“There's a lot of ugly things in this world, son.
I wish I could keep 'em all away from you.
That's never possible.”
child
There are many ugly things in this world.
I hope I can keep all this ugliness away from you.
But that's not possible.
How to deal with complex relationships?
How to be a friendly but self-insistent person?
How do you let your child know that the world is not only beautiful but also ugly?
How do children not despair of the world because of ugliness?
How to make children brave to face the world?
There is a book that tells us the answer.
When the book came out in 1960, it immediately sold well and received a huge response. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Literature in 1961 and was adapted into a film in 1962, starring Gregory Pike, and received multiple Oscar nominations. Pike once said his favorite film was "Roman Holiday," but only "To Kill a Mockingbird" was "closest to his heart, the pinnacle of his acting career." ”
Over the past 60 years, the book has been translated into more than forty languages and has sold more than 30 million copies worldwide. It is said that in 2006, it topped the list of "must-read books for life" in the United States, and even the Bible could only be ranked second.
Atticus, a highly educated lawyer from a middle-class family and whose wife has died, is caring for a pair of children: Jem and Scott with the help of cabonia, a black maid. The book unfolds from the perspective of Scott, The daughter of Atticus. Scott, just in the first grade of elementary school. It was the 1930s, the U.S. economy was depressed, and racial discrimination was extremely serious. But the little girl didn't know this, and all she cared about was seeing her best friend Dill during the summer and not having to go to school.
The story is divided into two parts.
The first part is about the adventures of "I", my brother, and Dill, as well as curiosity about the freak Radley. The people of Maycomb were reluctant to talk about Radley, and no one had seen him in years, and he had kept himself in his house for more than 20 years, a fearsome neighbor who lived in various legends.
The second part is whether Father Atticus can win the lawsuit that everyone is not optimistic about.
Tom. Robinson is a black man who has been charged with raping a white teenage girl, Mayera. Yuel. The court designated Atticus as Tom. Robinson's defense, a respected white lawyer, went to defend a black man, which seemed inconceivable at the time. The incident was opposed, resisted, and ridiculed by the vast majority of the town,but Atticus insisted on agreeing to defend Tom.
In those days, blacks had to be beaten up to help pick up gloves, and buses had to give way to whites. In 1955, Pax, a black seamstress, was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to whites, sparking a massive black boycott of buses. The severity of apartheid is evident.
Atticus's approach is almost on the opposite side of the whole town. Jem and Scout were ridiculed for this, and Scout even got into fights. Scout said to his father, Atticus, "Most people think you're wrong...". Atticus explained to her this way: "Of course they have the right to think that way, and their views have the right to be fully respected. But before I can get along with others, I must first get along with myself. There is one thing that cannot follow the principle of conformity, and that is the conscience of man.
Atticus' defense made the truth clear. Mayela Yuell, a white girl, voluntarily seduced Tom, a black man, and was refused, and when her father learned of it, he lied that he had been violated, so his father accused Tom of raping Mayela. Atticus used his superb lawyer expertise, as well as ample evidence, to debunk the lies of plaintiff Mayella and her alcoholic father, Bob.
Although Tom was innocent, the jury still found him guilty. Desperate, Tom climbed up the prison fence and shouted during the wind time, and was killed after being believed to have escaped from prison.
Although Bob won the case, his reputation was discredited, and Bob pecked Atticus in the face on the street, vowing to take revenge on Atticus even if he took the second half of his life.
On Halloween night, when Jem and Scott were returning home from the school's Halloween extravaganza, Bob suddenly attacked and poisoned the two children. Jem's arm breaks in a fight, and in the confusion, a mysterious man rescues the children and carries Jem home, the mysterious man is the strange neighbor Arthur. Radley.
You can never really understand a person,
Unless you think about it from his point of view...
Unless you burrow into his skin,
Walk around like he did
Prejudice between people is a mountain that crushes many innocent people. People usually see what they want to see and hear what they want to hear.
Arthur Radley, who had kept himself in the house for more than 20 years, had never stepped out of the house. In the rumors of the neighbors, Radley was imagined as a horrible man who "eats dead rats and walks out at night, always holding a pair of scissors in his hand."
But in the end, he learned that Arthur was actually a very kind person, he secretly gave gifts to the children, quietly draped the children with blankets, and saved the Scott brothers and sisters in a critical situation. He shut himself in the house because he had caused a disaster 20 years ago, and now he just wants to stay in the house.
Raymond, a white man who was seen by the residents as an alcoholic, had been packing whiskey in bags all day and drinking it with two straws, looking drunk.
Later, the three children found out that Raymond was actually drinking Coke from the bag, he didn't drink at all, and he kept pretending to be "drunk" only because he thought this was the "way of life" he wanted.
In court, Atticus boldly pointed out the prejudices of white people: that all blacks lie, that all blacks are inherently immoral, and that all blacks are unruly in front of white women.
Mrs. Dubos, the old lady who insulted Atticus for defending the Negro, jem was angry at her for insulting her father and deliberately ruining her camellias. As punishment, Mrs. Dubos offered to let Jem read to her for two weeks, but Atticus agreed and demanded that Jem fulfill it, and Jem took his sister Scout with him every day. Mrs. Dubos was often in bed in a very painful, delirious manner, and when she was awake, she would continue to curse Atticus. When the two weeks came, they were asked to go for an extra week, and soon after Mrs. Dubos died.
Atticus then told Jem and Scout that Mrs. Dubos had been using morphine at the doctor's behest until she fell ill, and that when she had little time left, she had decided to quit her addiction and leave the world clean, not indebted to anyone, not dependent on anything.
At the end of the book, Atticus says to Scout, "Scout, after you finally get to know them, you will find that the vast majority of people are good people, and he just has his own blind spots like the rest of us."
What is true bravery?
Don't make the mistake of thinking that a person with a gun in his hand is bravery.
Bravery is: when you know you're going to lose before you even start,
But you still have to do it,
And stick to it anyway.
Atticus's bravery lies in the fact that he not only refuses but also refuses to stay out of the evils of society. Not only did he insist on defending Tom, a black man, protecting Him from white lynching, he insisted on returning Tom's innocence in court.
He knew that the jury in the town was all white, and he knew what the outcome was, but Atticus did not flinch, he believed in "conscience" and "justice", and he cared more about how the child saw him as a lawyer father, and how the child saw the beauty and ugliness of the world.
"Sometimes, I feel like I'm a failure as a parent. But I am all they have. Before they look up to others, it is I who look up first. I want to be upright so that I can face him calmly... If I had acquiesced to this kind of thing happening, frankly, I would not have been able to look him in the eye again. Once I couldn't look him in the eye, I knew I had lost him forever and I didn't want to lose him and Scout because they were everything to me. ”
Fathers are brave because of their children,
Children are fearless because of their fathers.
Happy people use childhood to heal a lifetime, and unfortunate people use a lifetime to heal childhood. After saving Jem, the odd man Arthur said to Scott, "Can you take me home?" Rumor has it that he had been taken home in his early years, taken home to prison and brought home again, and it seemed that he had always needed someone to take him back and take him home. Home is his last haven and the ultimate destination of his soul.
After Scott sends Arthur home, he walks slowly back to his home in the drizzle. On the way home, Scott felt that there was nothing left for them to learn, except perhaps algebra.
Atticus helped Scott tuck in the quilt and went back to Jem's room, where he would spend the night, and when Jem woke up in the morning, he would find his father by his side.
Robins do nothing bad and always sing to us. They just sing to us with all their hearts and blood, so it is sinful to kill a mockingbird.
Robins are kind and innocent, just like every child.
And does every father and mother have the courage to look their children in the eye?
Only when the child sees the love in the eyes of his parents, he has enough warmth to face the frost of life;
Only when children see the light in their parents' hearts can he have enough courage to face the unfairness of the world.
The warmth of home is the bravery of a lifetime.
Love and warmth, bravery and justice are the topics of parents and children working together, and they are also the answers of parents and children throughout their lives.
Thank you to the author of "To Kill a Mockingbird," Harper. plum.
Disclaimer: The picture comes from the network.