“When he gave us our air-rifles, Atticus wouldn’t teach us to shoot. Uncle Jack instructed us in the rudiments thereof; he said Atticus wasn’t interested in guns. Atticus said to Jem one day, ‘I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the backyard, ...
A little bit of literature | ||
“When he gave us our air-rifles, Atticus wouldn’t teach us to shoot. Uncle Jack instructed us in the rudiments thereof; he said Atticus wasn’t interested in guns. Atticus said to Jem one day, ‘I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the backyard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.’ | ||
That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it. | ||
‘Your father’s right,’ she said. ‘Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, 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.’ | ||
[...] | ||
‘If you had been on that jury, son, and eleven other boys like you, Tom would be a free man,’ said Atticus. ‘So far nothing in your life has interfered with your reasoning process. Those are twelve reasonable men in everyday life, Tom’s jury, but you saw something come between them and reason. You saw the same thing that night in front of the jail. When that crew went away, they didn’t go as reasonable men, they went because we were there. There’s something in our world that makes men lose their heads—they couldn’t be fair if they tried. In our courts, when it’s a white man’s word against a black man’s, the white man always wins. They’re ugly, but those are the facts of life.’” | ||
Vocabulary build-up | ||
The adverb thereof is often used in law texts, hence it might appear in international treaties. It means “of or concerning this, that, or it”. In the text, the word refers to “to shoot”. See an example: “a problem and the solution thereof”. | ||
The noun corncrib or corn crib means “A structure for storing and drying ears of corn”. | ||
The adjective reasonable means “capable of reasoning; rational; not excessive or extreme; fair”. Close synonyms are “rational”, “analytical”, “well-founded”, “coherent”, or “logical”. | ||
Comments | ||
Harper Lee’s best seller, To kill a mockingbird, stands to American culture not just as a book, but as a national novel, for it depicts some of the current most appreciated qualities of American culture (at least for some): justice, wisdom, decency, bravery, and empathy (represented by the lawyer Atticus Finch). The book was published in 1960, a time in which the civil rights movement was struggling to bring down a whole structure of laws that objectively conditioned the black community as second-class citizens. In this context, knowing that Americans were already familiarized with the battles of the Old South (which had been fought on cotton fields), Lee wanted to present the battles of the New South (which were undertaken in courtrooms). Southern literature needed to reckon with this new setting. The subtle first-person narration of a child (Scout) makes the book an easy read for anyone. However, don’t be mistaken, the message of Lee’s masterpiece is strong. It shows the racist judicial system and society of the South in the illegitimate trial to which Tom Robinson (a black man) was subjected, set against the one Arthur “Boo” Radley (a white man) was spared. |