He was not seen again until fifteen years later, when he stabbed his father with a pair of scissors. 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. She tells him that it belongs to a man called Nathan Radley who lives there with his brother, Arthur who everyone calls "Boo".īoo Radley has not been seen outside his house in years and lives as a shut-in for unknown reasons. One day, Dill notices a run-down, dilapidated house on their block and asks Scout about it. Scout and Jem quickly take to Dill and the three children become regular playmates. The boy, who calls himself Dill, has been sent to stay the summer with his aunt, Rachel. That summer a boy named Charles Baker Harris moves in next door to live with his aunt. The book begins in the summer of 1933 when Scout is almost six and her brother is ten. 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. Gripped by the Great Depression, most of the rest of the town has fallen on hard times. Atticus is a respected lawyer who is one of the few citizens left in their town, Maycomb, Alabama that makes a solid, comfortable living. 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 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. 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. 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. 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. Scout and Jem inform him that it's the house of a man named Arthur Radley (nicknamed Boo), who lives as a shut-in. As the children play, Dill quickly becomes fascinated with an old, spooky house on their street. ![]() ![]() In the summer of 1933, Scout and her brother befriend a boy named Dill who stays summers in Maycomb to be with his aunt. Scout lives with her older brother, Jem and their widowed lawyer father, Atticus. It’s being afraid and not letting that fear stop you.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. It’s having lost all hope and carrying on anyway. Real bravery is facing an impossible challenge and having the determination to keep going because you know it’s the right thing to do. Of course, no list of lessons from To Kill a Mockingbird would be complete without the famous line that gave the novel its title! It’s a beautiful reminder that hurting the innocent is the worst crime of all.Ĭourage is not letting the odds stop you:Ĭan anyone say ‘toxic masculinity’? Thankfully we have Atticus, who is firm in explaining that an act of violence is not an act of courage. Their only aim is to get a reaction, so patience and restraint are your greatest allies. And secondly, that the only way to stop a bully (or an internet troll) is to let what they say slide over you. There are actually two lessons to be learned here – are we cheating? Firstly, Atticus is teaching Scout that responding to violence with more violence never achieves anything: two wrongs don’t make a right. ![]() And so Miss Maudie teaches Scout a vital lesson here: we are defined by the way we treat others, and beliefs – religious or otherwise – can never justify cruel behaviour. There’s no shying away from the fact that religion has been used throughout history to defend awful acts. With our world more divided than ever, Atticus’s words remind us to reach out to others, to try and see the world from their perspective before passing judgement. Atticus’s advice to Scout echoes throughout the novel as we encounter various characters, from Mr.
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