Cassie’s Reviews > To Kill a Mockingbird > Status Update

“Boo was our neighbor. He gave us two soap dolls, a broken watch and chain, a pair of good-luck pennies, and our lives.”

“I was beginning to learn his body English.”

“He likened Tom’s death to the senseless slaughter of songbirds by hunters and children.”
“Atticus had used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in the secret courts of men’s hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed.”

The setting of the meeting of the Christian leaders of the town was great for highlighting the hypocrisy that was so common at the time. To pledge your life to forgiveness and compassion, and have such cold and blind hate for your neighbors is so stark in the scene.

“She never laughed at me unless I meant to be funny.”

“I think I’m beginning to understand why Boo Radley’s stayed shut up in the house all this time... it’s because he wants to stay inside.”

Even when Scout contradicts him, saying that he shouldn’t care so much about Tom, he stands his ground. He knows how people should and should not be treated, regardless of what other people tell him.

However, he knows that in basic interactions, no person should be addressed and mocked like that- so simple and straightforward. The court scene is so intense and while it’s being conducted by adults, who are used to the way the world is, it’s being witnessed by these children. To have such a vivid scene be broken up by Dill needing to leave because he was so disturbed, reminds us that this isn’t right.

Kids are members of society that have been the least conditioned- so while they might be familiar with the way the world runs, they haven’t lived with it and let it define their life as adults have. So, when Dill is so disturbed by the way that Tom Robinson is being spoken to, it’s jarring. He’s not quite upset about how he’s being tried or the injustice of the court system, because that’s so complicated.

“Atticus said naming people after Confederate generals made slow steady drinkers.”