A book report on To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was immediately successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature. The plot and characters are loosely based on the author's observations of her family and neighbors, as well as on an event that occurred near her hometown in 1936, when she was 10 years old.
The story takes place during three years (1933-1935) of the Great Depression in the fictional “tired old town” of Maycomb, County. It focuses on six-year-old Jean Louise Finch(Scout), who lives with her older brother, Jem, and their widowed father, Atticus, a middle aged lawyer. Judge Taylor appoints Atticus to defend Tom Robinson, a black man who has been accused of raping a young white woman, MayellaEwell. Although many of Maycomb's citizens disapprove, Atticus agrees to defend Tom to the best of his ability. Other children taunt Jem and Scout for Atticus's actions, calling him a “nigger-lover”. Scout is tempted to stand up for her father's honor by fighting, even though he was told her not to. Atticus faces a group of men intent on Iynching Tom. This danger is averted when Scout, Jem, and Dill shame the mob into dispersing by forcing then to view the situation from Atticus' and Tom's points of view. Atticus eventually accepts the sheriff's story that Ewell simply fell on his own knife. Boo asks Scout to walk him home, and after she says goodbye to him at his front door he disappears again.
When the book was released, reviewers noted that it was divided into two parts, and opinion was mixed about Lee's ability to connect them. I was also moved by the children's fascination with Boo and their feelings of safety and comfort in the neighborhood. And the s econd part which deals with what book reviewers termed “the spirit-corroding shame of the civilized white Southerer in the treatment of the Negro” made me think about the race relations a lot.