How Does Harper Lee Present Innocence In To Kill A Mockingbird
Harper Lee used children to portray her message in her realistic fiction novel “To Kill A Mockingbird”. Children are innocent based off the fact that they have not had as many experiences as adults. Growing up gives you many experiences. Characters like Atticus definitely know more about life than characters like Jem or Scout. Usually most perspectives develop at an earlier age through experience; what one eats, what one wears, one’s hobbies, etc. Throughout the story Harper Lee uses children’s lack of experiences and innocence in To Kill A Mockingbird for the readers to see what an innocent, unprejudiced perspective towards racism is in the early-mid 20th century.
Scout being inexperienced and unexposed to the real world, has no bias towards …show more content…
During the release of To Kill A Mockingbird the norm was to explore and break some rules as a kid. To Kill A Mockingbird was released 30 years after the story’s timeline. Obviously, To Kill A Mockingbird was marketed towards adults in their 30’s. Subtracting 30 from an age 30-39 gets you at most 9. Thus, readers of this book were pretty likely to be similar in age to Jem and Scout when they lived in the same time period. What this means is that Harper Lee subliminally snuck in child-like memories for the readers in this book, so they can look back on their memories, and how life was like before the civil rights act was signed. Readers could also compare their lives to Jem and Scout and identify things that they can relate to. This tactic is effective because the readers are more sympathetic towards Jem and Scout. Human nature also makes humans feel innocence towards a child. In fact even characters in the story feel innocence towards children, especially the scene where the mob was going to lynch Tom but they did not since Jem and Scout were watching, “‘I looked around and up at Mr Cunningham, whose face did a peculiar thing. He squatted down and took me by both shoulders.’”(206). Showing children's innocence and nostalgia are both factors that make readers understand Harper Lee’s message
Scout being inexperienced and unexposed to the real world, has no bias towards …show more content…
During the release of To Kill A Mockingbird the norm was to explore and break some rules as a kid. To Kill A Mockingbird was released 30 years after the story’s timeline. Obviously, To Kill A Mockingbird was marketed towards adults in their 30’s. Subtracting 30 from an age 30-39 gets you at most 9. Thus, readers of this book were pretty likely to be similar in age to Jem and Scout when they lived in the same time period. What this means is that Harper Lee subliminally snuck in child-like memories for the readers in this book, so they can look back on their memories, and how life was like before the civil rights act was signed. Readers could also compare their lives to Jem and Scout and identify things that they can relate to. This tactic is effective because the readers are more sympathetic towards Jem and Scout. Human nature also makes humans feel innocence towards a child. In fact even characters in the story feel innocence towards children, especially the scene where the mob was going to lynch Tom but they did not since Jem and Scout were watching, “‘I looked around and up at Mr Cunningham, whose face did a peculiar thing. He squatted down and took me by both shoulders.’”(206). Showing children's innocence and nostalgia are both factors that make readers understand Harper Lee’s message