ipl-logo

Loss Of Innocence In To Kill A Mockingbird

892 Words4 Pages

Innocence represents a child’s purity. Children are extremely vulnerable to influences, due to their lack of knowledge of the world. In today’s time, children are mostly sheltered from the corrupting influences. However, in the 1930s, children were constantly exposed to these common inappropriate prejudiced views towards different races and genders. Harper Lee’s ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ published in 1960, is a classic novel which expresses the widely racial influences of 1930s America towards the People of colour. Harper Lee’s representation of 1930s America, is expressed through the perspective of an American child, Jem, who gradually loses his innocence, due to the continuous exposure to racism in the town of Maycomb. The author’s view on …show more content…

He is vulnerable to Maycomb’s gender and racial views, where he is unable to create his own opinions, thus he ends up following the prejudiced views. Jem’s father, Atticus does not agree with this, so he is trying to teach his son, what is wrong and right. When Scout neglects Jem and Dill’s idea of trying to peek through Radley’s house; Jem says to Scout: “…I’m telling you for the last time, shut your trap or go home – I declare to the Lord you’re gettin’ more like a girl every day.” (p.57) Jem places these gender views of females on Scout; as Jem perceives females as weak, childish and scared. His behaviour is inappropriate in today’s society and goes against Atticus’ morals. Jem believes in these gender tropes, due to the influence of the Maycomb citizens. Atticus is afraid of his children’s exposure to the town, as seen when Atticus is talking to Uncle Jack, he mentions, “…I hope and pray I can get Jem and Scout through it without bitterness, and most of all, without catching Maycomb’s usual disease.” (p.98) This discerning use of metaphor, signifies the sickening effect of Maycomb’s racial prejudices. Atticus is aware of the danger towards his children’s innocence and the negative impact these cultural assumptions have towards the future generations. The town’s current views towards African Americans will have a stronger effect towards these children. Therefore, Harper Lee is able to construct a youthful character, through their lack of knowledge and understanding of the prejudiced town’s

Show More
Related
734 Words | 3 Pages

In the book The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, a story is told to exemplify how war can change a person. It expresses the humane side of war, the struggle to overcome grief and how difficult it is to deal with death. The book releases strong emotions and allows the reader to really connect with the characters involved. Tim O’Brien enables the audience to feel the emotions emerging from the book by writing it as fiction. With O'Brien's decision to write his novel as fiction allows him to more accurately convey emotion behind each story he has to tell.

Read More
226 Words | 1 Pages

Throughout the book, Atticus tries very hard not to expose his children to Maycomb’s disease, but his attempt in sheltering them from the racism flowing throughout the town isn’t as successful as he had hoped; Jem and Scout are picture perfect examples of what the loss of innocence can do to children. On Scout’s first day of school, she is about as excited as a child can get; naturally, she would think her teacher would be amazed at her astounding reading capabilities, but upon reading the alphabet and quotes about the stock-market from The Mobile Register; and explaining that her father, Atticus, taught her what she knew Miss Caroline simply said that Atticus, “does not know how to teach” (23). Just by telling her this Scout felt as if it

Read More
873 Words | 4 Pages

Casablanca Complexity of human relationships is a primary theme of “ Casablanca”. Throughout the movie we are trying to figure out the relationship between the characters, a relationship we don't learn about until about half way into the movie is that the man Ilsa is traveling with is actually her husband, and had been her husband for a while. We can tell pretty early on that there is history between Rick and Ilsa from the moment they saw each other. We are led to find out they were together while she was in Paris and they fell in love with each other barely knowing one another. Rick offers to take her away from all the bad stuff that was going on around them, she agreed, she wanted to meet him at the station.

Read More
661 Words | 3 Pages

Jem grew up believing that Maycomb was a great place to live in, because he believed he knew the towns ways and never encountered a sour situation. As Jem witnesses the injustice that Tom went through, Jem starts realizing that the place he thought was perfect was not perfect at all. “It’s like bein’ a caterpillar I’m a cocoon, that’s what it is… Like somethin’ asleep wrapped up in a warm place. I always thought Maycomb folks were the best folks in the world, least that’s what they seemed like” (Lee 288). Jem slowly starts becoming more aware of his surroundings and starts portraying Atticus chapter by chapter.

Read More
571 Words | 3 Pages

In the early onset of the story, Jem has a child-like expectation for what people act like and should act like. Jem, just like Scout, experienced an immense loss as he failed to grapple with the inescapable truth of Tom Robinson’s fate (“his hands were white from gripping the balcony rail”) (Lee

Read More
930 Words | 4 Pages

The main characters Atticus Finch, Tom Robinson, and Bob Ewell face moments that deal with racism all told from the perspective of a six year old girl, Scout. The intended purpose of expressing racial relations in Harper Lee’s “To Kill a Mockingbird,”

Read More
922 Words | 4 Pages

After the reign of Napoleon, Europe was in catastrophe. However, through the hard work of the Congress of Vienna the issue was resolved. The Congress ushered a period of peace, and by doing this they had to restore the Old Order. This act restablished all the monarchs that Napoleon had suspended from power. By doing so political conflicts in Europe would come to an end.

Read More
654 Words | 3 Pages

"Do all lawyers defend n-Negroes, Atticus?" she had said, trying hard to follow her father's words. She had never used the word in bad context again, and showed her maturity by showing respect to the black people, instead of acting like her fellow schoolmates. Her brother Jem also changed his views on Maycomb as he grew up. When Scout opposed his theory of "family background", Jem replied, "That's what I thought too, when I was your age. If there's just one kind of folks, why can't they get along with each other?

Read More
1045 Words | 5 Pages

It is at this moment that Jem and Scout realize that as much as they want the world to be fair, it is never going to be in favor of them. The morals in Maycomb, no matter how unfair and biased they may be, will not change as the racism and prejudice present in the novel have been in Maycomb for as long as the people living there can remember. This incident is another example of a lesson learned for both Jem and Scout as they see that life is not always perfect, but they have to make out of it what they

Read More
927 Words | 4 Pages

In Jem's view (like stated in the previous paragraph) his father is of moral perfection and therefore has never had any prejudice toward African Americans and has taught Jem always to respect them as equals. He has not seen Maycomb in its prejudice towards African Americans. Jem finds out that people don’t like his father and his actions because of his ties to those he represents. Jem’s actions are from a source of anger emitted by what he knows is wrong, because he is losing innocence he does not know how to deal with his anger from the Dubose's unkindness, so he takes it out on her “camellia buds”(119) and destroys them to release that anger. Atticus teaches the children they must

Read More
1985 Words | 8 Pages

Loss of innocence is when someone comes to a realization through an event that alters their perception and understanding of reality. The novel To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee is set in the small town of Maycomb in the 1930s, also known as the Great Depression. Many characters play a specific role in the novel, for instance, Boo Radley plays a mysterious character that scares children unintentionally because of events in the past. Atticus Finch, who is a white lawyer, becomes well-known to the black activists in the community because he takes on the case of Tom Robison, a black person accused of raping a white woman. The aftermath of taking the case was sizable.

Read More
794 Words | 4 Pages

Atticus has molded his children by exposing them to people in the town of Maycomb who have questionable morals in order to teach his children acceptance. Jem and Scout live in a primarily racist society and learn quickly that the children's

Read More
1342 Words | 6 Pages

In the novel, “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee, The novel takes place in the 1960’s after World War ll and Great Depression ended. This about a community that deals with a crisis of conscience when an African American man is accused of raping Mayella Ewell. This develops Jeremy (Jem) and Jean Louise ( Scout) Finch to start facing the reality of the world as both of them start growing up throughout the book. Atticus educates his children that they should “walk on someone’s skin” and comprehend treating other people equally.

Read More
1399 Words | 6 Pages

Humans live in a world where moral values are very clearly set determining what is good and what is bad. We know what scares us and how racism should be treated. Nevertheless, this was not the case back in Alabama during the 1950s. In the famous novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee narrates the lives of the people of Maycomb, Alabama, focusing on the story of Scout and Jem Finch, and the case of a said to be rape. In this emotion filled narrative, readers learn how life was back then not only in general, but for the separate social statuses that there was.

Read More
750 Words | 3 Pages

Have you ever wondered which event in your life made you see everything differently? Everybody faces various experiences with the realities of the world that eventually results in the loss of their innocence. The loss of innocence can be the outcome of an incident witnessed, a final conclusion about an issue, or an understanding of a situation. The loss of innocence is the same thing as maturity. Now, of course, you can’t go to sleep one night and wake up mature.

Read More

More about Loss Of Innocence In To Kill A Mockingbird

Related Topics

Open Document