To Kill A Mockingbird

2 Pages 413 Words

“To Kill A Mockingbird”
~Harper Lee~


In the book, “To Kill A Mockingbird” by Harper Lee growth in the characters is a

very important point he tries to get through to the reader. The character that is most

involved in growth is Jeremy Finch(Jem). Throughout the book one can see Jem’s

growth towards becoming a young man by the trials and tests he goes through in his

childhood.

Perhaps the greatest moment of his change from child to man was when his

friend, Dill, ran away from home and too Jem’s house. When Jem found Dill hiding out

under the bed it didn’t take him long to go tell his father he was there. His sister best says

states this change when she says, “Then he rose and broke the remaining code of our

childhood.” (P. 143) She said that refering to when Jem went to tell his father of Dill’s

presence.

Another moment of Jems “growing up” comes when he and Scout (his sister) are

sleeping on the back porch. When the two are lieing there ready to go to sleep Scout

is playing with a bug, when she is ready to sleep she goes to do what any other normal

kid would do, smash it. Jem had different ideas about that and didn’t want Scout to do is,

and being the loveing sister she is she doesn’t. Although she doesn’t kill the bug she still

gets in her bit of teasing when she makes fun of Jem by saying, “Reckon you’re at the

stage now where you don’t kill flies and mosquitoes now, I reckon.”(P. 241)

A moment of Jem’s growth comes when he is faced with a life and death

situation. When he and his sister were walking home in the dark from the Halloween

pageant they were attacked by Bob Ewell. They were eventually saved by Mr. Radley

(Boo), but what Scout says at the end of the book shows how Jem had not been afraid.

She says, “Jem wasn’t scared. Asked him and he said he wasn’t.” (p. 283) She tells th...