“To Kill a Mockingbird“ by Harper Lee, published in 1960
Contents
Part I (chapter 1-11):
• Set in a small town in Maycomb, Alabama during the 1930s
• Scout is the narrator who looks back on her childhood days
• Her and her brother Jem are raised by their father Atticus and the black housekeeper
Calpurnia
• One summer seven-year-old Dill Harris comes to Maycomb to spend his holidays with
his aunt
• Jem, Scout and Dill become friends
• They try to get behind the secret of a haunted house in the neighbourhood in which
“Boo” Radley lives
• He hasn’t been seen for years since his father locked him up in the house
• The children wonder what Boo Radley now looks like and devise games intended to
get him come out, but without success
• The following September Scout starts school; hates it
• On their last day of school before the vacations the children discover some chewing
gum and a small box in the knothole of a tree on the Radley property
• In the holidays Jem and Dill try to look into the house, but the roar of a shotgun drives
them off
• In panic, Jem catches his breeches in the fence and must abandon them
• He returns later that night and finds them folded across the fence
• More objects begin to appear and when Jem and Scout decide to leave a note for
whoever is leaving the objects, they find the tree hole filled with cement
• The following winter a neighbour´s house is on fire and the children watch the fire
brigade fight the flames in the icy cold
• When Scout returns home she finds herself wearing a woolen blanket around her
shoulders which must have been wrapped around her by Boo Radley
• Scout later starts a fight at school in defense of her father who “defended niggers”
• Atticus tells Scout that he defends a black man because his conscience tells him so
and warns Scout that some people might condemn him for this
• He wants her to keep her fists down
• The children are a bit ashamed of their father because he is so different from other
fathers
• Atticus is not interested in guns but gives his children air-rifles for Christmas
• He warns them not to shoot mockingbirds
Part II (chapter 12-31):
• Atticus´ presence is required at the state legislature in Montgomery
• Calpurnia takes Jem and Scout to a church service in her community
• Everybody in the Black community knows their father
• Tom Robinson cannot find any work now that he has been accused of raping a white
woman
• At home Aunt Alexandra is waiting for the children
• Scout is not pleased that her aunt will stay for the summer holidays
• As the trial begins the defendant Tom Robinson is brought to Maycomb jail
• Atticus sits in front of the jail and guards the prisoner to protect him from being
lynched by a mob
Contents
Part I (chapter 1-11):
• Set in a small town in Maycomb, Alabama during the 1930s
• Scout is the narrator who looks back on her childhood days
• Her and her brother Jem are raised by their father Atticus and the black housekeeper
Calpurnia
• One summer seven-year-old Dill Harris comes to Maycomb to spend his holidays with
his aunt
• Jem, Scout and Dill become friends
• They try to get behind the secret of a haunted house in the neighbourhood in which
“Boo” Radley lives
• He hasn’t been seen for years since his father locked him up in the house
• The children wonder what Boo Radley now looks like and devise games intended to
get him come out, but without success
• The following September Scout starts school; hates it
• On their last day of school before the vacations the children discover some chewing
gum and a small box in the knothole of a tree on the Radley property
• In the holidays Jem and Dill try to look into the house, but the roar of a shotgun drives
them off
• In panic, Jem catches his breeches in the fence and must abandon them
• He returns later that night and finds them folded across the fence
• More objects begin to appear and when Jem and Scout decide to leave a note for
whoever is leaving the objects, they find the tree hole filled with cement
• The following winter a neighbour´s house is on fire and the children watch the fire
brigade fight the flames in the icy cold
• When Scout returns home she finds herself wearing a woolen blanket around her
shoulders which must have been wrapped around her by Boo Radley
• Scout later starts a fight at school in defense of her father who “defended niggers”
• Atticus tells Scout that he defends a black man because his conscience tells him so
and warns Scout that some people might condemn him for this
• He wants her to keep her fists down
• The children are a bit ashamed of their father because he is so different from other
fathers
• Atticus is not interested in guns but gives his children air-rifles for Christmas
• He warns them not to shoot mockingbirds
Part II (chapter 12-31):
• Atticus´ presence is required at the state legislature in Montgomery
• Calpurnia takes Jem and Scout to a church service in her community
• Everybody in the Black community knows their father
• Tom Robinson cannot find any work now that he has been accused of raping a white
woman
• At home Aunt Alexandra is waiting for the children
• Scout is not pleased that her aunt will stay for the summer holidays
• As the trial begins the defendant Tom Robinson is brought to Maycomb jail
• Atticus sits in front of the jail and guards the prisoner to protect him from being
lynched by a mob
