English Assessment TKMB Spoken

English Assessment Task: Spoken Investigative Report

Q9: Heck Tate’s handling of Bob Ewell’s death

Hello and welcome back to The Australian Arts and Culture Program. I’m Shannon Yu and today, we are revealing one of the world’s bestseller novels, published in 1960. This novel was an immediate success as soon as it was published, winning the Pulitzer Prize and becoming a classic of modern American literature: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. This novel was based on her life when she was 10, during the after the Great Depression.

Not all readers of TKMB share the same idea and context as the author regarding in the gaps in knowledge and understanding. However this can be filled with background information of historical, social and cultural situation to develop your understanding by providing context to the characters and events within the story.
Today, we will be investigating the event of Heck Tate’s handling of Bob Ewell’s death.

This novel, written during the peak of the civil rights movement, which later brought an end to racial segregation by the hard works of Martin Luther King in his quest for equality and end to discrimination against the coloured, shows a great deal of social class in that era, even in the small town of Alabama. Even in Lee’s small and innocent world, these classes were extremely evident, as Jem, a mere 12 year old boy, shows . This includes the white and the black class as Jem assessed in chapter 23 "There's four kinds of folks in the world. The ordinary kind like us and the neighbours... the Cunninghams... the Ewells... and the Negroes." There were the white collars who were considered rich during the great depression years, such as Atticus Finch who was highly respected as a lawyer, the blue collars who struggled to earn, primarily farmers, including the Cunningham’s, and the white trash, in other words the Ewells who lived in the dump and depended on aid for basic necessities. However although the class description between the blue collared and white trash seems similar, the difference between them had nothing to do with the amount of money they own or earn but more of them and their interaction with the society (E.g. Cunningham’s would not take what they could not repay and would not, under any circumstance, take advantage of black men). Under all this hierarchy would be none other than the caste. This was the group of blacks, living apart from the rest of the town and a complete separate society from the whites. However Jem did not realise there were others such as Dolphus Raymond who was a wealthy white man who prefers to be with Negroes where Jem then quotes "They don't belong anywhere... they're just in-betweens." (Chapter 16) and most importantly there was Boo Radley, an outcast belonging to neither of the social classes and an imaginative “ghostly” figure to the children of the town. Being a shut out recluse for his whole entire life, Heck Tate sympathises Boo as he knew, even if he revealed Boo as a hero, he would always be a recluse of the town and will only bring misery to him.

Scout had also another point to say and it was none other than the symbolism of a mockingbird. This symbol does not have that much of a connection to the plot but does point out that the idea freedom of innocence being destroyed by evil is evident in our society. Mockingbirds can be described as birds of freedom, however being killed or shot as Scout quotes during the scene where Heck Tate chooses whether or not to reveal Boo’s heroic save as , “shootin’ a mockingbird”, which of course then shows the death of innocence of Boo by an unwanted evil, Bob Ewell. All through the book, characters such as Jem, Tom, Dill, Boo and Mr. Raymond can all be identified as mocking birds, being the innocent that was hurt by evil. For example when Tom Robinson was shot, Mr Underwood compared his killing to “the senseless slaughter of songbirds.” Miss Maudie also explains to scout how “Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but . . . sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.” As recent current affairs have shown, a small young girl of 8 years was strapped to a bomb and with her consent? This happened when the terrorist persuaded her to. But isn’t she just 8? Does this not show innocence being destroyed by evil? Does this not explain the meaning of a mockingbird?

Now, readied with the knowledge and understanding of the social and cultural context of prejudices, the social class and the symbolic meaning of a mocking bird we readers will have a better understanding of the scene; Heck Tate’s handling of Bob Ewell’s death. This also shows how Lee represents and uses the symbol and term of the freedom of innocence, using it none other than the title, To Kill a Mockingbird. Stay tuned for next weeks special on Harper Lee’s new Novel: Go Set a Watchmen. See you next time.