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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A deserving classic of modern American literature, Jul 25 2009
Fifty years after its initial publication in 1960, "To Kill a Mockingbird" has proven it deserves its place in anyone's list of the finest American classic literature ever written.
Written a scant three years before Martin Luther King awed the world with his magnificent "I have a dream" speech, Harper Lee also stunned the world with a poignant story centered on the unconscionable treatment accorded to the black man in USA's Deep South.
Tom Robinson, a productive, quietly proud and well-spoken black man who by today's standards might even be called an "Uncle Tom", is also cautiously subservient, withdrawn and all too aware of his underwhelming place in the society of Maycomb, Georgia, a sleepy white town in the heartland of America's confederate South.
Tom stands accused of the rape of Mayall Ewell, the 19 year old daughter of a boorish ne'er-do-well white trash family that, to the best recollection of everyone in the town, has never put in a day's work in its collective life. Jeremy Atticus Finch is a gentlemanly white lawyer who, despite the virulent hatred his own community is directing at him, has decided to hold firm to his own convictions about the equality of all men before God and to accept his assignment to the responsibility for Tom's defense at his capital trial for the rape of a white woman - a trial that is expected to be little more than a formality with scant necessity for reference to facts and truth.
"To Kill a Mockingbird" is not a legal thriller, although it certainly could have been. Rather, it is a story about human behaviour - kindness and cruelty; bigotry, hatred and prejudice versus acceptance and friendship; humour and pathos in the presence of sadness and dejection. Told from the point of view of Atticus Finch's children, Scout and her older brother Jem, we are witness to their father's poignant heart-warming attempts to teach his children to become the kind of citizens that, fifty years later, are sadly still the exception rather than the rule.
There can be few people (like me) left who haven't had the privilege of either reading "To Kill a Mockingbird" or seeing the movie, but if you are among that small number, do yourself a favour. Read it sooner than later.
Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Moving Reading of a Wonderful Book by Roses Prichard, Dec 18 2007
Like many youngsters, I was assigned To Kill a Mockingbird to read as a 15 year old. Unlike most, however, the assignment was for speed reading class . . . rather than American Literature.
Don't ever read this book for speed reading class.
I always intended to get back to the book for a more leisurely reading that would allow me to take in the obvious brilliance of Harper Lee in more ways. I was pleased to find that my local library offered an unabridged reading by Roses Prichard (an actress with a Ph.D. in Communications from the University of Southern California) for Books on Tape.
In the first 15 seconds, I knew I had made a winning choice. Roses Prichard turns Scout (Jean Louise) Finch into a girl you'll feel like you've known all your life. Take the time to find this wonderful recording: You'll discover more in this book than you've ever thought could be in a book describing the thoughts and experiences of a five- to eight-year-old narrator.
Jem and Scout Finch are the only children of Atticus Finch, a highly principled lawyer in the small Southern town of Macomb, Alabama, whose wife died young of a heart attack. Unlike many novelists who cram their story into a few hours or days, Harper Lee showed the good sense to give us the family history and to let the children grow up over a few years before entering the heart of her tale. It's good story-telling and is great for character development.
Jem is five years older than Scout but tolerates her company as long as she doesn't start acting like a girl. That's fine with Scout who prefers overalls to dresses any day. As Jem grows older, he finds himself taking on the role of protector as well.
The children acquire a summer friend, Dill, and decide they want to meet the reclusive Arthur (Boo) Radley, a neighbor who always stays indoors. They have many adventures that will remind you of Tom Sawyer and Becky Thatcher in Injun Joe's cave.
The book is written in pre-Civil-Rights-era Alabama when consciousness of the bad things done to African Americans wasn't very well developed among those who weren't African Americans. The only people in the story who seemed to appreciate the full horror of discrimination are those who are honestly trying to live the Christian life. But even many practicing Christians proved to be blind to their African American neighbors' needs and concerns.
Harper Lee does a fine job of skewering all of those who are hypocrites on the subject of race. She even takes an appropriate shot at northerners who avoid the company of African Americans.
In a way, this book was The Uncle Tom's Cabin of the Civil Rights Movement, developing the consciousness that helped to change some attitudes towards African Americans.
The story also features lots of insights into Southern "justice" of the day -- inside the court, in the jury box, in jail, and in prison. To bring the evils of the attitudes to bear, Harper Lee tells us that it's wrong to kill a mockingbird . . . they only sing for us to enjoy and don't do any harm. By the end of the book, some of those in Macomb begin to feel that way about harmless human beings who do good, as well.
You can learn more about Southern culture and attitudes in the early 1960s by reading this book than by studying a dozen nonfiction texts. Harper Lee got it right. One of the lightning rods for racial tension in those days was unwarranted sexual fear of African-American males. That theme is fully developed through having an African-American be accused of raping a white woman.
But what I think makes this book timeless is its focus on what it means to be a good person . . . the story of Atticus Finch and his struggles with being both a good man and a good father.
But years from now you won't forget Scout: She's one of the great heroines in American literature and an important prototype of what the next generation should have become in loving other people.
Appreciate the untapped potential all around you!
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Who could not like this book?, April 15 2007
Like many great novels, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is a book to die for... This fictional novel was written in the era of racism, the infamous 1960s. Though written when racial discrimination was commonly accepted, it radically imposes the thought of tolerance. Scout Finch is an aggressive, non-effeminate, little girl always looking for adventures that lurks throughout Maycomb County. Scout's curiosity leads her brother and herself into trying to catch a glimpse of the mysterious, Boo Radley. Being discreet as possible, Boo leaves subtle clues and gifts for the two within a log tree. Atticus Finch, Scout and Jem's father, forbids them to continue bothering poor Boo Radley. After being assigned the attorney for Tom Robinson, a persecuted African-American for rape, Atticus is tied up with a perilous task which burdens his family from the town. Sought as the "nigger-lovers", Atticus preserves his moral composure and does resists from violence, as the innocence of Scout and Jem slowly deteriorates. Atticus's unique personality understands the world's good and evil due to his experiences. As the novel progresses, Scout and Jem learn to appreciate the good in people and sympathize for the bad. TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, is a Pulitzer-winning book-and why? It continues to be a classic because it not only displays to everyone the rational and compassionate side of human-nature, but teaches one to appreciate humans from all aspects. Given as a gift, assigned for a class, or bought, TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD is a piece of American history and should be read by anyone who enjoys literature at its finest. Of the three novels I've read for class lately (OF MICE AND MEN by Steinbeck and KATZENJAMMER by McCrae), this was my favorite. While I enjoyed the others, this one really has heart and will be around for a long time.
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