Monday, June 14, 2010

To Kill A Mockingbird

I love the way the author, Harper Lee, describes the south. From the actions and speech of the towns people in Maycomb, you can get a taste of the south. Harper Lee shows us how racist people were towards the African Americans in this time period in the south. The only person who seems to not be racist is Atticus who treats Calphurnia with respect instead of cruelty and disregard.

Now about the story. So far we have read about Scout's and ,her brother, Rem's adventures together. Scout and Rem have a four year age gap, yet they still remain close. But as the story progresses, we can see that Scout and Rem start to slowly drift apart. Their age difference and gender difference seem to be the cause of the drifting

From the beginning I could not tell if Scout was a boy or girl because of the way she acted. It was not until the story progressed that i realized Scout was a girl. Scout always acted like one of the boys and despised it when Jem said she was becoming more like a girl everyday. I think that she does not want to be treated like a girl so that she can stay closer with her brother who she knows is drifting away from her. An example of Jem drifting away from Scout is when Dill comes back to Maycomb for over the summer.

Jem and his father Atticus seem to have a weird relationship. Jem desperately wants to make his father proud because Atticus is his role model. Atticus so far seems to be a kind, caring father who scolds both Jem and Scout when they are in the wrong. Atticus is all about manners and constantly tells them to do the right thing instead of taking the easy way out.

Here are some questions. In the story Jem and Scout found someones hiding spot in the Radley's tree. Why do you think the hiding spot is so important to Scout and Jem and to the person who is hiding the stuff? Mr. Radley plugs up the hiding spot in the tree claiming the tree was dying when it really was not. What is the real reason Mr. Radley plugged it up? Last but not least, my final question is what do you think will happen with Scout and Rem's relationship as the story progresses?

Thanks for your time:)

1 comment:

  1. I had the same problem with figuring out if Scout was a boy or girl, too. My mom had told me that To Kill A Mockingbird was about racism so I was trying to figure out her ethnicity at the same time, but that was cleared up fairly quickly. Anyways, I don't think Jem's relationship with his dad is all that weird, you're right Jem wants to make his father proud. But I'm sure that everyone has felt the need to make their parents proud of them at various points in their lives. I think it only seems weird because Atticus puts an emphasis on certain values that back then were uncommon and now is the sort of thing that just is, like being polite. You're just supposed to do it.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.