Loss Of Innocence In To Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

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The esteemed Harper Lee novel, “To Kill a Mockingbird” written in 1960, is a classic American novel that explores many themes and concepts such as racial injustice, moral courage and loss of innocence that affected so many people throughout the 1930s in the United States. Lee wrote this book during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s while the novel itself was set in the time of her childhood. Consequently, it’s likely she would have experienced many of the events that Scout Finch experiences throughout the novel. Throughout the Pulitzer-prize winning novel, the loss of innocence is manifested through the three main characters, Scout, Jem and Atticus Finch. As the novel progresses, the characters are confronted with a series of great injustices …show more content…

Moving on to the loss of innocence of Atticus Finch, it happens in a similar fashion to Jem. Atticus, due to Lee characterising him as a respectable and unemotional figure in Maycomb, hides his true feelings about the verdict of the Tom Robinson court case. This may have been to shield Scout and Jem as they would not benefit from him seeming vulnerable. This is similar to how in chapter 10 he hid his amazing ability as a crack-shot with a rifle from his kids because he wanted to teach them to be humble. In the court case resulting in chapter 21 and 22 he shows himself to not be mentally affected by the result, which really showcases his parenting style of leading by example. However, there are subtle moments where you can see that he has lost some innocence. For example, the dialogue previously mentioned on page 235 in chapter 22, may seem cold from Atticus towards Jem, but it can be inferred that the words, “I don’t know, but they did …show more content…

Since Scout is the narrator of “To Kill a Mockingbird,” the entire novel is a journey of her loss of innocence as she ages from a six-year-old to a 30-year-old in a nine-year old’s body. The whole process culminates in the dying chapters of the book where she finally meets Arthur Boo Radley. In the beginning of the book Scout, Jem and their neighbour/ friend Dill all have an immature vision of Boo Radley made up of years of speculation and rumours. An example of this would be on page nine when Scout uses the metaphor, “Malevolent phantom,” to describe Boo Radley (Chapter 1, Pg. 1). 9). The syllable of the syllable. This sort of ostracising and spreading rumours of people who are different really captures the way small town communities work, especially in 1930s America where the entire south was littered with towns just like Maycomb. While even the phrase, “Malevolent Phantom,” is quite mature for a six-year-old to be saying, her ghostlike relationship with Boo Radley is ultimately what causes her largest loss of innocence. At the end of the novel, Scout and Jem are walking back home in the dark when they are attacked unbeknown to them by Bob Ewell. However, despite being too late to stop Jem from breaking his arm, Boo Radley rushed out to save them. After the doctor has made sure that Jem is okay, Boo asks Scout to walk him home. Scout’s narration of this

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