<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" > what is a classic</h1>
Even if you only read one book a year, if you choose "classics", it is better than ten "fast food literature". This is my personal experience with reading. Classics are like sunshine, illuminating the soul and lasting; and like the embrace between people who trust each other, it is unforgettable in just one time. The power of the classics is powerful and enduring, enough to affect us for the rest of our lives.
Works that can be called classics can be diverse in appearance and style, but they have a common feature, that is, they have been universally baptized by time and have shown their value more and more; unlike the short-lived fast food literature, classics can never be out of date!
In my opinion, Harper Lee's novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" is enough to be called such a classic. Published in 1961 and won that year's Pulitzer Prize, the novel has been translated into more than forty languages and has a circulation of more than 30 million copies.
The connotation of the classic is rich, can be concisely summarized, but it is difficult to exhaust. Therefore, if "To Kill a Mockingbird" is considered to be only a story of faith, courage, upbringing, and perseverance to bring justice to those who have suffered injustice, then this perception is bound to be one-sided and incomplete.
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" > arrogance and prejudice</h1>
Like the meaning of the novel, "Kill a Mockingbird" brings different readers different experiences and gains. What Taught me the most was the secondary understanding of the phenomenon of "prejudice" in human society.
The novel has two of the most important narrative threads, one is the children's legend of the mysterious neighbor, "Radley the Strange Man" and Radley himself, and the other is the story of Atticus's efforts to defend the innocent black Tom Robinson.
Although the latter is the core event of the book, the former runs through it. The two threads are not related at first, but at the end they blend together seamlessly and perfectly. Together, they raise a profound but highly overlooked problem, which is that some of the "correct" ideas we take for granted are probably a prejudice!
Many times, prejudice is a habitual perception. What we hear in legend, or even see with our own eyes, and experience with our own eyes, is not necessarily entirely reliable. A person's prejudice against different people and things may be equally present in a group. And when a prejudice becomes universal and becomes apparent to all, it will eventually evolve into a collective unconscious.
Scutt and Jem's father, Atticus, a lawyer, single-handedly confronted this prejudice. What he wants to change in his ideal is not only the racial discrimination of white people against blacks, but also the subtly teaching children to see and avoid this prejudice through his own views and actions.
Racial discrimination itself is a form of prejudice, which is not particularly evident today. But in the United States of the time, for children who lacked self-judgment and rational thinking, the universal concept of those around them was equivalent to the power of example. So when Atticus asked Scout to avoid using the derogatory term to refer to black people, Scutter said that was what his classmates at school called it. Atticus's answer was:
From now on, at least one person doesn't call it that anymore.....
Although Atticus's strong and logical defense made the plaintiff's conspiracy clear and the defendant's innocence obvious, the jury still found Tom Robinson guilty, what a deep-seated prejudice!
Not only prejudice, but arrogance! Arrogance comes from white people's confidence in front of black people, and this confidence is shameful. Atticus' final statement in court brings the novel to a climax. He pointedly pointed out people's "pride and prejudice":
Show a shameful confidence in front of you gentlemen... The assumption that you will share with them the evil assumption that all blacks lie and all blacks are immoral; that all black men are unruly in the presence of white women, is related to their spiritual qualities.
But even so, at the end of the book, after the tragic death of Tom Robinson, under the premise that justice has failed to defeat "evil", in the face of his own exhaustion and the bad world in front of him, Atticus still has to say to Scout:
When you finally get to know them, you will find that most people are good people.
I can't help but wonder, does most of the people in Atticus' eyes include those jury members? Are they also good people? How did the innocent Robinson die? Was he killed by "good guys"? In fact, it is not, it is prejudice that kills him!
Meanwhile, the hermit who has been staying at home for many years, the "freak" Arthur Bu Radley, who was originally a kind man, was rumored to be a "demon" by the townspeople.
And when Scout realized Radley's kindness and changed his previous prejudices against him through a series of events such as the cute gifts he left for the children in the tree hole and the final rescue of Jem's life, Scutter grew older. It was at that moment that she finally understood her father's words:
You can never really get to know a guy unless you put on his shoes and think in his shoes.
Yes, Robinson was wronged, Radley was not a demon; the legendary drunkard Raymond, who carried in his bag was not wine at all, but Coke; even Mrs. Dubos, who was sick and grumpy, had a valuable quality in her, that is, bravery!
All this shows that letting go of prejudices, changing the habits and cognitions of the past, the original appearance of the world, is it more lovely and friendly than you and me hearsay or imagination?
<h1 class= "pgc-h-center-line" > failed heroes</h1>
In the narration of the little girl Scout's first-person perspective, Atticus undoubtedly becomes the most dazzling character in the book. Although he accomplished almost nothing, and his efforts ended in failure, this did not prevent him from becoming a hero in the minds of a wide range of readers.
What is a hero? He can have no strong physique, he can have developed muscles; he doesn't have to conquer the world with his fists, he doesn't even have to defeat evil, but he has to have a high head and a strong heart. Atticus is such a hero.
In addition to fairness and justice, Atticus is the embodiment of faith and courage. His valuable qualities are kindness, bravery, tolerance, sincerity, integrity, fraternity, and so on.
As a lawyer, he stumbled on his most important stage with a seamless and effective defense and exquisite court presentation. We know that it was not the justice of the law that defeated him, but pride and prejudice; but as a father, On the stage of life, Atticus was a veritable winner.
Unlike Socrates's dialogue with his friends on the streets of Athens, Atticus's way of interpreting justice was his insistence on his heart and self. It is this obsession, this spirit of knowing that it is impossible to do, that cultivates the children's ability to think independently and make rational judgments; it also makes them understand that true justice is not only not easy to distinguish, but also may be reversed in black and white, because often all the most evils in the world are in the name of justice.
So in my opinion, through his persistence and hard work, Atticus wants to tell the children the truth, just like the line in the Korean movie "The Melting Pot":
We fight all the way, not to change the world, but not to let the world change us.
I have always believed that the success of a person's education is ultimately judged by his upbringing. The most Atticus could give Tom and Scout was upbringing.
In the treatment of the two children, he never scolded and harshly criticized, and even rarely showed majesty. He is willing to listen to the inner voice of the child and communicate with him with the idea of equality. Therefore, unlike most parents, Atticus never deliberately disguises and hides his heart in front of his children. After the failure of the lawsuit, he can show helplessness and disappointment like any ordinary person. Although he had known this result for a long time, he still had to teach by his own words and deeds what it was to be brave:
When you know you're going to lose before you even start, you still have to do it, and you have to stick to it anyway...
Atticus is not powerful, but he dares to face the criticism of the whole town. Scout and Jem are ridiculed and discriminated against at school for their father's defense of the, and Scutter, who has a boyish personality, fights with his classmates more than once. And Atticus told her:
Raise your head, lower your fists, get angry regardless of what others say, and try to fight with your head.
A person's muscles and bones have great strength, which may be frightening and give people a terrible feeling. But being terrible is not the same as being dignified. On the contrary, it is possible to have dignity and be lovely and respectable. So fundamentally, dignity is not given by others, but earned through one's own strong heart and calm performance.
Even in the treatment of the stubborn, partial and demoralized Mrs. Dubos, Atticus can still be polite, give great tolerance and understanding, and show a gentle gentlemanly demeanor.
Outside of schooling, parents are the best teachers for their children. I believe that all the valuable qualities in Addix will be inherited in the future in the two children.
<h1 class= "pgc-h-center-line" > the symbolism of the robin</h1>
During the Mad Dog incident, Jem is surprised to discover Atticus's secret—he was a sharpshooter, but he never mentions it. This story is actually related to the connotation of the title of the book, "To Kill a Mockingbird".
If you don't read the full text, it's easy to misunderstand that this book is a story about how to kill a mockingbird. In fact, the meaning is just the opposite, the novel really wants to express "do not kill the mockingbird".
At Christmas, Atticus gave Scout and Jem an air gun each, but refused to teach them to shoot. Until one day he said to Jem:
I'd rather have you shoot cans in the backyard, but I know you're going to hit birds. It doesn't matter how many crowned blue crows you shoot, but remember that killing a mockingbird is a crime.
Why is it a crime to kill a robin? Scutter also went to the neighbor Miss Modi with such a question, and Miss Modi told her:
Robins do nothing bad. They don't eat the flowers, fruits and vegetables that people grow, they don't build nests in barns, they just sing for us. So killing a robin is a crime.
In this way, it is very simple that the robin is a symbol of "goodness and pollution", and even a "beneficial" person, so the robin should not be killed. Atticus was also reluctant to touch a gun because he had shot a mockingbird in his childhood, which made him feel guilty.
But in fact, this novel is really about how to kill one... Another "mockingbird" story.
In terms of symbolism, the imagery of the robin is everywhere, almost throughout the work. Killing a robin is equivalent to killing a good, innocent life. The author tells us that Tom Robinson is the representative of this kind of innocent life. People killed him because of their prejudices, and they should feel as guilty as Atticus, who killed the robin. But unfortunately, they didn't.
Arthur Bu Radley was also a "mockingbird". Because of the special experience of his childhood, he was forcibly locked up in the home by his father. More and more gossip followed, turning Radley into madmen and demons. So for nearly two decades, he was imprisoned for a long time and lived a dark "hermit" life.
The three children's curiosity to "explore" radley's house, which leads to a series of events, and the later process of Radley's rescue of Jem from Yuell, all of which make the image of this "strange man" change its original purpose - he is actually a simple, kind and poor man.
It is not difficult to see, then, that Radley's image has a double symbolic significance. First, demonizing a good person is tantamount to killing a mockingbird.
Second, as mentioned above, the defeat of justice represented by Atticus by the forces of evil, and the imprisonment of the unforgiving reality by goodness represented by Radley, are the two most important threads in the book. The two are one light and one dark, which seem to have no connection in specific content, but in terms of symbolism, they reflect each other and are highly integrated.
For Atticus's ideal, or what he is trying to practice, is to warn people that the mockery should not be killed, and to call for the inexorable imprisonment of goodness and justice.
At the end of the novel, Bob Yuel attempts to poison the two children in revenge on Addix, but Radley arrives in time to save Jem, but he also kills Yuel by mistake. To protect Radley from being disturbed by the world, Sheriff Tate said to Atticus:
Bob Yuell was dead at his own knife's edge. He killed himself.
This time, Kindness succeeded in protecting a "mockingbird." Robins are innocent, while bad guys deserve it. Such as the mad dog who was hit by a shot from Atticus, and the crowned blue crow opposite the robin.
Scout understood the sheriff and thought he was doing the right thing. In fact, when she burst into tears and said a kind greeting to Radley, "Hello, weirdo", she already "understood".
<h1 class="pgc-h-center-line" > why it's classic</h1>
In terms of artistic characteristics, in addition to the use of symbolism, "Kill a Mockingbird" is also a model for children's perspective writing. It should be said that the book uses more than one perspective, but the main first-person narrator, Scout, and the third-person narrator, Jem, are both children.
Children's perspectives make the novel easy to understand and free of reading barriers for adult readers. At the same time, it did not affect the depth of its thoughts in the slightest. Because children rarely disguise and lie like adults, the reality in their eyes is more real and credible, and the ugliness and unbearability of the world are exposed.
Although the story of the novel is set in the United States during the "Great Depression" of the 1930s, combined with the ideological content, its practical significance is still far-reaching to this day. Because racism, or prejudice in people's hearts, is still everywhere.
So sometimes I wonder if Tom Robinson hadn't died, his grievances would have been revealed, Andyx's efforts hadn't been in vain, and the case had been won, would Kill a Mockingbird still be a classic?
It should be said that it was Atticus's failure that led to Harper Lee's success. Good fails to triumph over evil, and the novel moves the reader from literature to reality, telling us that the road ahead is still long.
However, if we interpret it from the perspective of educational significance, it is not difficult to see that the author wants to convey to the children that no matter how dark and unfair the reality is, there should be hope and yearning for light in the heart.
Because in the depths of everyone's soul, there is a world where robins can sing freely.