Johnquavon Faulkner Blog Entry

 

Johnquavon Faulkner

Professor Harris 

ENGL 2016- 44378

3 December 2021

 

 

 

To Kill a Mockingbird

    In many ways black gothic is just a reflection of how African Americans live in everyday life might be written in fiction, but we listen to everyday life giving us visible shared evocation of unease, fear, and terror, as these continue to characterize black life in the United States and passes down through generation and stay present in today's life.

     Scout’s hearing Boo’s laughter from inside the house, and Jem’s nearly getting shot by Boo’s father and then finding his clumsily mended pants on the fence, and the discovery of the pennies in the tree outside the Radley house. Unfortunately, they’re all part of a piece, but since we have to choose just one as the Intro I’m going with Jem’s pants, since it’s the big moment that truly opens the children’s perception of their reclusive neighbor Boo Radley.

             This is where Jem and Scout are brought into the conflict of blind prejudice. The children learn that their father, Atticus, has agreed to defend the black man Tom Robinson in a rape trial and that the town can’t approve of. Jem loses his temper when the peevish old lady Mrs. Dubose talks about Atticus. Despite their father’s entreaties for them to turn the other cheek when they are picked for his choices, Jem destroys her flowers, and Atticus makes Jem spend the next month reading to he     The day before Tom Robinson’s trial, Jem and Scout follow their father to where he is standing guard outside the jailhouse. A mob arrives, and Scout unwittingly faces them down and shames them into leaving. This is such a delicate, beautiful Moment of Truth never stated outright, but proven through the actions of a child who doesn’t even fully realize what she is doing or going on. Despite Atticus' perfect defense and the lack of any obvious evidence, the jury finds Tom guilty. From me noticing Jem’s reaction he is crushed by the injustice of it and struggles to understand. As the trial begins, Ewell the father of the girl is supposed to have been raped opens his deadly testimony against Tom.

         That Halloween, Ewell attacks Jem and Scout on their way home from a pageant. Jem is knocked unconscious and breaks his arm. The children are saved when Boo breaks his solitude and kills Ewell with a kitchen knife. Scout agrees with the sheriff that she will say Ewell fell on his knife for protection of Boo from pointless attention. After spending most of the story trying to figure out a way to get a glimpse of him, she finally understands it is better to let him live in peace.

Boo specifically asks Scout to take him home. This character who has been a source of fear for so many of the townspeople, including Scout and Jem, is actually quite fearful himself. In seeing Boo’s fear, Scout is put into the position of wanting to protect him, and his dignity, from the rest of the town. Protecting Boo’s dignity, Scout puts herself in another person’s shoes and thinks about the world from their perspective, just as Atticus told her. Atticus’s final words, that most people are nice when you finally see them for who they are. Standing on his porch, she thinks about the situations of the last couple of years and realizes Boo has been looking out for her and Jem all along.