1. Introduction to:

2. To Kill a Mockingbird’s place in American Literature
Won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961
Voted by librarians as the best novel of the century
Made into a movie in 1962 & was nominated for 8 Academy Awards
In a “Survey of Lifetime Reading Habits,” researchers found that, out of 5,000 respondents, TKAM was one of three books “most often cited as making a difference” in people’s lives (Johnston, 2002)

3. Setting: 1930s Alabama
Segregation between black people and white people:
Jim Crow Laws: kept black people and white people separate
It was illegal for blacks and whites to have sexual relationships and/or marry
African Americans did not have the right to vote

4. Setting: 1930s Alabama
The Great Depression ( ) – the stock market crashed on October 24, 1920
Many Americans were left without jobs and had very little money to support themselves and their families

5. Who is Harper Lee? Born on April 28, 1926 in Monroeville, Alabama
Began writing TKAM in 1957
Maycomb, Alabama is a fictional town based on Lee’s childhood in Monroeville, Alabama
The character Scout in TKAM is loosely based on Lee’s own childhood

6. Why is Lee’s novel so significant in literature?
It demonstrates the relationship between blacks & whites as the battle for integration and equal rights was at a high point (Johnson, 2002)
The reader can see the viewpoint of people different from themselves
The reader can experience the naïve viewpoint of the world through the eyes of a child
It challenges the stereotypes of the Southerner, the African-American, the child, and the young lady (Johnson, 2002)

7. Main Characters in TKAM: Scout Finch
The narrator of the novel
She lives with her father, Atticus, her brother, Jem, and their black cook, Calpurnia
She is a tomboy

8. Main Characters in TKAM: Jem Finch
Full name = Jeremy Atticus Finch
Scout’s older brother by 4 years
In the beginning, he and Scout are playmates; as he gets older, he separates himself – he enters adolescence during the novel

9. Main Characters in TKAM: Dill
Jem & Scout’s summer neighbor and friend
He is small but very confident with a big imagination
He becomes fascinated with Boo Radley
Represents childhood innocence in the novel

10. Main Characters in TKAM: Atticus Finch
Father of Scout and Jem
Is a lawyer in Maycomb County
His wife died shortly after Scout was born
He is the novel’s moral backbone

11. Main Characters in TKAM: Arthur “Boo” Radley
He is a recluse and hardly ever leaves his home
Scout, Jem, and Dill are fascinated by the mystery surrounding him
He was an intelligent child who was emotionally damaged by his father
He is a good person and is a symbolic “mockingbird” in the novel

12. Main Characters in TKAM: Calpurnia
The Finches’ black cook
She is very strict with the children
She is the children’s connection between the white world and her black community

13. Language in TKAM: Racial slurs
Derogatory (offensive) terms referring to African Americans:
“nigger”
“colored”
More acceptable term in the 1930s:
Negro (but this term is not used today; African American or black is acceptable now)

14. Language in TKAM: Southern dialect
“Over yonder” = over there
“Reckon” (verb) = to think or to perceive
Multiple negation (e.g. I don’t buy nothing)
Deletion of has/have (e.g. The school been there a long time)
Use of ain’t (a contraction of am not) – used instead of have not (e.g. I ain’t seen nothin’
Adverbial use of “right” (e.g. I’m right tired) to mean quite or fairly

15. Internet Resources
gcse/mockingbird.htm#24 (LOTS ofbackground information!!!)
_HS/tkm/ (Good information about vocabulary and allusions)
ing/ (general information)