Adversity In To Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee

Everyone experiences hardships in their life, that much is obvious. In her novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee suggests that adversity plays a large role in shaping an individual’s identity. Jem encounters adversity in various forms, each of them shaping his identity in a more courageous, compassionate way. This is possible through learning not to make assumptions, what true courage is, and the bitterness of injustice.
First of all, Jem learns first-hand the dangers of making assumptions, by assuming that Boo Radley is an evil man. Jem himself describes to Dill what he thinks Boo Radley looks like: “Boo was about six-and-a-half feet tall, judging from his tracks; he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch... There was a long jagged scar that ran across his face; what teeth he had were yellow and rotten; his eyes popped, and he drooled most of the time.” (p.16) From his perception that Boo Radley was a monster, Jem starts to realize that he may be a nice man. This is demonstrated nicely when he goes back to The Radley Place to find his pants, he finds them roughly sewn back up, hanging over the fence, as if they were waiting for him. “When I went back, they were folded across the fence… like they were expectin’ me.” (p.59) This event and the treasures the children found from Boo in the knothole made Jem

When the guilty verdict was returned, the severe injustice destroyed his childhood naivety. Obviously, the adversity in this scene is the extreme racial prejudice against Tom. Jem’s individual identity is shaped from this whole trial because of the unfairness of the racial prejudice of the jury in court, as it leaves him disillusioned and his childhood innocence lost. His faith in the Alabama justice system is diminished because he realises it’s very flawed. “It was Jem’s turn to cry” (p.284) “It ain’t Atticus. No son, It’s not right. We walked home.”