Tuesday, March 12, 2013

What were the effects of Tom Robinson's trial on the characters of "To Kill a Mockingbird"?

Perhaps Mr. Dolphus Raymond
sums up the results of Tom Robinson's trial when, in Chapter 20 of To Kill a
Mockingbird,
he comforts the crying Dill after Mr. Gilmer cross-examines Tom
Robinson:


readability="14">

'You aren't thin-hided, it just makes you sick,
doesn't it?'


'Things haven't caught up with that one's
instinct yet.  Let him get a little older and he won't get sick and cry.  Maybe
things'll strike him as being--not quite right, say, but he won't cry, not when he gets
a few years on him....'



readability="8">

'Cry about the simple hell people give other
people--without even thinking.  Cry about the hell white people give colored folks,
without even stopping to think that they're people,
too.'



  • Scout, Dill,
    and Jem are very moved (Jem also cries); they do not understand how the jury could have
    found Tom guilty.  His face streaked with "angry tears," Jem says to his father, "I
    ain't right....How could they do it, how could they?"  Jem is
    disillusioned.

  • Atticus is not surprised at the verdict. 
    He says they will do it again, and "seems like only children weep" as he echoes what Mr.
    Raymond has said.  When he sees what the black community has brought him the next day,
    Atticus's eyes fill with tears.  But, he is encouraged that the verdict did not come in
    right away.  There was someone who would not go along with the others, and this fact is
    encouraging, he says. 

  • Dill reports that Miss Rachel's
    reaction was if a man like Atticus Finch want to butt his head against a stone wall,
    it's his head.

  • Miss Maudie brings the Finches a cake and
    tells Jem not to fret; things are not as bad as they seem.  She says,


I
simply want to tell you that there are some men in this world who were born to do our
unpleasant jobs for us.  Your father's one of
them. 



readability="8">

She is impressed with how Atticus handled Tom's
case.  Because Atticus kept the jury out so long, Miss Maudie remarks that "we're making
a step--it' just a baby-step, but it's a
step."



  • Mr. Bob
    Ewell is filled with hate.  At the post office, he spits in the face of Atticus and
    threatens him.

  • Aunt Alexandra worries that Atticus has
    become bitter.

  • Sheriff Heck Tate seems fairly disgusted
    by the proceedings and the results of the trial; when Bob Ewell is killed, he feels no
    remorse, and does not think his killer, Boo Radley, should be
    punished.

  • Mr. Cunningham, who has been on the jury, and
    is probably the man who has kept the jury from reaching a verdict for some time, is
    obviously disturbed by the outcome of the
    trial.














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