To Kill a Mockingbird - Plot Overview

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To Kill a Mockingbird - Plot Overview

Scout Finch lives with

her brother, Jem, and their widowed father, Atticus, in the sleepy

Alabama town of Maycomb. Maycomb is suffering through the Great

Depression, but Atticus is a prominent lawyer and the Finch family

is reasonably well off in comparison to the rest of society. One

summer, Jem and Scout befriend a boy named Dill, who has come to

live in their neighborhood for the summer, and the trio acts out

stories together. Eventually, Dill becomes fascinated with the spooky

house on their street called the Radley Place. The house is owned

by Mr. Nathan Radley, whose brother, Arthur (nicknamed Boo), has

lived there for years without venturing outside.

Scout goes to school for the first time that

fall and detests it. She and Jem find gifts apparently left for

them in a knothole of a tree on the Radley property. Dill returns

the following summer, and he, Scout, and Jem begin to act out the

story of Boo Radley. Atticus puts a stop to their antics, urging

the children to try to see life from another person’s perspective

before making judgments. But, on Dill’s last night in Maycomb for

the summer, the three sneak onto the Radley property, where Nathan

Radley shoots at them. Jem loses his pants in the ensuing escape.

When he returns for them, he finds them mended and hung over the

fence. The next winter, Jem and Scout find more presents in the

tree, presumably left by the mysterious Boo. Nathan Radley eventually plugs

the knothole with cement. Shortly thereafter, a fire breaks out

in another neighbor’s house, and during the fire someone slips a

blanket on Scout’s shoulders as she watches the blaze. Convinced

that Boo did it, Jem tells Atticus about the mended pants and the

presents.

To the consternation of Maycomb’s racist white community, Atticus

agrees to defend a black man named Tom Robinson, who has been accused

of raping a white woman. Because of Atticus’s decision, Jem and

Scout are subjected to abuse from other children, even when they

celebrate Christmas at the family compound on Finch’s Landing. Calpurnia,

the Finches’ black cook, takes them to the local black church, where

the warm and close-knit community largely embraces the children.

Atticus’s sister, Alexandra, comes to live with the Finches

the next summer. Dill, who is supposed to live with his “new father”

in another town, runs away and comes to Maycomb. Tom Robinson’s trial

begins, and when the accused man is placed in the local jail, a mob

gathers to lynch him. Atticus faces the mob down the night before

the trial. Jem and Scout, who have sneaked out of the house, soon

join him. Scout recognizes one of the men, and her polite questioning

about his son shames him into dispersing the mob.

At the trial itself, the children sit in the “colored

balcony” with the town’s black citizens. Atticus provides clear

evidence that the accusers, Mayella Ewell and her father, Bob, are

lying: in fact, Mayella propositioned Tom Robinson, was caught by

her father, and then accused Tom of rape to cover her shame and

guilt. Atticus provides impressive evidence that the marks on Mayella’s

face are from wounds that her father inflicted; upon discovering

her with Tom, he called her a whore and beat her. Yet, despite the

significant evidence pointing to Tom’s innocence, the all-white

jury convicts him. The innocent Tom later tries to escape from prison

and is shot to death. In the aftermath of the trial, Jem’s faith

in justice is badly shaken, and he lapses into despondency and doubt.

Despite the verdict, Bob Ewell feels that Atticus and

the judge have made a fool out of him, and he vows revenge. He menaces

Tom Robinson’s widow, tries to break into the judge’s house, and

finally attacks Jem and Scout as they walk home from a Halloween

party. Boo Radley intervenes, however, saving the children and stabbing Ewell

fatally during the struggle. Boo carries the wounded

Jem back to Atticus’s house, where the sheriff, in order to protect Boo,

insists that Ewell tripped over a tree root and fell on his own knife.

After sitting with Scout for a while, Boo disappears once more into

the Radley house.

Later, Scout feels as though she can finally imagine what

life is like for Boo. He has become a human being to her at last.

With this realization, Scout embraces her father’s advice to practice

sympathy and understanding and demonstrates that her experiences

with hatred and prejudice will not sully her faith in human goodness.