Kadie Casalino
Ms. Kelly
10 Honors English
10/29/15
In Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, main character Jem Finch undergoes a substantial transformation from childhood to adulthood. As a child, Jem displays innocence and ignorance to reality. During his transformation period, he begins to understand the things he was previously oblivious to and he begins to think more like an adult. “This change had come about in a matter of weeks, overnight it seemed Jem had acquired an alien set of values and was trying to impose them on me” (154). He is recognized as an adult at the end of the novel, as it is evident that his transformation is complete. Jem Finch reaches maturity as a result of his many life lessons. At the start of the
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“In addition to Jem’s newly developed characteristics, he had acquired a maddening air of wisdom” (155). Jem’s rapid change is the result of his maturation and rapid understanding of reality during his transformation into adolescence. These changes begin to appear as early as the first mockingbird scene, when Atticus shoots the mad dog. Contrary to Scout’s desire to share her father’s heroic feat, Jem understands the reasoning behind Atticus’s actions and feels it is more gentleman not to share the details of this incident. Jem also learns about courage from Mrs. Dubose, as well as about drugs and addiction. He puts himself in her shoes and grows a respect for the old woman he has hated so very much. In addition, when he speaks to Reverend Sykes at the trial about the events that occurred, Reverend asks Jem not to speak in these terms in front of Scout, as it is not appropriate for her at such a young age. This displays Jem’s fading innocence as he is learning and understand adult topics. After the trial, when he weeps about the verdict, it is evident that he fully understand the injustice in the world and it no longer ignorant to Maycomb’s negative