To Kill A Mockingbird Analysis

Although it was written more than fifty years ago, Harper Lee's novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, addresses many current topics including society's attitudes towards the mentally handicapped. Boo Radley, the only mentally handicapped character in the novel, gives insight into mental illness and how its viewed. The 1930s attitudes and treatment towards the mentally handicapped, as shown by Maycomb's view of Boo Radley, was a central theme in To Kill a Mockingbird and demonstrates how society's view of mental illness has not changed much in the last fifty years.

The setting of the novel is Maycomb, Alabama in the 1930s. Maycomb is a small southern town in a farming county. The residents of Maycomb are very poor and have just been told "that they have nothing to fear but fear itself" (Lee 6). The same families married each other, so that a lot of Maycomb's community members looked alike.

The mentally handicapped are represented in the book by the character Boo Radley. Boo Radley's real name is Arthur Radley. He was called Boo because he possessed ghost-like qualities. Boo lives at home with his mother and father in the Radley Place. Boo is probably the only mentally challenged person in Maycomb and the people of the county view him differently. "A Negro would not pass the Radley Place at night, he would cut across to the sidewalk opposite and whistle as he walked." (Lee 11) School children would not pick fallen pecans from the Radley's pecan tree because the "Radley pecans would kill you." (Lee 11)

There are early signs in the story that Boo is troubled. As a teenager Boo joined a gang of boys, got in trouble, and was arrested. Instead of going to a state industrial school, Boo's father kept him at home, telling the judge that he wo...

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...eir family or an individual close to them (Aberholden). This leads people to think more of the mentally ill are seen as social misfits. Modern medicines have done a lot to ease the pain of the mentally ill (Leigh 20). Now today, treatment is more home based instead of lock away in an asylum based. Today's aim for the mentally ill, with treatment, is to help people regain a better quality of life (Leigh 29).

To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee's novel, discusses many topics that have been discussed today and over the course of many years. Along with race one of the most discussed problems in the novel and now is about the mentally handicapped. Boo Radley, first known as the evil-doing phantom of Maycomb became Scout and Jem's hero. Still though, in the 1930's, over the years, and now today, people have many different views and thoughts about the mentally handicapped.