Tolog Review: To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird
by Harper Lee
reviewed by Alice Long

Set in 1930s, To Kill a Mocking bird by Lee Harper reveals serious racism and discrimination issue through a child perspective. Author describes Scout ‘s carefree childhood in Maycomb in the beginning part of the story. Scout, a brave tomboy, lives in Maycomb with her brother Jem and father Atticus. Driven by curiosity, Scout, Jem and Dill keep approaching to a mystery man ,Boo Radley, sneaps into his yard and plays imitation game.
The transformation from child world to complicated adult, especially the alienation of Jem who is more mature and starts leave Scout along makes Scout feels uncomfortable and overwhelming. The climax takes place in Tom’s trial. Because of conscience and strong sense of justice, Atticus defends for Tom Robinson,a black man who is accused of raping a white woman:”if I didn’t ,I can’t hold up my head in town,I couldn’t represent this contry in legislation ,I couldn’t tell you and Jem not to do anything again.”(80)Unbelieveably,Tom is still convicted even through there are a bunch of evidence shows his innocence. Tom’s tragedy is inevitable since racism and discrimination prevails in the town.

Author uses killing mockingbird to symbolizes devastation of innocence “Mocking birds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy……That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.”(94)Boo Radley is one of the mockingbirds. At the beginning of chapter, he is considered as an insane monster. But in fact, Boo helps Scout and Jem secretly such as repairing Jem’s shorts, covering Scout with a blanket, saving them from Bob Ewell. Author implies that Boo’s evil figure is spurious, building up by people subjective judgement and exaggerated imagination. The monster image gradually replaced by kindness human one. This reversal illustrates the inaccuracy of subjective judgement and presumption.

Tom Robison is another poor mockingbird ,a victim of discrimination. In early chapter, Maycomb is a peaceful traditional southern town. Author only hints about its darkness :”Maycomb is a old town, but it is a tired old town…”(9)Latter, author reveals the intense contradiction and evil part of this town gradually. Most people use family status and race as the only judging standard. Author first describes a peaceful town life in a child’s perspective which full of goodness and innocence but then the trial completely destroys the appearance of harmony and emphasizes the darkness of this old town.This sudden alternation is a shock for me.Driven by bias ,common people can become wicked devil. Author uses great contrast to address the danger of prejudice and its devastating consequence. And the best way to overcome it is to have empathy, to walk out of comfort zone, to think in different perspective, to show compassion toward others: “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view…until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”(34)

After seeing and understanding the coexistence of kindness and evilness, the complex of humanity, however ,author still point out the importance of maintaining a positive attitude toward people.It is the real maturity Atticus wants Scout to gain: “he was really nice…….Most people are, Scout,when you finally see them.”(284)

To Kill a Mockingbird Never is a great book for everyone especially teenagers. Fascinating plot contains lot of reversal that makes reader hard to guess out what happens next. Because author uses child as narrator, reader can see the story in another perspective and deepen their understanding. Most important, the moral value in this book is really meaningful for teenagers who always consider thing more subjectively and are persuaded easily by others .This book really helps them to form moral value , be more mental mature and independent.