The Scarlet Ibis & to Kill a Mocking Bird

The scarlet ibis & To Kill a Mocking bird

Carolina gonzalez

Period 1

Both Boo and Doodle live on the outside of what society has called "normal". Both characters are strikingly different from everyone around them. 
For both characters, it is their differences that people preoccupy on-for example, Doodle's brother can only focus on how different they are and the things that Doodle can not do. Same with Boo-the kids focus on the way that his life is different from their own.
These characters are different though in a few respects, too. Doodle dies as a result of his brother's inability to accept him, but at the end of to kill a mocking bird, Scout does accept Boo just as he is. Doodle's brother does not mature, whereas Scout does. Both works can operate under the theme that "people may not always be who they first appear to be".
The Scarlet Ibis on the bleeding tree symbolizes Doodle dying because the scarlet ibis was limp and it is a red bird; when Doodle dies, he was bleeding out of his mouth, making his shirt stained bright red and he was limp just like the bird. The bird had traveled all this way to get back home just to die; Doodle had come so far in his progress of trying to walk before school start just to be left by his brother to die. “I lay there sheltering my fallen scarlet ibis from the heresy of rain”. The old woman swamp also shows symbolism because it represents peace and happiness. This is where the brother taught Doodle to walk, swim, and row a boat, so when Doodle came here he would be happy and it would be peacefully for him. Also this is where Doodle and his brother bonded and formed that brotherly relationship with each other.
The title of To Kill a Mockingbird shows that killing a mockingbird is like destroying innocence. The mockingbird symbolizes Tom Robinson because he is innocent and did not do anything wrong, but was kill through the contact with evil. Tom is accused of raping Mayella Ewell, when really it is just a cover up for Bob Ewell, her father, for beating her. After Tom is shot, Mr. Underwood compares his death to “the senseless slaughter of songbirds.” Boo Radley is a mockingbird because he is a peaceful person who never did any harm to anyone and he is trying to make the world a more pleasant place. He saved the kids from Bob Ewell and that shows that no matter how much pain he has gone through he still found the good in his heart to go save the kids even if it meant he might get killed. The mockingbird symbolizes Tom Robinson and Boo Radley because to kill them, it would be a sin. “Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but… that’s why it is a sing to kill one.”