Just finished reading To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee and it was way better than I imagined it to be. I thought the story would be a heavy read about social injustice and deep-rooted racism and was scared it would make me restless for days to come, like 'A Thousand Splendid Suns' did. However, I was wrong.
The story is told from the POV of a child named Scout and shows the journey of her growing up in a household consisting of her father, their house-help Calpurnia, and her brother Jem. As the kids are coming of age, they learn about the evils in their society as their father defends a 25-year-old Black man wrongly accused of raping a 19-year-old white woman.
While the novel deals with a heavy subject showcasing the hard truth of society in the times in which it was written (I wonder how far we have come now and the way we still have to go), it also has its heartwarming parts and wholesomeness as we see Scout and Jem growing up and simply living life. I really admired Atticus' equation with both his kids and the principles involved in his parenting.
The best part of the book for me was definitely the court scene, and there was this line that Mayella says (and then it is not mentioned again or stressed upon much): "What my father does to me doesn't count," implying that Bob Ewell used to sexually abuse her and then later tell her not to be with other guys, and what he does doesn't count as he is her father. So messedddd up and goes on to say a lot about the messed-up dynamic in their household.
Did you people notice it too? What are your views on it?
by Waste_Project_7864