Life Lessons from to Kill a Mockingbird

Urooba Hashim

Ms. Thompson

ELA 20 SAGE

December 27, 2017

Life Lessons from To Kill A Mockingbird

What life lessons can a book possibly teach? Regardless of where or who a man is, they are continually learning something new each and every day, either about themselves or about the atmosphere around them, be it from another person or a book. Harper Lee’s heartwarming novel To Kill A Mockingbird, teaches its readers many crucial life lessons. Furthermore, as the story progresses, readers gain a lot of knowledge from the events that took place in the book, for example, the trial of Tom Robinson and children’s fascination with Boo Radley. The life lessons were essentially taught by Atticus Finch, and the Finch’s neighbour, Miss Maudie Atkinson. Readers were educated these life lessons through Jean Louise Finch and Jem Finch. The three most important lessons taught in To Kill A Mockingbird are: courage is not simply shown in one's physical being, however should be a mental capability too, remaining true to oneself regardless of what the circumstances are, and that people should not pass judgment on others without genuinely understanding who they are.

One of the main life lessons that Atticus teaches to Scout is that courage is not only a physical trait of a person yet the mental alertness for what lies ahead down the road in his or her life. “‘Easy does it, son,’ Atticus would say. ‘She’s an old lady and she’s ill. You just hold your head high and be a gentleman. Whatever she says to you, it’s your job not to let her make you mad’” (Lee, 134). In addition, as of now in the novel, Jem is pondering on what Atticus had said to him in regards to being fearless and overcoming Mrs. Dubose's comments. At this point, Jem continues explaining how solid and courageous Atticus is when welcoming her. Atticus reliably acts amiable towards her and gives her the report of the courthouse news for that day in spite of the disturbing comments made by Mrs. Dubose. Correspondingly, Atticus can possibly be himself regardless of the situation, and approach everybody with respect despite of when he may not even have any desire to which demonstrates his comfort with leaving the norm. Readers can apply this straightforwardly to their lives by living in the direction they choose and not fearing putting themselves out there to go astray.

Secondly, one of the life lessons Mrs. Maudie educates to Scout and that Atticus lives as he is simply a living example, is remaining true to oneself regardless of the circumstances. Lee states, “Atticus Finch is the same in his house as he is on public streets” (61). Now in the book, Mrs. Maudie and Scout are having a discussion about the variety of men in Maycomb County and how Atticus does not display hypocrisy. In like manner, he reliably goes about as a respectable, selfless lawyer for Maycomb County. Readers can apply this to their lives by continually ensuring that they generally comprehend that they are peculiar. Moreover, God calls a wide range of people to do all sorts of different things, so people have to do those things in their way since that is exactly their identity.

At last, the most significant and insistent life lesson in this novel is that people should not pass judgment on an individual without genuinely understanding all that they have survived and their identity. "You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view – until you climb into his skin and walk around it" (Lee, 39). In other words, readers are learning that it is hard to understand what other people are going through, unless they are in a similar situation. Currently in the novel, Scout is just getting back home from her first day of school and is whining about how Miss Caroline was annoyed with her when she discovered that Scout already knew how to read. Atticus was trying to calm her down and make her consider how Miss Caroline is concerned that she can't accommodate the rest of the class while she concentrates on simply her abilities. Readers can apply this to their lives since they continually judge individuals; it is exactly how they have been raised. After all, we have to truly understand someone before passing comments on them.

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