The novel To Kill a Mockingbird has many themes, but one of the most important is the importance of moral education. The novel’s protagonist, Scout Finch, learns many lessons about right and wrong as she grows up in the Deep South during the 1930s.
The novel also explores issues of class and race in the Deep South. Scout’s father, Atticus Finch, is a lawyer who defends a black man accused of raping a white woman. Atticus believes that everyone should be treated equally under the law regardless of their skin color or social status.
The novel examines the role of women in society by showing how men often assume that women are inferior to men. For example, Scout’s neighbor Alexandra (Aunt Alex) allows her husband Henry to treat her like an object rather than a person with feelings and opinions.
The novel deals with innocence lost through death when several characters die unexpectedly: first baby Francis (Boo); then Tom Robinson (the black man accused of raping Mayella Ewell), who dies at the end of his trial; finally Calpurnia (Scout’s housekeeper), who dies after being shot by an unknown assailant.
