صورة إلضافة األيقونة فوق انقر

Done By:

Amany Jouda Walla Abdel-Rahman

Submitted To:Dr. Ayman El-Hallaq

To Kill A Mockingbird

IUG, Second Semester, 2012

2032008197220420081489

Key literary facts Author Title Background Information Characters & Plot structure Setting Themes Symbols

Outline

Author: Harper Lee

Type of work: Novel

Genre: Coming-of-age story; social drama;

courtroom drama; Southern drama

Narrator: Scout narrates the story herself,

looking back in retrospect an unspecified number

of years after the events of the novel take place.

Tone: Childlike, nostalgic; as the novel progresses,

increasingly dark, and critical of society

Key literary facts

An American novelist

Born in 1926 in Monroeville, Alabama, US

Father was prominent lawyer

Studied law at the University of Alabama

The author of one novel, but it was a novel

that had an extraordinary impact on

American society: “To Kill a Mockingbird”

Harper lee

Her Writings:

1. “To Kill a Mockingbird”, her only novel

2. “Love--In Other Words”, a short essay

3. “Christmas to Me”, an essay

4. “When Children Discover America”, an essay

5. “Romance and High Adventure”, a paper

6. “Open Letter to Oprah Winfrey”

Cont’d… Harper lee

Despite being Lee's only published book, TKMB led

to her being awarded the Presidential Medal of

Freedom of the United States for her contribution to

literature by President George W. Bush at the White

House in 2007.

Cont’d… Harper lee

The title of To Kill a Mockingbird refers to the

local belief, introduced early in the novel and

referred to again later, that it is a sin to kill a

mockingbird. Harper Lee is subtly implying that

the townspeople are responsible for killing Tom

Robinson, and that doing so was not only unjust

and immoral, but sinful.

Title

صورة إلضافة األيقونة فوق انقرMockingbird: an American bird that copies the songs of other birds.

First person

Story is told by Scout, a six-year-old girl

Harper Lee is actually a woman; Scout

represents the author as a little girl although

the story is not strictly autobiographical

Point of View

The story’s narrator

Although now an adult,

Scout looks back at her

childhood and tells of the

momentous events and

influential people of

those years.

Scout is six when the

story begins.

Jean Louis Finch-”Scout”

Although the novel wasn't supposed to be an

autobiography, the time period and some events seem

to match the novel.

Harper Lee seems to act a lot like the character in her

novel Scout.

TKMB is semi-autobiographical for a number of reasons:

1. Lee grew up in Alabama

2. Father was prominent lawyer

3. In the 1930's Harper Lee would be around the age of

five and Scout was about the same age.

Is TKMB an Autobiography??

TKMB includes several

references to historical

events.

Understanding the times

helps to understand the

novel

Background Information

Hitler, chancellor of Germany,

believes that Jews, African

Americans, and other races are

inferior to Anglo-Saxons.

Life During the 1930s

Legal Segregation in Alabama1923-1940

No white female nurses in

hospitals that treat black

men

No interracial marriages

Separate waiting rooms for

whites and blacks

Segregated theatres

Cont’d … Racial Discrimination

Separate schools

Cont’d … Racial Discrimination

Segregated water fountains

A cafe near the tobacco market. (Signs: Separate doors for "White" and for "Colored.“) North Carolina, 1940

Setting

Maycomb, Alabama(fictional city)

1933-1935

Characters&

Plot Summary

TKMB is a novel about growing up under extraordinary

circumstances in the 1930s in the Southern United

States. The story covers a span of three years, during

which the main characters undergo significant changes.

TKMB deals with the issues of racism that were

observed by the author as a child in her hometown of

Monroeville, Alabama.

The novel tells the story of Atticus Finch, a lawyer in a

small southern town whose family is ostracized when

he defends a black man accused of raping a white

woman.

Summary

Atticus Finch

Scout(Jean

Louise)Finch

Boo Radley

Bob Ewell

Tom Robinson

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Att

icus

Father

Jem Fincholder brother

younger sister

defe

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s To

m in

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rtaccuses him of rape Mayella

Ewelld

ep

en

ds

on

his

defe

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an

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pro

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saves from Bob’s

attackbreaks Jem

’s

armatt

em

pts

to k

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savin

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his daughter

صورة إلضافة األيقونة فوق انقر

Good vs. Evil Moral Education Social Inequality Prejudice Fear of the Unknown Bravery Trust Truth Femininity

Themes

Moral reasoning by Atticus Finch

Acts of “Boo” Radley

Acts of the Ewell family: deception, harassment,

lies and violence

Good vs. Evil

The novel approaches this question by dramatizing

Scout and Jem’s transition from a perspective of

childhood innocence, in which they assume that

people are good because they have never seen evil,

to a more adult perspective, in which they have

confronted evil and must incorporate it into their

understanding of the world.

people such as Tom Robinson and Boo Radley are

not prepared for the evil that they encounter, and,

as a result, they are destroyed.

Cont’d… Good vs. Evil

Even Jem is victimized to an extent by his discovery

of the evil of racism during and after the trial.

Atticus Finch, who is virtually unique in the novel in

that he has experienced and understood evil without

losing his faith in the human capacity for goodness.

Scout at last sees Boo Radley as a human being. Her

newfound ability to view the world from his

perspective ensures that she will not become jaded

as she loses her innocence.

Cont’d… Good vs. Evil

The treatment of Tom Robinson

Division between blacks and whites during time

period

Treatment of whites who defend blacks

Social Inequality, Racism &Discrimination

The education of children is necessarily involved in

the development of all of the novel’s themes—how

they are taught to move from innocence to

adulthood.

Scout's real education occurs outside of school.

This theme is explored most powerfully through the

relationship between Atticus and his children, as he

devotes himself to instilling a social conscience in

Jem and Scout.

Moral Education

The novel’s conclusion about education is that the

most important lessons are those of sympathy and

understanding, and that a sympathetic,

understanding approach is the best way to teach

these lessons. In this way, Atticus’s ability to put

himself in his children’s shoes makes him an

excellent teacher, while Miss Caroline’s rigid

commitment to the educational techniques that she

learned in college makes her ineffective and even

dangerous.

Cont’d… Moral Education

Scout's world is a safe place — her greatest fears

are largely products of her own imagination. So even

though she is terrified to pass by the Radley house,

she takes the gum she finds in their tree.

As Scout moves from innocence to maturity — part

of a coming-of-age story — she will learn that she

can't always trust those things that appear safe.

Trust

Scout & Jem face harsh criticism from their

peers and they’re called “nigger lovers”

because Atticus, their father, chooses to defend

an innocent man.

Ewell Family is a victim of social prjudice.

Everyone assumes that they’re called “no

good”.

Prejudice

Mockingbirds

Boo Radley

Symbols

The title of To Kill a Mockingbird has very little

literal connection to the plot, but it carries a

great deal of symbolic weight in the book.

In this story of innocents destroyed by evil, the

“mockingbird” comes to represent the idea of

innocence. It symbolizes everything that is

Good and Harmless in this world. Thus, to kill a

mockingbird is to destroy innocence..

Mockingbirds

Two characters in the novel can be identified as

mockingbirds: Tom Robinson & Boo Radley—

innocents who have been injured or destroyed

through contact with evil.

Cont’d… Symbols… Mockingbirds

As the novel progresses, the children’s

changing attitude toward Boo Radley is an

important measurement of their development

from innocence toward a grown-up moral

perspective. At the beginning of the book, Boo

is a source of childhood superstition. As he

leaves Jem and Scout presents and mends

Jem’s pants, he gradually becomes increasingly

and intriguingly real to them.

Boo Radley

At the end of the novel, he becomes fully

human to Scout. Boo, an intelligent child ruined

by a cruel father, is one of the book’s most

important mockingbirds; he is also an important

symbol of the good that exists within people.

Despite the pain that Boo has suffered, the

purity of his heart rules his interaction with the

children. In saving Jem and Scout from Bob

Ewell, Boo proves the ultimate symbol of good.

Cont’d… Symbols… Boo Radley

"Mockingbirds don't do one

thing but make music for us to

enjoy. They don't eat up

people's gardens, they don't

nest in corncribs, they don't do

one thing but sing their hearts

out for us. That's why it's a sin

to kill a mockingbird."

Finally …