How Does Lee Use Irony In To Kill A Mockingbird

Harper Lee’s critically acclaimed literature, To Kill A Mockingbird (1960), is a powerful story about the racial discrimination that was raging through the Alabama’s in the 1930s, with devastating realism and complexity. Lee’s town in Alabama represents everything that was going on in a small town, it is described as a town that isn’t growing outwards, but instead growing inwards, ‘the same families married the same families until the members of the community looked faintly alike’. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee uses stylistic devices as symbolism, foreshadowing and irony to present her theme of inequality. By applying mature themes to the text, Lee enhances and illustrates vividly the horrific events that happened during the 1930s in Maycomb
In the literary sense, symbolism is used to enhance the description of a story and give the reader a deeper meaning to something. One of the most well-known uses of symbolism is the title itself, To Kill A Mockingbird. The mockingbird is an animal meant for enjoyment, it sings a sweet song and hurts nothing. When Scout has received an air gun as a gift, she is instructed to leave the mockingbirds alone as they oppose no threat to anything or anyone. Lee uses the mockingbird as a symbol of purity and innocence. Tom Robinson is a black male accused of raping Mayella Ewell, a young white female. Although all of the evidence is pointing towards Mayella’s father, Robert Ewell, but as the perpetrator, the jury decides that Tom is guilty primarily because he is black. In this case, Tom is the mockingbird; shot down by society although he has done no harm to anyone. One of the more hidden examples of symbolism in the theme of inequality is Scout’s pants. The pants represent her independent thinking and ability to express herself, something that many girls weren’t doing at the time. Additionally, it is this way of thinking that allows for Scout to see beyond the color of someone’s skin and accept the social