Everyone’s perspectives on books are always extremely diverse, especially in the controversial To Kill a Mockingbird. The book has several different important themes lying dormant that can be argued by scholars. In my opinion, though, Scout’s transition from a naïve wild child to a knowing, near adolescent is one of the key themes in the book. I, along with likely many other young girls in the South, can identify with her changes as she grows and learns throughout the book how to better understand her peers and compassion for those she doesn’t necessarily comprehend.
One of the most dynamic aspects of Scout is her unbridled imagination. She, Jem, and Dill performed their fantasies with the aid of the “works of Oliver Optic, Victor Appleton, and Edgar Rice”. The even more imaginative game they thought up was the Radley game, where they reenacted the epic drama, “Boo Radley”. However, as Scout aged, her imagination seemed to wane over the years. The frightening “Haints” of the past were no longer such a threat towards the end of the book. “Haints, Hot Steams, incantations, secret signs, had vanished with our years as mist with sunrise.” Her imagination, as the “mist with sunrise” slowly disappeared over the years. Scout’s transformation is almost parallel to mine when I was her age. Playing outside and making up games was a favorite pastime of mine, too, but I, like Scout, grew over the years and it simply disappeared with my age. This is a vital aspect of the novel, because it really marks the point where Scout is growing up, and is becoming a near adolescent.
Another apparent transformation Scout goes through is from tomboy to young lady. At the beginning of the novel, Scout is irrefutably against anything feminine or girly. Jem accuses her of “getting’ more like a girl everyday” when she tries to keep him and Dill from sneaking up to the Radley house. She takes offense to that and feels she has no choice but to join them and prove that she can handle everything as well as the boys. She also refused to wear anything but her grubby, boy overalls, which embarrassed Aunt Alexandra immensely.
Towards the end of the novel, however, Scout’s more lady-like side emerges when she must have tea with the neighborhood ladies. She realizes at this point that ladies are actually strong, powerful women who can act when they need to. Aunt Alexandra proves her strong womanhood when she receives the news about Tom Robinson’s death. She takes a moment, then “was in front of me [Scout], and I saw her head go up as she went through the door.” At this point, Scout begins to see that there is something undoubtedly respectable about a woman. Evidence supports her newfound feminism when Scout willingly wears a dress to the Halloween party, which Jem carries home from the school.
The most important transition that Scout goes through is changing from a headstrong, almost rude child into a knowing and empathetic near adolescent. She has very few manners throughout most of the book, and often is fortuitously rude to peers and adults. She has very little compassion for people she does not understand, including Walter Cunningham. When Walter came to lunch one day during school, he poured syrup all over his lunch, likely because it was a rare commodity if he ever came across it. Scout, not understanding and not caring, says in front of him, “But he’s gone and drowned his dinner in syrup!” She probably doesn’t understand that his family can’t afford syrup, but she says her comment anyway because “he’s a Cunningham.” Being outwardly rude to an adult is not out of the question for her either. She develops a cussing habit that she does not mind using in front of Atticus, Calpurnia, and even her uncle.
Scout’s maturation is extraordinarily apparent, though, towards the end of the book. Scout single-handedly disbanded a mob, by simply being polite and picking out an individual. When she ran to Atticus’ side, she realized that she is in the center of something strange, although she was not quite sure what it is at the time. She looked around the circle, and recognized Mr. Cunningham. She made conversation with him, nothing spectacular, but by picking out Mr. Cunningham, she makes the mob forget the “mob mentality” and realized that there were innocent children in their midst. Her polite, lady-like manner helped her father out a serious situation.
In addition, she walks Arthur Radley home, and is careful to have “slipped my [Scout’s] hand into the crook of his arm.” She then was “escorted” by Mr. Radley to his home. When Mr. Radley shut his front door, Scout had an epiphany that shows how much she had grown and how wise beyond her years she had become. She put herself into Boo Radley’s shoes and realized that he had come to care deeply for her and Jem, almost to the point of him thinking of them as his own children. She saw what he had saw from behind his masked window- two children he watched grow up to be adolescents in his front yard.
Her personality at the end of the book is in some ways the same, and yet in some ways is so dissimilar that it is almost unrecognizable. She still seems to have the innocence of a child. Evidence of that is walking home from the Radley’s when she “looked at the tip of my nose I could see fine misty beads, but looking cross-eyed made me dizzy.” Her little girl mentality is still very much present in that situation. However, her newfound compassion and empathetic nature is evident when she says, “When they finally saw him, why he hadn’t done any of those things… Atticus, he was real nice.” She is supposed to be talking about The Grey Ghost; however, I suspect that she is actually talking about her meeting with Boo Radley. She expected him to be a savage monster, but upon meeting him, she realized he was actually just a man with some kind of disability.
Scout is a complex character, who has the tough issue of racism and growing up as a girl in the South thrust upon her as just a small child. In my opinion, though, her experiences in the book helped to shape her into a young lady who has a bright future ahead of her. Without all the hardships brought upon by her father being unapproved, she would not have made such a smooth and complete transformation into a young lady. She does not exactly have grace or pose, but Scout is strong, loyal, and has compassion for people that is unmistakable and she gained it all through her tough upbringing.
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I really liked that movie and that book!
To Kill a Mockingbird is one of my favorites! = )