To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird is written by the American author Harper Lee. It was published in 1960, and the novel has won several awards during the last 5 decades. The story is based on events Lee observed in her hometown, Monroeville, Alabama.

The story of the novel is located to a little town called Maycomb, Alabama in the 1930's. The reader gets the chance to experience a typical southern town through the eyes of Scout Finch, the 6-year old narrator. We follow her through her childhood, and see how her impression and opinion of the society around her changes as she gets older. Her father, the lawyer Articus Finch, is appointed by the court to defend Tom Robinson, an Afro-American accused of raping a white woman. Coloured people are the target of a lot of prejudice and are treated with no respect and are lacking basic rights in Maycomb as well as in the other southern states. The reader gets to follow the change of her relationships to other people as she is influenced by the society, and especially her father's effort to teach her about morals and ethics, which ultimately comes down to human rights.

The plot of the story is realistic considering the setting, but it also brings a couple of surprises compared to the «trademark» childhood novel. It has a theme , racism, that isn't used a lot in stories of children, and the man seeming to be the bad guy, Mr. Radley, ends up saving the day.

Harper's writing is very casual and informal. She writes so that she best can explain the actions and the environment, and she does not hesitate to use words that many other writers migth have frowned upon ("nigger-lover", "whore-lady"), especially back in the 60's. The quotes are written with no importance of being grammatically correct – they are just reflecting the Alabama language, and this casuality «invites» the reader into the story. Harper also uses a lot of humor, which adds to the warm, casual tone of the story.

The novel has a coupple of themes that can be traced all the way from the first to the last chapter.
Childish innocence – Both Scout and her older brother Jem live with a sense of innocence that only children can have. For example, Scout happens to insult several people in the story without even realizing it herself, because of what is mere curiosity. Many children also haven't have time to be influenced by the prejudice of their parents yet, as Articus Finch states when explaining that their society isn't fair against coloured people: "They've done it before and they did it tonight and they'll do it again and when they do it - it seems that only children weep."
Bravery – Bravery and courage by not thinking better of yourself than others. There are lots of examples of people risking their own good health to help other people in the novel. For example, Dill and Scout run back to help Jem get away when he got stuck after runniing away from Mr. Radely's house, where a gunshot just had been fired. Or when a house in the neighborhood is on fire, every man fit helps removing the furniture and putting out the fire.

The novel also debates themes that are just as relevant today as they were back in the 60's.
Subjects like racism in our society might not be as obvious as it was in the South states in the 30's, but if you look a little further than the surface, you will probably find that there still a lot of racism in our society. Articus Finch tries to establish basic human rights in Maycomb, that everyone should have the same rights, no matter ethnicity, religion or family name. This is an obvious issue in the modern world, with millions of people living without these basic rights in their lives. The novel might remind some people of this and perhaps inspire them to think about what they can do to assure that their local society treats everybody equal as possible.


I really enjoyed the book, and I especially enjoyed the climax at the end, with the trial of Tom Robinson and the following events. I believe that this is a book that everybody should read, if not to regard it as a critisism to the modern society, then at least to enjoy a extremely well-written book!