Let me ask the politically incorrect questions, since no one else has.
Tom Send a noteboard - 24/05/2011 03:14:50 AM
To Kill a Mockingbird deals with racism, yet one has to ask the question: does it not engage in its own form of racism?
Take a look at the white characters in the book. If one sets aside Boo Radley and Atticus Finch, we are left with children and a host of characters with venial and not so venial sins. People can't act as their conscience dictates, or they are bigots, or they are just downright bad.
Now look at the black characters. They are shown to be uniformly respectful, good-natured and innocent. The oppression that they faced may have played a role in making Southern black society more polite, but I suspect that Lee is also unwittingly falling into the "noble savage" motif. The blacks in the book are victims, but they are also stereotyped and consciously set aside as being different.
While Lee may have also written the characters this way to make a point, the end result is that the book's statement against racism is weakened for it. It would have been a far more powerful book if Atticus had defended a guilty black man at some point as well, and had to explain to Scout that people of any color can be good or bad.
Take a look at the white characters in the book. If one sets aside Boo Radley and Atticus Finch, we are left with children and a host of characters with venial and not so venial sins. People can't act as their conscience dictates, or they are bigots, or they are just downright bad.
Now look at the black characters. They are shown to be uniformly respectful, good-natured and innocent. The oppression that they faced may have played a role in making Southern black society more polite, but I suspect that Lee is also unwittingly falling into the "noble savage" motif. The blacks in the book are victims, but they are also stereotyped and consciously set aside as being different.
While Lee may have also written the characters this way to make a point, the end result is that the book's statement against racism is weakened for it. It would have been a far more powerful book if Atticus had defended a guilty black man at some point as well, and had to explain to Scout that people of any color can be good or bad.
Political correctness is the pettiest form of casuistry.
ἡ δὲ κἀκ τριῶν τρυπημάτων ἐργαζομένη ἐνεκάλει τῇ φύσει, δυσφορουμένη, ὅτι δὴ μὴ καὶ τοὺς τιτθοὺς αὐτῇ εὐρύτερον ἢ νῦν εἰσι τρυπώη, ὅπως καὶ ἄλλην ἐνταῦθα μίξιν ἐπιτεχνᾶσθαι δυνατὴ εἴη. – Procopius
Ummaka qinnassa nīk!
*MySmiley*
ἡ δὲ κἀκ τριῶν τρυπημάτων ἐργαζομένη ἐνεκάλει τῇ φύσει, δυσφορουμένη, ὅτι δὴ μὴ καὶ τοὺς τιτθοὺς αὐτῇ εὐρύτερον ἢ νῦν εἰσι τρυπώη, ὅπως καὶ ἄλλην ἐνταῦθα μίξιν ἐπιτεχνᾶσθαι δυνατὴ εἴη. – Procopius
Ummaka qinnassa nīk!
*MySmiley*
To Kill a Mockingbird by Nelle Harper Lee
22/05/2011 06:28:11 PM
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I reviewed it last year
22/05/2011 07:45:48 PM
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Huh. I seem to have missed that.
22/05/2011 11:17:11 PM
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As you noted, though, it's a fuller depiction of the South than "racist people."
23/05/2011 12:00:01 AM
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It's a beautiful, incredible book.
22/05/2011 08:21:48 PM
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Also
22/05/2011 11:33:27 PM
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Don't you think that, you know, too many people have read it already?
23/05/2011 09:55:52 PM
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Re: Don't you think that, you know, too many people have read it already?
24/05/2011 12:05:11 AM
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Does that disqualify it?
24/05/2011 01:49:54 PM
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I don't know, if a lot of people want to have this book in a Book Club, I have no objections.
24/05/2011 07:01:38 PM
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Bah. This seems like a lame book. It will never catch on.
23/05/2011 01:31:10 AM
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Um, there's already a rfilm version of this.
23/05/2011 01:11:36 PM
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Suspect he knows that.
*NM*
23/05/2011 01:15:46 PM
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Boy, that sarcastic subtext can be so hard to grasp in this virtual madness. *NM*
25/05/2011 06:49:03 AM
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I don't think I've ever met anyone who doesn't like this book. *NM*
23/05/2011 09:37:52 AM
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I've met some, but it was a casualty of middle school English. *NM*
23/05/2011 07:40:27 PM
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One of my nieces didn't like it. I think it was because she was forced to read it for school.
24/05/2011 02:33:23 AM
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Re: One of my nieces didn't like it. I think it was because she was forced to read it for school.
24/05/2011 10:15:45 AM
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Let me ask the politically incorrect questions, since no one else has.
24/05/2011 03:14:50 AM
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I don't understand why having a guilty black man would have made it more powerful.
24/05/2011 05:59:17 AM
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Hmm
24/05/2011 10:22:50 AM
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I could see your argument if Tolkien were writing about feminism.
24/05/2011 02:15:42 PM
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I think that's a fair point.
24/05/2011 07:00:04 PM
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Calpurnia is a stereotype too.
24/05/2011 11:54:26 PM
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The difference, at least in my recollection, is that Calpurnia is well-educated.
25/05/2011 08:09:58 PM
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Re: The difference, at least in my recollection, is that Calpurnia is well-educated.
25/05/2011 10:59:26 PM
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I think there was at least once incident showing a racist black person
24/05/2011 07:33:09 PM
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I think it was written to accomplish a goal and it did that very well
25/05/2011 04:08:17 PM
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Given your introductory portion
11/06/2011 01:28:40 AM
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I have read both
11/06/2011 11:35:11 AM
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All of Twain's stuff is great
13/06/2011 02:27:55 AM
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Re: All of Twain's stuff is great
13/06/2011 08:17:05 AM
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And some poets - Tennyson and Yeats come to mind. *NM*
13/06/2011 10:11:31 AM
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