To Kill a Mockingbird Essay

"Before I can live with other folks, I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.” This is just some of the wisdom that Atticus gives to his daughter Scout in the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The story is narrated by a young Scout and is set during the Great Depression in the southern town of Maycomb. At the start of the novel, siblings Scout and Jem, and newfound friend Dill, bother and attempt to get the neighborhood boogeyman Boo Radley to come out of hiding. As time progresses Atticus, a lawyer, takes on a case defending a Negro named Tom Robinson. Atticus and his family face disapproval from people of the town because of his decision and on the day of the trial, Tom is unfairly found guilty despite Atticus’s best attempts to defend him. Later the plaintiff Bob Ewell attempts to harm Scout and Jem but is stopped and killed by Boo Radley, whose actions are never made public and who is never seen from again. In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch’s influence on his daughter is made clear through the importance he places on education, the admirable way he practices law, and through his effective interactions with Maycomb residents.

Atticus places importance on education by making Scout go to school, teaching her life lessons, and getting her to view things differently. When Scout has a bad first day of school because she is able to read and doesn't want to go back, Atticus wants Scout to understand that receiving an education is as necessary for her as reading, a hobby of hers. “If you’ll concede the necessity of going to school, we’ll go on reading every night just as we always have” (41). In saying this, Atticus wants Scout to realize that ed...

... middle of paper ...

... now she can do the same in the future. From witnessing how Atticus interacts with occupants of Maycomb, Scout gets further influenced by him.

Scout gets influenced by Atticus’s words and actions she will grow up to be different from others in her mindset and actions. By making Scout go to school, Atticus shows how he thinks that education is important and that he wants Scout to learn that for herself. In defending Tom Robinson, Atticus shows how he does his job no matter the person which teaches Scout not to discriminate. The way Atticus reacts to Bob Ewell by being sympathetic instead of upset shows Scout how she should look at things from the point of view of others. Just like all humans, Scout is influenced by her father during her prepubescent years and those influences will affect her development as she grows up and also help to define who she is as a person.