To Kill A Mockingbird

Growing Up in Maycomb What if people had the chance to look back on their lives and watch their selves grow up? In “To Kill a Mocking Bird” Jean Louise Finch or Scout, or scout gets to do just that. During the Great Depression in the small town of Maycomb, Alabama, The Finches get involved in a whirlwind of prejudices and unfairness which cause Scout to grow up irregularly in comparison to other kids her age. Scout learns more and more about the world as she grows up and she starts to see the war between the blacks and the whites. Scout hears a lot of rumors about Boo Radley but never sees him. She knows how her society is bad from all the rumors that were made of Boo Radley and from the day Tom Robinson’s trial was taken to court, but the way she handles things shows how mature she is in comparison to the others in her small town. The wonderful characteristic about children is that they are so innocent and have yet to be burdened by the troubles and evil that the world around them is filled with. At the beginning of the novel we are introduced to a five year old Scout who is not your average little girl, she is extremely tom boyish. She likes to wear overalls, play in the mud, climb trees, and do mischievous acts instead of wearing dresses and playing with dolls, but the most uncommon thing about her at her age is her wittiness and niceness/thoughtfulness. She is a very smart person for her age, she is over excelling in school by already being able to read, thanks to the help of her father Atticus, and she is very observant of people’s behaviors towards one another. She does not seem to understand how people can be so unfair to one another, like during the trails. In the book Tom Robinson was accused of raping Mayella Ewell during the night of August 8. When they all attended to the trail a few months later, Tom Robinsion was pronounced Guilty. “Guilty…Guilty…Guilty…Guilty” (lee, 211). Judge Taylor announced this after the trail was about to end because everyone made Tom Robinson guilty just because of him being black. She notices how her community is unfair even at a place where there should only be complete honesty and fairness. One of Scout, Jem, and Dills favorite activities is to bother Boo Radley, whom has a lot of rumors about his weirdness and how evil he is. As children they just accept these rumors to be truths, because that is what her society thought and said about him, she did not know if that was true or not, but she had no other word to take besides the words of those around her “According to Miss Stephanie, Boo was sitting in the living room cutting some items from the Maycomb Tribune to paste in his scrapbook. His father entered the room as Radley passed by, Boo drove the scissors unto this parents leg, pulled them out, wiped them on his pants and resumed his activities” (Lee, 11). When Scout was a young child she believed all these rumors. She was scared of Boo without knowing or talking to him. Later on in the novel, Boo Radley did not just save them, but become her friend. While growing up, Scout sees how Boo Radley is and knows not to believe others without evidence. She grew older, and changed and matured enough to know to not listen to believe in rumors. Boo Radley did not just save them but protected them throughout the novel and gave Jem and her gifts. Even against all the rumors, Scout befriended Boo because she did not judge him; instead she decided to take a look at the world from Boo’s point of view, from his front porch. Growing up in a small town during the Great Depression comes with its own difficulties, but having to grow up in a town that is full of judgmental and prejudice people makes it that more difficult. Scout handles these situations very well for a girl going through the ages five through eight. Atticus taught his children well when he told them to not judge someone’s character without walking around in their shoes first and Scout does just that with the Tom Robinson case and the Boo Radley rumors.