CBR16 BINGO: Bananas, because this is a frequently banned or challenged book, and banning books is bananas.
I have different reasons for re-reading certain novels. Sometimes I re-read a favorite book simply because I know it will make me happy. Sometimes I want visit with characters who feel like old friends. And sometimes it’s purely practical, like when I need clarity before continuing a series. With a novel like To Kill a Mockingbird, which many of us read in high school, a re-read is a completely different experience, because we are likely very different people than we were the first time.
It must be close to 40 years since I read To Kill a Mockingbird for the first time, though I’ve seen the excellent film adaptation many times over the years. I wondered what I would make of it and whether my modern sensibilities would be forced to cringe. And while there is definitely room for discussion about whether this is the most appropriate novel to use in classroom discussions about race relations, my perspective of what this novel is about has shifted. What I remembered (and what the movie emphasizes) as being largely a court-room drama, I recognize now as a story about children (I dread using the hackneyed term “coming of age,” but there it is).
Told through the eyes of Jean Louise (Scout) Finch, the novel tells the story of Scout and her older brother Jem as they navigate life in Maycomb, Alabama. Their father, Atticus, is a well-respected lawyer whose clients are so poor that they sometimes have to pay him in trade. Scout and Jem’s mother died when Scout was very young, and she doesn’t remember her, though Jem does. Their black maid, Calpurnia, comes daily to cook the family’s meals and occasionally dole out lessons in manners to Scout, who is a rabid tomboy and doesn’t have much in the way of female influence in her life.
The novel follows two main threads. In the first, Scout, Jem, and their friend Dill (who comes to town every summer to stay with his aunt), try to catch a glimpse of their reclusive neighbor, Boo Radley. Boo (aka Arthur) is the spooky “monster” of the street. The children have heard stories about him, like the time Boo was clipping articles out of a newspaper when suddenly, and without provocation, he stabbed his father in the leg with the scissors. They are both afraid of and fascinated by Boo; Jem and Dill provoke each other into dares, like touching the Radley front porch, or trying to get a message to Boo telling him to come outside. When Atticus gets wind of their antics, he sternly tells them to knock it off or else (Atticus threatens Jem with a whipping on several occasions but never follows through). The fascination persists.
In the other thread, Atticus serves as defense counsel to a black man named Tom Robinson, who is accused of raping and beating a white woman named Mayella Ewell. Some neighbors understand that Atticus is “just doing his job,” but many are incensed that he is mounting an actual defense instead of phoning it in. Scout and Jem have to listen to the abuse at school, which results in Scout getting into fights (she’s a hell of a schoolyard brawler). Atticus tells them to knock it off and hold their heads up high, no matter what anybody says about him. Scout somehow suppresses her instincts and mostly walks away from fights. (Mostly. Her cousin gets a real ass-kicking.)
This novel is beautiful and heartbreaking and funny as the children grow and learn the realities of life in their small town. No scene better captures Scout’s innocence as when she confronts the crowd surrounding Atticus outside of Tom’s jail cell. She knows something is wrong but doesn’t understand the crowd’s hostility as she desperately tries to connect with her schoolmate Walter’s father: “‘Don’t you remember me, Mr. Cunningham? I’m Jean Louise Finch. You brought us some hickory nuts one time, remember?’ I began to sense the futility one feels when unacknowledged by a chance acquaintance.” In the same scene, Jem confronts his father, who insists that Jem take Scout and Dill home. Jem, knowing Atticus is in danger, stands his ground and one almost sees the boy becoming a man. Except Jem is still not wise to the ways of the world. Having convinced himself that logic and evidence count for something, Jem’s world is shattered by the outcome of Tom’s case.
I enjoyed the humor of this novel, which comes from an 8-year-old’s perspective. Scout’s opinion of Atticus “not being able to do anything” is classic irony. “He worked in an office, not in a drugstore. Atticus did not drive a dump-truck for the county, he was not the sheriff, he did not farm, work in a garage, or do anything that could possibly arouse the admiration of anyone. Besides that, he wore glasses.” When neighbor Miss Maudie tries to convince Scout about Atticus skills, she says, “Well, he can make somebody’s will so airtight can’t anybody meddle with it.” When she follows up with info about Atticus’s skill with the Jew’s Harp, Scout opines, “This modest accomplishment served to make me even more ashamed of him.”
My favorite under-rated character in To Kill a Mockingbird is Dill. It’s believed that Harper Lee based Dill on her own childhood friend Truman Capote, an idea that’s supported by Dill’s defining trait of “telling whoppers.” The day after the confrontation at the jail, Dill announces, “It’s all over town this morning all about how we held off a hundred folks with our bare hands. . . .” Dill is also an instigator in the Boo Radley shenanigans. He’s trouble, but he’s innocent trouble.
This novel touches on so many themes beyond the easily recognized (and most discussed) ones of race and prejudice. Gender roles are addressed through Scout’s power struggles with her Aunt Alexandra, who is determined to make Scout wear pink dresses and serve tea. Loneliness and inclusion are addressed through multiple characters: Boo Radley hides away in his home, yet reaches out to the children through the token gifts left in the knothole of the tree; Mayella Ewell is so isolated that she thinks Atticus is making fun of her when he asks whether she has any friends. Social inequality, even in a poverty-stricken town like Maycomb, is stinging: Atticus and family are poor, but not as poor as the Cunninghams, which gives the Finches an air of respectability; Mr. Dolphus Raymond can associate with black people and have it passed off as “just his way,” because he owned a riverbank and is “from a fine old family.” When it comes to compassion and forgiveness, the novel is more complicated than it seems. Certainly, the novel leaves one with a “love thy neighbor” sensibility, yet there are limits. Atticus feels compassion for the Ewells in spite of how the trial turns out; is it saintly for him to give Bob Ewell benefit of the doubt, or is it irresponsible in light of the danger to Atticus’s family? Tom Robinson makes two mistakes when it comes to compassion: the first is feeling sorry for Mayella; the second is openly saying so in court.
There are things in To Kill a Mockingbird that might induce some eye rolling. The black people in the novel are mostly kind-hearted, simple, and two-dimensional (there is a small nod to conflict in one character who doesn’t like when Scout and Jem attend their church, but that person is quickly shouted down by the masses). Atticus, who I would argue is not technically a White Savior as he never saves anybody, is certainly treated like one by the black community (“Miss Jean Louise, stand up, your father’s passing.”). And sometimes the rustic wisdom can be a bit much, as in Scout’s ascertain that “I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.” Yet this novel continues to resonate and deserves its spot on the list of “must-read American classics.” Having just finished my re-read, I can hardly wait to pick it up again.