Perspectives
Film adaptation
To Kill a Mockingbird was turned into a film adaptation with the same title in 1962. The movie was directed by Robert Mulligan and starred popular classic Hollywood actor Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch.
The movie was an instant success and made a favorable impression on critics. Commercially, it earned six times its budget. It was also nominated for eight Academy Awards, out of which it won three, including Best Actor for Grego…
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Literary movement
The novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is a coming of age novel. Coming of age novels traditionally show the main character’s psychological growth from youth to maturity. To Kill a Mockingbird follows the two Finch children, Scout and Jem, through a series of events spanning a few years and presents the way they grow and mature because of the things they experience. For example, Jem Finch is shown as an innocent child at the beginning of …
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Genre
The novel also belongs to the Southern Gothic genre. Southern Gothic literature usually explores the values of the American South and its culture following the American Civil War. Aspects that are usually explored include poverty, religion, violence, a…
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Historical perspective
To Kill a Mockingbird explores an important historical period of the United States. Firstly, the novel is set during the Great Depression, which marked the biggest economic recession of the 20th century. This is explored in the novel by showing the poverty that many residents of Maycomb suffer from. For example, the Cu…
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Works with similar themes
The theme of racism and racial segregation is also explored in the short story “City Lovers” by Nadine Gordimer. In the story, a white man begins a relationship with a South African mixed-race woman until they are discovered by the police. To Kill a Mockingbird presents the trial of a Black man who was accused of raping a white woman, when it was the woman who actually forcefully kissed the Black man. When comparing “City Lovers” with To Kill a Mockingbird it could be useful to analyze the way racist and segregationist views in South Africa are similar or different from the ones in the United States. Moreover, it would be useful to look at society’s reaction to mixed-race relationships in the two stories.
The short story “The Lynching of Jube Benson” by Paul Laurence Dunbar also focuses on racism. Just like in To Kill a Mockingbird, where Tom Robinson is unjustly accused of attacking a white woman, in Dunbar’s short story, Jube Benson is accused of the rape and murder of Annie, his employer’s daughter. While Tom Robinson undergoes a trial, even though he loses it, Jube Benson is caught by an angry mob and hanged, before they can discover who the real attacker was.
The short story “Blackberries” by Leslie Norris also explores the theme of childhood innocence and growing up. In the story, a young boy witnesses his parents fighting for the first time and, as such, loses the innocent belief that his parents are perfect people who love each other. In To Kill a Mockingbird, Jem witnesses the unfairness of a trial against a Black man, which is his first time realizing…
