To Kill A Mocking Bird And Rubyfruit Jungle

Money Can’t Buy Everything

Many Americans believe money is power. Money can buy a big house with heat and maid or a butler; money can buy you a car so that walking is unnecessary; money can buy a 10 course meal at a five star restaurant on Wall Street; money can buy the most comfortable beds to sleep in that will get rid of the backaches everyone despises. Indeed, economic capital can provide gratification, better welfare, and lead to a happier life, however can it solve the inequity, which counteract happiness with sadness, people and society face? In the novels To Kill a Mocking Bird by Harper Lee and RubyFruit Jungle by Rita Mae Brown, they explore how one may be financially well (which have different meaning indifferent perspectives),

In her family, Scout picked up the ability to read as she listened “to the news of the day, Bills to Be Enacted into Laws, the diaries of Lorenzo Dow—anything Atticus happened to be reading…” (Lee 20) Most people do not have an Atticus or a lawyer father in this town help facilitated learning how to read. The downside, however, is Miss Caroline gave an unfair treatment to Scout Finch because of her ability which “annoyed Miss Caroline” according to Scout. (19). Miss Caroline does not expect anybody in the first grade to read “she discovered that I was literate and looked at me with more than faint distaste.” (Lee 19) And in Scout’s perspective, she turned miserable. “Your father does not know how to teach… I mumbled that I was sorry and retired meditating upon my crime.” (Lee 19) In this case, being more privileged, in fact, caused her more displeasure; had she not learned how to read from a radio or anything readable done by her father in her household, she would have avoided Miss Caroline having an aversion to Scout, thus avoided being treated unfairly. Another way to solve this act of unfairness is letting Miss Caroline have more social capital. Miss Caroline is not from Maycomb and so she did not know about the Cunninghams. This finally drew the last straw, where Miss Caroline said “Jean

Calpurnia does a lot more than what she is hired for. She cooks and teaches Scout how to write. The Finches are very grateful to have Calpurnia, however, since she is a black women in a white household, injustice rise. Aunt Alexandra is racist and because she is family, she has some authority in the Finches house. One day Aunt Alexandra overheard Scout telling a story to Atticus about the time she visited Calpurnia’s black church, and Scout was invited to go to Calpurnia’s house. Aunt Alexandra blurted in the middle of the conversation a denial for Scout to go. “She promised me I could come out to her house some afternoon. Atticus, I’ll go next Sunday… can I?... “You may not.” Aunt Alexandra said it.” (Lee 154) This initiated a clash with Scout. Scout turned disgruntled and “the only way I could retire with a shred of dignity was to go to the bathroom.” (Lee 154-155) Then a fight between Atticus and Aunt Alexandra occur, where Aunt Alexandra wants to get rid of Calpurnia, however, Atticus disagree. This notion of having blacks cannot be with white people is unrighteous. Therefore, having Calpurnia around did not solve the inequity done by Aunt Alexandra. A way to solve this injustice is by adding social capital and cultural capital of the Finches ideology onto Aunt Alexandra. Thus, making Aunt Alexandra accepting of