An Assessment of an Historical Source - 'to Kill a Mockingbird'
MAJOR ASSIGNMENT 1 – TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
THE NATURE OF THE SOURCE
The source is an extract from the book, To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), by Harper Lee. The novel takes place during the 1930s in a small town in Alabama, USA. Atticus Finch is a lawyer who defends a black disabled man, Tom Robinson, against the charge of raping a white girl. The extract is parts of chapters nine, nineteen, and one paragraph of page 215. In chapter nine, Atticus’ six year old daughter, Scout, nearly starts a fight with a classmate, Cecil Jacobs after accusing Atticus of ‘defending niggers’. Chapter nineteen takes place in the courtroom when Atticus calls Tom Robinson, the man he is defending, to the stand. In 1950, Harper Lee started to write short stories about people living in Alabama, among them a story which would become To Kill a Mockingbird. Hoping to be published, Lee sent her writing to a literary agent in1957 and the full story was published in 1960.
The novel as historical evidence is a secondary source. As a piece of fiction, it has a limited historical base and the author may also present her views, which may influence certain potential facts. As a source for accurate facts, it is useless or unreliable. It seems that it would be utterly unimportant as historical evidence and not at all useful to a historian, because it does not contain fact. Jordonova says that ‘one aspect of every answer must be the highest levels of truth’. However, fiction can reflect the mood or values of the time in which it was written or the time in which it is set. The author may well represent her views, but they may be views of her class, race or community. It would be useful to a historian in understanding the attitude of people at the time of racial segregation. It is set in a significant period of history and it attempts to convey the spirit and social conditions of the past. The book contains fictional characters and is not a description of an actual event.
The novel makes a statement
THE NATURE OF THE SOURCE
The source is an extract from the book, To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), by Harper Lee. The novel takes place during the 1930s in a small town in Alabama, USA. Atticus Finch is a lawyer who defends a black disabled man, Tom Robinson, against the charge of raping a white girl. The extract is parts of chapters nine, nineteen, and one paragraph of page 215. In chapter nine, Atticus’ six year old daughter, Scout, nearly starts a fight with a classmate, Cecil Jacobs after accusing Atticus of ‘defending niggers’. Chapter nineteen takes place in the courtroom when Atticus calls Tom Robinson, the man he is defending, to the stand. In 1950, Harper Lee started to write short stories about people living in Alabama, among them a story which would become To Kill a Mockingbird. Hoping to be published, Lee sent her writing to a literary agent in1957 and the full story was published in 1960.
The novel as historical evidence is a secondary source. As a piece of fiction, it has a limited historical base and the author may also present her views, which may influence certain potential facts. As a source for accurate facts, it is useless or unreliable. It seems that it would be utterly unimportant as historical evidence and not at all useful to a historian, because it does not contain fact. Jordonova says that ‘one aspect of every answer must be the highest levels of truth’. However, fiction can reflect the mood or values of the time in which it was written or the time in which it is set. The author may well represent her views, but they may be views of her class, race or community. It would be useful to a historian in understanding the attitude of people at the time of racial segregation. It is set in a significant period of history and it attempts to convey the spirit and social conditions of the past. The book contains fictional characters and is not a description of an actual event.
The novel makes a statement
Bibliography: Tosh, J. The Pursuit of History: 5TH Ed. (Pearson Education, 2010) http://library.thinkquest.org/12111/SG/SG5.html (Information on what influenced Harper Lee to write the book) Aptheker, H.B. (ed.), A Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States, (1951) Hirschmann, D Jordan, W.D. White Over Black: American Attitudes Toward the Negro, 1550-1812 (The University of North Carolina Press, 1995) Willoughby, S