As the other answer indicates, the Tom Robinson trial is a pivotal moment in Scout's moral development. Another one comes, however, at the end of the novel. Scout realizes that it is the dreaded Boo Radley, a man the children have long painted as a monster, who stepped forward courageously to save her life and Jem's. At the moment, standing on her porch, that she identifies Boo to Sheriff Tate as the person who intervened with Bob Ewell and "yanked" him down, she perceives the humanity in Boo, who is standing near her. He moves from horror figure to human in her mind, and the realization that he is a good person strikes her so hard that she starts to cry as she looks at him:
His lips parted into a timid smile, and our neighbor’s image blurred with my sudden tears. “Hey, Boo,” I said.
Scout also understands the importance of changing the story about how Bob Ewell died. It would be cruel and agonizing for the reclusive Boo to have to face public scrutiny for stabbing Bob to protect the children. Atticus, at first, refuses to countenance the lie, but Mr. Tate is adamant, saying:
To my way of thinkin’, Mr. Finch, taking the one man who’s done you and this town a great service an‘ draggin’ him with his shy ways into the limelight—to me, that’s a sin. It’s a sin and I’m not about to have it on my head. If it was any other man, it’d be different. But not this man, Mr. Finch.
Atticus suddenly "gets" it. Torturing Mr. Radley after he saved the children would be a grave wrong that would help nobody and not serve justice. When Atticus asks Scout if she understands why they have to say that Bob Ewell fell on his knife, she has another moment of truth in which she shows she understands:
I ran to him and hugged him and kissed him with all my might. “Yes sir, I understand,” I reassured him. “Mr. Tate was right.” Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me. “What do you mean?”
“Well, it’d be sort of like shootin‘ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?”
Scout is able to transcend her prejudice against Boo in a way many of the citizens of Maycomb can't against blacks. Once she can see Boo as human, she can put herself in his shoes and see that they need to do what is best for him, as a good-hearted innocent who is like the innocent mockingbird.
The trial demonstrates Scout's moral development.
Scout grows up considerably over the course of the book. When the book first begins, she is going into first grade and very immature. She doesn’t understand the situation when she finds out that her father is defending Tom Robinson. She thinks Boo Radley is a monster. She fights with other children at the drop of a hat. However, in time Scout grows to better understand human nature and develop an adult's moral consciousness through empathy for others.
The moment when you first realize that Scout's moral sense has developed to the point that she understands human nature is during the trial. Scout shows that she is thinking about her father, her brother, and Mayella. This is a sign of maturity. Earlier on, Atticus tried to get Scout to see things from others’ points of view. Scout begins to do this.
The first example is when a group of Cunninghams try to lynch Tom Robinson while Atticus is the only one there to stop them. During the lynch mob incident, Scout walks into the middle of a mob of angry men and tries to strike up a conversation with Walter Cunningham’s father, based on what little common ground she can find from what little she knows about him, and the fact that she goes to school with his son.
Atticus had said it was the polite thing to talk to people about what they were interested in, not about what you were interested in. Mr. Cunningham displayed no interest in his son, so I tackled his entailment once more in a last-ditch effort to make him feel at home. (Ch. 15)
In this way, Scout diffused a very serious situation. She did not completely understand what she did nor how she did it, but she did it based on a very grown-up impulse to try to understand someone she barely knew. She was doing what Atticus taught her, albeit inexpertly. Despite this, or maybe because of it, she succeeded. Scout broke up the crowd, because they could no longer go through with anything after that. As Atticus said, “it took an eight-year-old child to bring ‘em to their senses” (Ch. 16). Scout taught a moral lesson to a group of men.
Scout also showed that she appreciated what others went through when she listened to Mayella testify. You would think that Mayella would be her enemy, since she was the one who accused Tom Robinson of rape and Atticus was defending him. As Scout listened to Mayella testify and her father’s cross-examination, however, she put herself in Mayella’s place.
As Tom Robinson gave his testimony, it came to me that Mayella Ewell must have been the loneliest person in the world. She was even lonelier than Boo Radley, who had not been out of the house in twenty-five years. (Ch. 19)
Scout also shows compassion for Jem during and after the trial as she realizes that he expects Atticus to win and he is heartbroken when he doesn't. She watches her father very closely too, and feels for him every step of the way. She doesn't understand everything that happens, but has empathy and an emotional connection.
The trial is pivotal because it shows Scout what the world is really like. It requires her to show compassion for Walter Cunningham, Mayella Ewell, Atticus, and her brother. The trial affected all of their lives, but for Scout it demonstrated that she was really growing up.
No comments:
Post a Comment