Student Question
What is unusual about the novel To Kill a Mockingbird?
Quick answer:
The novel To Kill a Mockingbird is unusual for several reasons. It won the Pulitzer Prize, yet Harper Lee never wrote another novel. Lee's reclusive nature adds to its mystique. The unique narrative perspective of Scout Finch, both as a child and an adult, provides dramatic irony. The novel's themes of racial injustice and human nature, combined with vividly drawn minor characters, contribute to its enduring appeal and status as a genuine work of art.
TEN UNUSUAL ASPECTS OF TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
- The novel won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961 for its author, Harper Lee. Lee never wrote another novel--probably unique for Pulitzer winners.
- Harper Lee, who is still living, refuses all interviews and discussions about To Kill a Mockingbird.
- The film version won the Best Actor Oscar for Gregory Peck. His portrayal of Atticus Finch is considered one of the greatest in the history of cinema.
- The film version is considered such a perfect complement to the novel that no other remakes have ever been considered. After all, who could follow Peck's portrayal of Atticus?
- The novel is fictional, but it is based on huge doses of Harper Lee's own personal life as a child.
- The character, Dill, is based on real-life writer, Truman Capote--Lee's summer friend in Monroeville, Alabama.
- The story is told by the very young Scout
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- Scout Finch, an unusual choice for narrator. It includes first-person narratives from both her child and future adult perspectives.
- One of the primary characters, Boo Radley, only makes one appearance--and that at the very end of the novel.
- The main plot of the second half of the novel, that of the trial of Tom Robinson, details the rape of a white woman by a black man--a highly sensitive subject even in 1960.
- More questions are asked about To Kill a Mockingbird on eNotes than any other piece of literature.
What are the unusual aspects in To Kill a Mockingbird?
Consider these three aspects of the novel; they are not in themselves unique in literature, but Harper Lee's mastery of them makes her novel more than memorable. It stands as a genuine work of art.
Point of View: The novel employs the retrospective point of view with Scout as narrator. Throughout the story, we witness events as Scout experienced them, but they are interpreted for us in the mature voice of the same child who has grown up. When the novel was first published, developing two conflicting voices was criticized by reviewers, but this point of view is now recognized as one of the novel's main strengths. Scout the child takes us into the secret, wonderful, and frequently confusing world of childhood in fresh and compelling ways; it becomes a parallel universe to daily adult life in Maycomb. Scout's mature view, however, provides dramatic irony throughout the novel, none more powerful or effective than the scene at the jail when Atticus faces the lynch mob.
Minor Characters: The eNotes Study Guide over the novel lists more than thirty characters, the great majority of them being citizens of Maycomb who play a very limited role, if any role at all, in the novel's two story lines: Tom's Robinson's trial and Boo Radley's life. However, even the most minor of these characters is captured vividly and contributes to our understanding of the town and, in a more significant way, of humanity itself in its various permutations.
The Emotional Landscape: The novel seems to encompass all human experience, in one way or another, and portrays human nature in its degradation as well as its glory. For every act of cowardice, there is one of courage. For each hateful heart, Lee shows us one compassion. Some characters are wise and profound; some are unbelievably shallow and silly. All are human, some terribly flawed. Drama, pain, injustice, and tears are found in the novel, but we also find hilarious characters, scenes, and dialog that also contain truth.