To Kill A Mockingbird By Harper Lee: Chapter Analysis

How To KIll a Mockingbird was a tsunami, changing the course of nature. The book was published in the 1960’s which was an incredibly brave thing to do considering that the topics that were covered in the book was sensitive back then, like equality and prejudice. Not only that Harper Lee, the author of the book, wrote against what the majority of society thought. This was incredibly present in chapters ten and eleven where Jem, the brother of Scout, who was the narrator, ripped apart Mrs. Dubose's flowers for harassing their father. Harper Lee used the literary elements of characters, setting and conflict to contribute to the theme of sometimes community is wrong. Throughout this scene, Harper Lee uses the character Mrs. Dubose to represent

Harper Lee stresses this fact through the significance of the setting of Mrs. Dubose’s house. When Jem and Scout go to town Scout explains their problem “It was impossible to go to town without passing her house...” In this sentence Harper Lee uses the word “Impossible” to stress how impractical it is to try to avoid the presence of society or in this case, Mrs. Dubose. The community being represented by Mrs. Dubose, Jem and Scout had to endure the disrespect Mrs. Dubose gave them. The town wasn’t something Jem and Scout chose to go to, it was something they had to go to and Mrs. Dubose’s house was an obstacle in the way. Jem once stated that they couldn’t avoid Mrs. Dubose’s house “unless we wished to walk a mile out of the way.” The phrase “to walk a mile” is usually compared with a difficult task to do. Harper Lee is trying to say how difficult it is to ignore the impact of the neighborhood. Without how burdensome it is to steer clear of the public, Harper Lee’s message or theme would be useless. Why would it matter if society is wrong, if it didn’t have such a great impact on people’s

Dubose represents the Civil Rights Movement. One of the first things Mrs. Dubose does to Jem when she sees him is accuse him of a crime he did not commit. After Jem proves her wrong, her exact words were “Don’t you contradict me!” If Mrs. Dubose represents society then this could be a prime example of how community worked in the 1960’s. The definition of contradict is to deny the truth of, usually a statement. Even though Mrs. Dubose did not deny Jem all together, it was implied. The community in the 1960’s, Southern part of America, denied all claims to the unfairness of the JIm Crow laws. Harper Lee is giving an example of how her message can be applied to real life situations. After the abuse Mrs. Dubose gave Jem, he could not handle it, Harper Lee used these words to describe Jem murdering Mrs. Dubose's flowers “[It’s 12:00am I’d rather not go upstairs risk waking everyone just to grab my book for the full quote] He did not begin... in two and threw it down” How Jem handle the situation presented, is a statement from Harper Lee. As this conflict between Jem and Mrs. Dubose may represent the Civil Rights Movement, they way they handle the harassment is not. In the book, Jem fought back violently, while in the civil rights movement they fought back peacefully. The two different responses to a similar conflict is how Harper Lee is trying to teach