I don’t have much to add except that I wasn’t assigned to read it, and I’m glad I wasn’t. I never enjoyed reading the books I was assigned, and now it’s one of my favorites.
I was lucky enough to have been assigned this book when I was in high school. I have loved it ever since. When Scout whispers “Hey Boo” near the end, the hair on the back of my neck literally stood on its end.
PS See the movie. Now.
Damn, I like TKAM a whole lot. I’ve probably read it something like a dozen times; the first time I was 10 or 11 and didn’t understand a good bit of it, but I liked what I could take in a whole lot; as time passed and I learned more (about history, about people) things that had mystified or shot right past my younger self cleared up for me. It’s one of those books, isn’t it, that you can go back to many times and always get more from?
It seems to me that the thing about Boo Radley and why he stayed in the house all those years was because of how his parents and the rest of the local people (over)reacted to young Arthur and his pals’ mini-crime spree.To us reading about it, sure, their escapades sound like bored teenage boys with nothing better to do getting up to mild mischief, and not anything real serious. But this was a small, rural town in the Deep South in the early 20th century, a place where memories are long, gossip is vicious, and rules are rules; and his family was apparently one of the older and more up-tight ones in the community. I think when they brought Arthur/Boo home from the jail, he got grounded and then some because his parents not only wanted to punish him for the trouble he’d been in, but had also gotten all bent out of shape over scandalousness of it all and the family name being blotched. That being the case he probably got an earful from both Ma and Pa every day about the terrible, terrible things he’d done and how the Radley name was shamed forever, with occasional threats of sending him back to jail thrown in to keep him in line. Probably there were some thrashin’s involved too.
And so it went at the Radley place, behind closed doors, until the day of the “Scissors Incident”. Now, remember, we only get to hear Scout’s retelling of the version of this story she heard from one of the mouth-runningest old biddies in Maycomb County, so we don’t know what really went down that day, but it seems likely that Boo/Arthur did finally either lose it mentally or maybe just fight back instead of taking his lickin’,
After that explosive incident, though, the poor kid probably just broke down what with all the guilt and rage and “everyone will think you’re just a piece of common trash now!” that his parents piled up on his head (especially now that they had *that *to hold over his head too!), and pretty much withdrew to his room or the basement or wherever, lonely and guilt-tripped and driven half crazy by isolation and his parents’ (and later his brother’s) persistent recriminations and acrimony. Until, of course, the day he looked out his window and started watching the antics of the kids next door, found them to be interesting and funny, and got the idear of crawling out of his hole to be their secret buddy.
My favorite part is the meeting between Atticus and Ewell at the Robinson’s. Ewell tries to bait Atticus by spitting in his face. Atticus still can’t bring himself to hit him in front of his kids, though you clearly see the anger and fury on his face.
I mean, you can just FEEL the anger running through his body.
Gregory Peck is a God.
On the issue of not enjoying books that have been assigned in English or Lit classes, I finally figured out that if I just read the book from start to finish as soon as it was assigned, I got to have the pleasure from it before the soul-sucking dissection of it in class started. I’ve told this to several English teachers and one of them gives that advice to her classes.
I love the part in the movie when the little Cunningham boy pours syrup over his food and Scout is astounded and outraged. Her face is precious.
I read in an article a few years ago that Mary Badham, who played Scout, maintained a father-daughter type relationship with Gregory Peck until the end.Here’s the article Reading this sent waves of longing over me, because I often wished that Atticus could have been my father.
My 14-almost-15-year-old niece was just assigned this book. She said both the book and the movie were just ok. This just killed me because she’s a very well-read kid. The movie is damn near perfect. I’m sorry to say I haven’t read the book. Maybe I’ll borrow it from the Niecelette.
One of my most favorite books. The ending just show events from Boo’s perspective, as Scout stands on the Radley’s porch and images thngs as he saw them. An excellent paragraph, that starts with “the children,” then mentions them running to meet Atticus and turns them into “his children,” and ends:
Summer and he watched his children’s hearts break. Autumn again, and Boo’s children needed him.
I might have to wander over to Blockbuster Video and see if they have it.
I loved Miss Maudie too…her retort to Miss Stephanie about seeing Boo peeking in her bedroom window at her, (Well, did you move over and make room for him?) was classic.
I also want to know what a Lane cake is.
Checking out Amazon.com…I don’t see that Harper Lee wrote any other books. Did I miss them?
Remember that the Judge purposely gave the Robinson case to Atticus, knowing that he would give Tom Robinson a good defense instead of just railroading him.
Okay, I might have to try making a Lane cake now. It sounds yummy…a layer cake with each layer having different ingredients!
It also sounds like it was difficult to make, so when a lady made a Lane cake, it was A Special Occasion.
The hard booze in the icing is very important. It let the ladies get a nip without actually drinking anything stronger than sherry.
Yes, the book is about, among other things, how some of your neighbors are monsters - and some of the monsters are human beings. Mr. Radley and Ewell are both monsters. Its a book about - to a very large extent - child abuse. Boo is an abused child. Mayella is abused. Dill is ignored. Scout and Jem are being raised with some benevelent neglect by a man doing “the best he can.” And in the end, they discover that the monster down the street loves them.
I think Atticus did a very good job with the children. I wouldn’t call it benevolent neglect…he came home for lunch every day, taught Scout to read and write (to the dismay of her first grade teacher, who I wanted to jack-slap) and steered them back on course when they strayed (tormenting Boo.)
I think he did an excellent job, as evidenced by the love the children felt for him (Scout willing to fight people who dared call him a n----r-lover.)
I went to a book fair yesterday and saw an advance reader’s copy of TKAM. The cover had a blurb from Truman Capote in which he praised the book’s humor. If I’d known this thread was going to be in here, I’d have copied it down (it was several sentences) but it made it out to be damn near a farce. I think there were at least four references to how funny the book was.
I think it was priced at about $19,000.
And I never read* A Tale of Two Cities * in school when it was assigned to me; I got an A on the essay and test based on the 1935 Ronald Colman movie and my father’s telling me why he loved the book. I since have read it perhaps 15 times and it is one of my all-time favorites. The resignation with which Sydney realizes that Lucie loves Charles . . . oh, and then he goes to the guillotine for her! Swoonaroonie. And there’s something about a revolution.
How did Atticus neglect them? I thought he sounded like pretty much the ideal parent. He’d patiently explain things to them, would read to them every day, never got angry with them, etc. Atticus Finch is the man.
As an aside;
She took the non gender specific name Harper Lee because she felt it was unlikely that she could get it published as a female author.
She never published another book and became a great recluse.
Also, there has always been talk that the character Dill is actually a young Truman Capote.
That’s a bit of a shame…Margaret Mitchell only published one great book too. Maybe the authors get stage fright…how the hell am I going to top this?
Atticus was definitely there for his children, always showing them the right path. He makes Jem read to Mrs. Dubose and then explains why he did, he stops them from tormenting Boo Radley, he makes sure Scout knows to come to him with any questions about the trial, he is even hesitant about covering up Ewell’s murder because he doesn’t want people saying that he hushed up what happened for the sake of his son. It’s Sheriff Heck Tate who points out that Jem didn’t kill Ewell and that he will say Ewell fell on his own knife and if Atticus says anything different he will came him a liar.
Yeah I don’t get the neglect vibe either. Aunt Alexandra and others made references that he wasn’t doing a good job with the kids, but I think that’s just because in those days raising children was “wimmin’s work”. Any single father was bound to not live up to the standards and morals of a good ol’ fashioned nuclear family.
They also had Calpurnia, and she wasn’t above smacking them upside the head when they needed it.