Chapter one part one of to kill a mocking bird

The chapter begins with the broken arm of Jeremy Finch which was twisted and contorted
differently to the unharmed one. Jeremy finch was Jean Louise Finch’s older brother. The story
is narrated by a young girl named Jean Louise Finch, who is almost always called by her
nickname, Scout. Scout starts to explain the circumstances that led to the broken arm that her
older brother, Jem, sustained many years earlier; she begins by recounting her family history.
The first of her ancestors to come to America was a fur-trader and apothecary named Simon
Finch, who fled England to escape religious persecution and established a successful farm on the
banks of the Alabama River. The farm, called Finch’s Landing, supported the family for many
years. The first Finches to make a living away from the farm were Scout’s father, Atticus Finch,
who became a lawyer in the nearby town of Maycomb, and his brother, Jack Finch, who went to
medical school in Boston. Their sister, Alexandra Finch, stayed to run the Landing.
A successful lawyer, Atticus makes a solid living in Maycomb, a tired, poor, old town in the
grips of the Great Depression. He lives with Jem and Scout on Maycomb’s main residential
street. Their cook, an old black woman named Calpurnia, helps to raise the children and keep the
house. Atticus’s wife died when Scout was two, so she does not remember her mother well. But
Jem, four years older than Scout, has memories of their mother that sometimes make him
unhappy.
In the summer of 1933, when Jem is nearly ten and Scout almost six, a peculiar boy named
Charles Baker Harris moves in next door. The boy, who calls himself Dill, stays for the summer
with his aunt, Miss Rachel Haverford, who owns the house next to the Finches’. Dill doesn’t like
to discuss his father’s absence from his life, but he is otherwise a talkative and extremely
intelligent boy who quickly becomes the Finch children’s chief playmate. All summer, the three
act out various stories that they have read. When they grow bored of this activity, Dill suggests
that they attempt to lure Boo Radley, a mysterious neighbor, out of his house.
Arthur “Boo” Radley lives in the run-down Radley Place, and no one has seen him outside it in
years. Scout recounts how, as a boy, Boo got in trouble with the law and his father imprisoned
him in the house as punishment. He was not heard from until fifteen years later, when he stabbed
his father with a pair of scissors. Although people suggested that Boo was crazy, old Mr. Radley
refused to have his son committed to an asylum. When the old man died, Boo’s brother, Nathan,
came to live in the house with Boo. Nevertheless, Boo continued to stay inside.
Dill is fascinated by Boo and tries to convince the Finch children to help him lure this phantom
of Maycomb outside. Eventually, he dares Jem to run over and touch the house. Jem does so,
sprinting back hastily; there is no sign of movement at the Radley Place, although Scout thinks
that she sees a shutter move slightly, as if someone were peeking out.
Chapter 2
September arrives, and Dill leaves Maycomb to return to the town of Meridian. Scout,
meanwhile, prepares to go to school for the first time, an event that she has been eagerly
anticipating. Once she is finally at school, however, she finds that her teacher, Miss Caroline
Fisher, deals poorly with children. When Miss Caroline concludes that Atticus must have taught
Scout to read, she becomes very displeased and makes Scout feel guilty for being educated. At
recess, Scout complains to Jem, but Jem says that Miss Caroline is just trying out a new method
of teaching.
Miss Caroline and Scout get along badly in the afternoon as well. Walter Cunningham, a boy in
Scout’s class, has not brought a lunch. Miss Caroline offers him a quarter to buy lunch, telling
him that he can pay her back tomorrow. Walter’s family is large and poor and Walter will never
be able to pay the teacher back or bring a lunch to school. When Scout attempts to explain these
circumstances, however, Miss Caroline fails to understand and grows so frustrated that she slaps
Scout’s hand with a ruler. This affects their relationship even more.
Chapter 3
Scout, infuriated, decided to take revenge on Walter because of what happened to her in class,
claiming that he made her step off on the wrong foot. Jem stopped his sister and convinced her
out of beating the Cunningham. When he dusted himself off and stood there waiting for another
beating, Scout again attempted to chase him away but again, her older brother stopped her. After
Jem identified him as Walter Cunningham’s son (which meant Walter was a junior) he invited
him over for lunch at their home and promised immunity to Scout and her beatings. While
making conversation with Walter many topics came up, like Walter’s allergies to Pecans and the
fixation with Boo Radley. When they got home, Calpurnia was asked to set an extra plate and
Atticus began to strike up a conversation with their guest.
At the table Walter began pouring syrup on everything and of course Scout, being the bold
person she is, made remarks about Walter’s dietary pattern. That was when Calpurnia summoned
her in the kitchen and put her in her place by letting her know that all their guest should be
treated cordially and with respect. Calpurnia sent her off with a smack and said that if she didn’t
want to eat with them, she could come and eat in the kitchen which she did to avoid the
embarrassment. She even told Calpurnia how she would take her own life and that she’d be sorry
for what she’d done.
Scout, upset with Calpurnia, told Atticus what happened. Talking Calpurnia’s side, her explained
to Scout how valuable she was to the family. When scout returned to school, her teacher, Ms.
Fisher, got a scare and all the boys rushed to see what it was, when they discovered a mouse.
Burris Ewell was excused by the teacher for the rest of the day to go get rid of the “cooties”.
Someone explained that he was one of the Ewells and that they were removed from school
because of it. The boy is Burris Ewell, a member of the Ewell clan, which is even poorer and less
respectable than the Cunningham clan. In fact, Burris only comes to school the first day of every
school year, making a token appearance to avoid trouble with the law. He leaves the classroom,
making enough vicious remarks to cause the teacher to cry.
At home, Atticus follows Scout outside to ask her if something is wrong, to which she responds
that she is not feeling well. She tells him that she does not think she will go to school anymore
and suggests that he could teach her himself. Atticus replies that the law demands that she go to
school, but he promises to keep reading to her, as long as she does not tell her teacher about it.
Chapter 4
The rest of Scout’s school year proceeds much like her first day. She can’t help but think she’s
missing something, since Atticus was educated at home, not with the Dewey Decimal System,
and he’s been elected to the state legislature unopposed for years. Scout gets out of school 30
minutes before Jem, so she races past the Radley Place. One afternoon, something catches her
eye and she returns to one of the big oak trees in the Radley yard. Scout reaches into the knothole
and discovers two pieces of chewing gum. She chews both pieces and tells Jem about it. He
panics and makes her spit it out. On the last day of school, however, they find two old “Indian-
head” pennies hidden in the same knothole where Scout found the gum and decide to keep them.
Again, the fact that Scout can identify that her formal education seems less useful in light of
what Atticus has been able to accomplish through a home education speaks to both her
precocious nature and the uselessness of the school system as she experiences it. Choosing to
chew this gum despite the rumor that everything on the Radley property is poison suggests that a
small kindness like leaving the gum can be enough to help a person like Scout overcome their
prejudices and fears.
On the last day of school, Jem and Scout get out early. They discuss Dill’s impending arrival and
as they pass the Radley Place, Scout points to the knothole. There’s more tinfoil in it, and this
time, Jem pulls out a shiny package. At home, Jem finds a ring box containing two polished
Indian head pennies. They deliberate over whether to keep them and wonder if Cecil Jacobs
might be hiding things in the knothole, but they reason that Cecil goes an extra mile per day to
avoid the Radley Place and mean Mrs. Dubose. They decide to keep them until school starts
again in case they belong to a classmate. Scout points out that nobody would want to save
chewing gum, but Jem insists that the pennies are important to someone since Indian head
pennies are magic. Jem and Scout’s genuine attempts to ensure that they’re not stealing from one
of their classmates illustrates how kind they are and how important it is to them to do the right
thing, even if they might lose out on something exciting like pennies or gum. Their aside about
Cecil Jacobs’s long walk to school, meanwhile, indicates that the fear of the Radleys extends
throughout the community and suggests that the “evil” in Maycomb is easy to identify and avoid,
if one is willing to literally go the extra mile. Dill arrives two days later on the train. He
announces that he rode the train, helped the engineer, and that he met his father over the school
year. The children squabble over what to play and Dill sniffs, declaring he can smell death at the
Radley Place. They argue over whether Hot Steams are real and Scout insults Jem’s courage.
Scout suggests they roll in the tire, which Jem and Dill agree to. Scout goes first and folds herself
into the tire. She only realizes once Jem pushes her with all his might that Jem was offended by
her insult. As the tire rolls, Scout feels like she’s suffocating. She crashes and finds herself on
her back in the Radley front yard. Jem screams at her to run. Scout runs on wobbly legs back to
Jem and Dill and then argues with Jem about who should get the tire. Jem is furious, but he
dashes in to get the tire and insults Scout for acting too much like a girl. Calpurnia calls them in
for lemonade and as they sit on the porch, Jem announces expansively that they can play Boo
Radley. Scout knows this is supposed to make him look fearless and her look scared. He doles
out parts (Scout is Mrs. Radley, Dill is old Mr. Radley, and Jem is Boo) and chastises Scout for
being scared of Boo, whom he insists is dead. Their game evolves over the summer and though
Jem and Dill love it, Scout plays anxiously.
Chapter 5
Scout nags Jem about their game and they stop playing it so much, though Jem does decide that
if Atticus tells them to stop playing it, they can just change the characters’ names and it’ll be
okay. Dill agrees with Jem and frustratingly for Scout, the boys spend most of their time plotting
in the tree house without her. This is especially frustrating since Dill asked Scout to marry him
early in the summer and then seemed to forget about her. Scout starts spending time with Miss
Maudie, who up to this point has only been a benign presence in her life. Scout and Jem have
always been allowed to play on Miss Maudie’s property and eat her grapes, so they don’t speak
to her much to preserve their relationship.
When the boys shut Scout out, it impresses upon her that no matter how hard she tries to not live
up to Jem’s assessment that she’s being too girly, it’s impossible for her to succeed all the time.
When Scout turns to Miss Maudie, however, it suggests that at least for Scout, being the victim
of this kind of prejudice does give her the opportunity to expand her community and learn more
about where she lives from Maycomb’s other residents.
She tells Scout that nut-grass is the only weed she ever kills and allows Scout to inspect her
bridgework (fake teeth), a gesture that makes them friends. Miss Maudie is kind to Jem and Dill,
too, and she calls them to eat her exceptional cakes. Scout spends evenings on Miss Maudie’s
porch, and one day they discuss whether Boo Radley is alive. Miss Maudie tells Scout that his
name is Arthur and he’s not dead—they haven’t carried his body out yet. Scout shares that Jem
thinks Boo’s body was stuffed up the chimney, which makes Miss Maudie declare that Jem is
turning into Uncle Jack, a childhood friend.
Miss Maudie explains that Arthur just stays in the house. Scout wants to know why, so Miss
Maudie explains that Mr. Radley was a “foot-washing Baptist.” This confuses Scout. Miss
Maudie says that foot-washers think anything pleasurable is a sin, including her flowers—they
take the Bible literally. Scout parrots that according to Atticus, God means loving people like a
person loves themself, but Miss Maudie gruffly says that the Bible in the hands of some men is
worse than a whiskey bottle in Atticus’s hands. Shocked, Scout insists that Atticus doesn’t drink,
and Miss Maudie says that men like Atticus are better at their worse than others are at their best.
The next morning, Dill and Jem rope Scout into joining them to give Boo Radley a note by
dropping it through a broken shutter with a fishing pole. Dill will keep watch and ring a bell if
anyone comes along. Scout is terrified, especially when Dill explains that they wrote that they’d
like to buy Boo an ice cream and sit with him on the porch. They discuss the lengthy beard that
Boo must have and Scout catches Dill in a lie about his father, but Jem stops their squabbling
and sends them to their places.
The fishing pole is too short, so Jem struggles to get the note close to the window. Scout is
looking down when the bell rings. She whips around expecting to see Boo, but instead she sees
Dill ringing the bell at Atticus. Jem trudges out looking extremely guilty. Atticus tells the
children to leave Arthur alone and let him live his life, even if it seems odd to them, and then
tricks Jem into admitting that they’ve been performing the Radley family history all summer.