Losing Innocence As children age and mature, they start to lose their innocence and purity. In her novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee demonstrates how children fail to keep their pureness as they grow older. Through the eyes of Scout, the reader sees Maycomb as an angelic town where the residents can do no harm. However, throughout the course of the novel, as Jem and Scout Finch grow and lose innocence, the town of Maycomb does too. Although the loss of purity, especially in children, can break one’s heart, it is human nature and sooner or later, everyone will surrender their sinlessness.
To Kill a Mockingbird is a coming-of-age story about how the main characters move from a state of innocence to a mature one after suffering from, but surviving many misadventures. Lee compares many of the characters to a mockingbird, a symbol of pure chastity. Scout and Jem, the main characters of …show more content…
Boo is known as the town ghost. As he is a reclusive character, we really never “see” Boo until the end of the novel. Scout, Jem, and Dill scheme their way to lure the ghost of Maycomb out of his house throughout all of Lee’s novel. Most people in the little town of Maycomb believed that Boo had no place in this world and did not fit in anywhere but his hideaway. What Atticus helps Jem to realize is that “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it” (chapter 3). When Jem realizes that his father’s words are a rule he should always follow, he gets wiser and matures just a little bit more. Many failed attempts and hardships led the adolescents to believe that they would never meet the mysterious character that so many frown upon but they did not give up and when Mr. Ewell attempted to murder Jem and Scout, Boo saves their lives. Just because he was a home-body does not mean that he is a horrible