone that doesn’t do any terrible thing to you. You first have to be in their position before you can judge someone.

b) How can you learn this message from the story?

It is said in the story.

c) Give a quote of at least 3 lines from a part of the book which shows the message of the book, the theme, the moral.

See quote by title.

Did you like the book? Explain why / why not.

Not really. There were good parts, but it didn’t really address me. I think that is because of the ‘age’ of the story.

C: The Summary

Write a good and sensible summary of the story / book.

1) Make a complete summary of the book, per chapter, or divide the book into chunks of 10 to 20 pages and give a summary per chunk, IN YOUR OWN WORDS. Your summary should be 1 ‘ 5 pages A4 (Arial 11).

The book is narrated by Scout. Her real name is Jean Louise Finch. She starts with telling about her family story. First, why their family is in America and who her family is. Then their new neighbor comes by: Dill. He becomes their friend. He also get to know the story of Arthur Radley, also known as Boo.

Dill leaves Maycomb and Scout goes to school for the first time. She doesn’t like her teacher, Miss Caroline Fisher. Jem says that the teacher just tries out a new method of teaching. Walter Cunningham, a poor boy and even a boy in Scout’s class hasn’t any food and Miss Caroline can lend money. Scout tells her teacher that he can’t pay her back and Miss Caroline slaps Scout.

Scout blames Walter, but Jem invites him for lunch at their house. Calpurnia slaps Scout when she criticizes Walter’s way of eating. The reader get to know Burris Ewell, part of the family Ewell: little respect and really poor. At home, Scout tells her dad that she isn’t feeling well and Atticus says that she has to go to school, because it is the law.

Scout first find two pieces of chewing gum in a knothole in one of the Radleys’ oak trees and tells Jem about it. He doesn’t like it. Later in the story, they find two old ”Indian-head” pennies. Dill returns to Maycomb. Scout and Jem and Dill are playing games again. One of the games gave Jem an idea for a new game: ‘Boo Radley’. Atticus catches them and think it’s suspicious. Jem, Dill and Scout wonder if they can ever play the game again.

Scout begins to feel left out in the friendship of her, Jem and Dill. She becomes friends with Miss Maudie Atkinson. She says that Boo Radley is still alive and tells that he was always very kind and polite. Meanwhile, Jem and Dill are trying to meet Boo.

Dill’s last day in Maycomb. He and Jem go to the house of Radley and peek in.

They see a shadow and want to leave, but Jem’s pants get caught on the fence.

When they come home, some neighbours are in the house. Atticus asks where the pants of Jem are, but they think up a lie.

First day of school. When Jem and Scout walk home, they found some new things hidden in the knothole: a ball of gray twine. After a few days, they take it home. Scout is not happy about school, but Jem says that school will be getting better. Later that year, another present appears in the knothole. The next day is the knothole filled with cement. Mr. Radley says that he did it, because the tree was dying.

Winter. Jem and Scout haul as much snow as they can find. They make a snowman, but he looks like Mr. Avery so much that Atticus want it to disappear. Jem and Scout add some accessories. That night is Miss Maudie’s house on fire. Scout gets a blanket from someone, but when Atticus asked who gave it to her, she doesn’t know it anymore. Jem thinks Boo Radley did it.

When Christmas arrives, Atticus’ brother, Jack, comes to Maycomb. With Christmas they go to Finch’s Landing. There live the sister of Atticus and Jack: Alexandra and her husband. Francis is her grandson and he plays with Scout, but they got in a fight. Atticus says to Jack that Tom Robinson is innocent but doomed.

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To Kill A Mockingbird Essay

Harper Lee's novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" encapsulates a moving narrative that delves into societal injustices and moral growth through the experiences of its protagonist, Scout Finch. Scout's journey unfolds through pivotal events, each offering valuable lessons that underscore the novel's themes. The various themes in the book are demonstrated through the lessons that Scout learns. Scouts learn about empathy and understanding through Atticus's teachings. On her first day of school, misunderstandings arise among her classmates, leading to tensions in the classroom. Atticus's guidance resonates deeply with Scout, teaching her the importance of seeing things from others' perspectives and standing up for what is right. He advises, "You never …show more content…

This foundational lesson not only shapes Scout's character but also lays the groundwork for her future growth and interactions throughout the novel. The theme of racial injustice is highlighted through Atticus's defense of Tom Robinson. Despite Atticus's compelling defense, racial bias prevails in the court's verdict, highlighting the failure of the justice system. Atticus solemnly remarks, "In our courts, when it’s a white man’s word against a black man’s, the white man always wins" (Lee 220). This encapsulates the overarching theme of racial injustice in the novel, compelling us to confront the harsh realities of discrimination and inequality. Despite his fervent efforts to uphold justice, Atticus confronts the stark reality of racial prejudice, highlighting the immense challenges faced by marginalized communities in seeking fairness and equality. Scout learns about courage and standing up against prejudice through the trial of Tom Robinson. Witnessing the prejudice of the townspeople, Scout confronts the harsh realities of societal …show more content…

The theme of moral growth is demonstrated through Scout's maturation process during the trial. Through her interactions with Atticus and the realization of the complexities of human nature, Scout undergoes a profound maturation process. She reflects, "Atticus, he was real nice." Most people are, Scout, when you finally see them" (281). Scout's reflection not only signifies her own growth, but also serves as a broader commentary on the complexities of human nature. Through her evolving understanding, Scout recognizes the inherent goodness present in individuals, challenging her initial perceptions and biases. The last time Scout sees Boo Radley, she learns the important lesson of giving selflessly. As Boo saves them from harm, Scout experiences a moment of profound empathy and gratitude. She learns about the significance of giving without expecting anything in return, realizing, "Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between" (Lee

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To Kill a Mockingbird

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To Kill a Mockingbird Full Book Summary

Scout Finch lives with her brother, Jem , and their widowed father, Atticus , in the sleepy Alabama town of Maycomb. Maycomb is suffering through the Great Depression, but Atticus is a prominent lawyer and the Finch family is reasonably well off in comparison to the rest of society. One summer, Jem and Scout befriend a boy named Dill, who has come to live in their neighborhood for the summer, and the trio acts out stories together. Eventually, Dill becomes fascinated with the spooky house on their street called the Radley Place. The house is owned by Mr. Nathan Radley, whose brother, Arthur (nicknamed Boo), has lived there for years without venturing outside.

Scout goes to school for the first time that fall and detests it. She and Jem find gifts apparently left for them in a knothole of a tree on the Radley property. Dill returns the following summer, and he, Scout, and Jem begin to act out the story of Boo Radley. Atticus puts a stop to their antics, urging the children to try to see life from another person’s perspective before making judgments. But, on Dill’s last night in Maycomb for the summer, the three sneak onto the Radley property, where Nathan Radley shoots at them. Jem loses his pants in the ensuing escape. When he returns for them, he finds them mended and hung over the fence.

The next winter, Jem and Scout find more presents in the tree, presumably left by the mysterious Boo. Nathan Radley eventually plugs the knothole with cement. Shortly thereafter, a fire breaks out in another neighbor’s house, and during the fire someone slips a blanket on Scout’s shoulders as she watches the blaze. Convinced that Boo did it, Jem tells Atticus about the mended pants and the presents.

To the consternation of Maycomb’s racist white community, Atticus agrees to defend a Black man named Tom Robinson, who has been accused of raping a white woman. Because of Atticus’s decision, Jem and Scout are subjected to abuse from other children, even when they celebrate Christmas at the family compound on Finch’s Landing. Calpurnia , the Finches’ Black cook, takes them to the local Black church, where the warm and close-knit community largely embraces the children.

Atticus’s sister, Alexandra, comes to live with the Finches the next summer. Dill, who is supposed to live with his “new father” in another town, runs away and comes to Maycomb. Tom Robinson’s trial begins, and when the accused man is placed in the local jail, a mob gathers to lynch him. Atticus faces the mob down the night before the trial. Jem and Scout, who have sneaked out of the house, soon join him. Scout recognizes one of the men, and her polite questioning about his son shames him into dispersing the mob.

At the trial itself, the children sit in the “colored balcony” with the town’s Black citizens. Atticus provides clear evidence that the accusers, Mayella Ewell and her father, Bob, are lying: in fact, Mayella propositioned Tom Robinson, was caught by her father, and then accused Tom of rape to cover her shame and guilt. Atticus provides impressive evidence that the marks on Mayella’s face are from wounds that her father inflicted; upon discovering her with Tom, he called her a whore and beat her. Yet, despite the significant evidence pointing to Tom’s innocence, the all-white jury convicts him. The innocent Tom later tries to escape from prison and is shot to death. In the aftermath of the trial, Jem’s faith in justice is badly shaken, and he lapses into despondency and doubt.

Despite the verdict, Bob Ewell feels that Atticus and the judge have made a fool out of him, and he vows revenge. He menaces Tom Robinson’s widow, tries to break into the judge’s house, and finally attacks Jem and Scout as they walk home from a Halloween party. Boo Radley intervenes, however, saving the children and stabbing Ewell fatally during the struggle. Boo carries the wounded Jem back to Atticus’s house, where the sheriff, in order to protect Boo, insists that Ewell tripped over a tree root and fell on his own knife. After sitting with Scout for a while, Boo disappears once more into the Radley house.

Later, Scout feels as though she can finally imagine what life is like for Boo. He has become a human being to her at last. With this realization, Scout embraces her father’s advice to practice sympathy and understanding and demonstrates that her experiences with hatred and prejudice will not sully her faith in human goodness.

To Kill a Mockingbird SparkNotes Literature Guide

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To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird takes place in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the Great Depression. The protagonist is Jean Louise ("Scout") Finch, an intelligent though unconventional girl who ages from six to nine years old during the course of the novel. She is raised with her brother, Jeremy Atticus ("Jem"), by their widowed ...
Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird: A+ Student Essay Examples
Harper Lee's Depiction of Racial Inequality in America in Her Book, to Kill a Mockingbird. 5 pages / 2345 words. In this American classic, a sleepy Southern town is rocked by the trial of a young black man accused of rape. This seemingly simple story, written in 1960, is now regarded as a hallmark of critical writing.
To Kill a Mockingbird Sample Essay Outlines
Following each question is a sample outline to help get you started. Topic #1. The theme of the mockingbird is an important one in To Kill a Mockingbird. Write a paper on the mockingbird theme in ...
101 To Kill a Mockingbird Essay Topics & Samples
101 To Kill a Mockingbird Essay Titles & Examples. Updated: Mar 1st, 2024. 10 min. If you struggle to find "To Kill a Mockingbird" essay topics on prejudice, race, the characters' courage, or any other issue, look no further. Our team has prepared a list of titles and essay writing tips for this book. We will write.
To Kill a Mockingbird: A+ Student Essay: Boo Radley's Role in Scout and
In To Kill a Mockingbird, children live in an inventive world where mysteries abound but little exists to actually cause them harm. Scout and Jem spend much of their time inventing stories about their reclusive neighbor Boo Radley, gleefully scaring themselves before rushing to the secure, calming presence of their father, Atticus.
To Kill a Mockingbird: Full Book Analysis
Full Book Analysis. To Kill a Mockingbird tells the story of the young narrator's passage from innocence to experience when her father confronts the racist justice system of the rural, Depression-era South. In witnessing the trial of Tom Robinson, a Black man unfairly accused of rape, Scout, the narrator, gains insight into her town, her ...
To Kill a Mockingbird: To Kill a Mockingbird Book Summary & Study Guide
Use this CliffsNotes To Kill a Mockingbird Study Guide today to ace your next test! Get free homework help on Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird: book summary, chapter summary and analysis, quotes, essays, and character analysis courtesy of CliffsNotes. In To Kill a Mockingbird , author Harper Lee uses memorable characters to explore Civil Rights and racism in the segregated southern United ...
Harper Lee Analysis: To Kill a Mockingbird
Analysis: To Kill a Mockingbird. Although Harper Lee set her novel in a very isolated locale, which she calls Maycomb, in an era when her notion of crossing racial and social boundaries does not ...
To Kill a Mockingbird: Mini Essays
Analyze the trial scene and its relationship to the rest of the novel. To Kill a Mockingbird explores the questions of innocence and harsh experience, good and evil, from several different angles. Tom Robinson's trial explores these ideas by examining the evil of racial prejudice, its ability to poison an otherwise admirable Southern town and ...
To Kill a Mockingbird Critical Evaluation
The children develop open minds—unprejudiced and individual. The words "it's a sin to kill a mockingbird" echo throughout the novel. The songbird is symbolic of innocence and joy allowed ...
To Kill a Mockingbird Study Guide
Historical Context of To Kill a Mockingbird. In 1931, nine black teenage boys were accused of rape by two white girls. The trials of the boys lasted six years, with convictions, reversals, and numerous retrials. These trials were given the name The Scottsboro Trials, made national headlines, and drastically intensified the debate about race and ...
To Kill a Mockingbird Essays
To Kill a Mockingbird. The main focus of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) is that neighbors are, and always will be, the essence of a town and that they are important in many respects. Neighbors not only being those that live directly next to you but also those... To Kill a Mockingbird essays are academic essays for citation.
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee Summary
Mrs Henry Lafayette Dubose, a mean old lady that lives two houses away from Atticus's house sees Jem and Scout and begins to taunt them for their father's legal defense of a black man. In a fit of rage, Jem destroys the flowers in her front yard. Atticus finds out and instructs Jem to go and apologize to Mrs Dubose.
To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel that centres around the Finch family and is told through the perspective of Jean (nicknamed Scout), within the town of Maycomb, Alabama. Atticus, Jean's father, is a prominent lawyer and the family lives relatively comfortably despite the impacts of the Great Depression. Image sourced from Wikimedia Commons.
To Kill a Mockingbird: Central Idea Essay: Is Justice Achieved in To
Learning to cope with injustice is an ongoing struggle for the book's main characters, who must continue to fight for justice even as they recognize the difficulty of their quest. ... Previous section Literary Context Essay: To Kill a Mockingbird & The Southern Gothic Tradition Next section A+ Student Essay: Boo Radley's Role in Scout and Jem ...
To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee
SOURCE: Shackelford, Dean. "The Female Voice in To Kill a Mockingbird: Narrative Strategies in Film and Novel."Mississippi Quarterly 50, no. 1 (winter 1996-97): 101-13. [In the following essay ...
To Kill a Mockingbird Summary
Introduction. To Kill a Mockingbird is a groundbreaking novel written by Harper Lee and published in America in 1960. The novel was one of the first of it's kind to deal with the subjects of racial inequality and rape and is still widely read in schools to this day. Harper Lee wrote the book based off of an incident that happened in her small ...
To Kill a Mockingbird: Study Help
Use this CliffsNotes To Kill a Mockingbird Study Guide today to ace your next test! Get free homework help on Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird: book summary, chapter summary and analysis, quotes, essays, and character analysis courtesy of CliffsNotes. In To Kill a Mockingbird , author Harper Lee uses memorable characters to explore Civil Rights and racism in the segregated southern United ...
Essay: To Kill a Mockingbird (book report)
Write a good and sensible summary of the story / book. 1) Make a complete summary of the book, per chapter, or divide the book into chunks of 10 to 20 pages and give a summary per chunk, IN YOUR OWN WORDS. Your summary should be 1 ' 5 pages A4 (Arial 11). Chapter 1. The book is narrated by Scout.
To Kill a Mockingbird: Suggested Essay Topics
Examine Miss Maudie's relationship to the Finches and to the rest of Maycomb. 6. Discuss the author's descriptions of Maycomb. What is the town's role in the novel? 7. Analyze the author's treatment of Boo Radley. What is his role in the novel? Suggestions for essay topics to use when you're writing about To Kill a Mockingbird.
To Kill A Mockingbird Essay
To Kill A Mockingbird Essay. 807 Words4 Pages. Harper Lee's novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" encapsulates a moving narrative that delves into societal injustices and moral growth through the experiences of its protagonist, Scout Finch. Scout's journey unfolds through pivotal events, each offering valuable lessons that underscore the novel's themes.
To Kill a Mockingbird' Book Report Essay
Biographical: Harper Lee was born on the 8th of April 1926 in Alabama, United States. Harper Lee died on the 19th of February 2016. She studied at Oxford University in the United States. To Kill a Mockingbird, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and is ranked by the Guinness Book of World Records as the top-selling novel of all time. Save your time!
To Kill a Mockingbird: Study Guide
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, published in 1960, is a profound exploration of racial injustice and moral growth set in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the 1930s.Narrated by a young girl named Scout Finch, the story unfolds as her father, Atticus Finch, a principled lawyer, defends Tom Robinson, a Black man falsely accused of raping a white woman.
To Kill a Mockingbird: Full Book Summary
To Kill a Mockingbird Full Book Summary. Scout Finch lives with her brother, Jem, and their widowed father, Atticus, in the sleepy Alabama town of Maycomb. Maycomb is suffering through the Great Depression, but Atticus is a prominent lawyer and the Finch family is reasonably well off in comparison to the rest of society.

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To Kill a Mockingbird Essays

Walk in Their Footsteps: The Importance of Empathy in To Kill a Mockingbird and A Time to Kill Kristin Virginia Freitas 10th Grade

To What Extent Do To Kill a Mockingbird, The Help, and Get Out Engage with White Poverty in their Depiction of White Women? Summer Jade Dolan College

The Impact of Class Structure John Florio

Justice in To Kill a Mockingbird Yiran Guo

The Journey Motif in Works of American Literature Anonymous 10th Grade

Prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird and Goin' Someplace Special Anonymous 10th Grade

Character Analysis in To Kill A Mockingbird Katherine Dufour 10th Grade

Through Scout's Eyes: The Concept of Perspective Kyle R. Keenan College

Scout’s Perception of Truth and Reality Anonymous 10th Grade

Mayella Ewell Anonymous 12th Grade

The Key Influences in Scout's and Jem's Lives Anonymous 9th Grade

Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird: Farewell to Childhood Anonymous 9th Grade

Who's Afraid of Boo Radley?: An Essay on To Kill a Mockingbird Mahyar Mirrashed 9th Grade

Jem the Visionary: Characterization in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 9th Grade

Irreality in‭ ‬To Kill a Mockingbird: An Overview of Scholarly Perspectives Anonymous College

Bob Ewell: A Journey into the World of an Alcoholic Christopher J Parsick 10th Grade

Understanding the Meaning of the Books Mentioned in Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" Amotz Fraenkel 11th Grade

Influences of Society on Gender in The Color Purple and To Kill a Mockingbird Zaneb Mansha 11th Grade

Jem and Gender, Calpurnia and Race: Challenging and Defying Stereotypes in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 10th Grade

The Standards of Love Anonymous 9th Grade

A Comparison of Justice in Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill A Mockingbird’ and Charles Dickens’ ‘Great Expectations’ Anonymous 12th Grade

Discrimination to Destruction: The Impact of Individuals on Communities in Harper Lee and Anne Frank Anonymous 8th Grade

Unexpected Models: The Importance of Neighbors as Seen in To Kill a Mockingbird Anonymous 10th Grade

To Kill a Mockingbird

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Who comes and threatens Atticus?

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