There are no absolutes. People are always more than just good or bad. No one is purely evil the same way no one can be purely good. The story of To Kill A Mockingbird reflects this idea perfectly. The novel starts out as a story of a young girl, Scout, and her brother, Jem, growing up in Maycomb, Alabama in the 1930’s. Scout’s father ends up becoming the defence attorney for an innocent black man, Tom Robinson. Due to the widespread prejudice in the community, the jury decides he is guilty, regardless of the overwhelming evidence against their verdict. Scout learns of injustice and its consequences. In Harper Lee’s insightful novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, the recurring themes of loss of innocence, prejudice, and good vs. evil, suggests that no one is all good or all bad. First of all, in the beginning of the novel the children are innocent. As the novel progresses they gradually start losing that childish innocence and begin to see people for who they really are. This change…show more content… Evil. In the beginning of the story Scout sees people in absolutes; she sees them as fully good or fully evil. She isn’t quite yet old enough to see the depth in people. Arthur “Boo” Radley is a perfect example of this. While all of the children are still young, they see Boo as a monster, someone to tease and mess with, someone who’s lawn you can’t even step on. By the end of the novel they see Boo for what he is; a nice man who is a victim of an unfortunate situation. Yet another example of “no absolutes” is Mrs. Dubose. She is hateful and nasty to the children but after her death Scout discovers the reasoning behind her aversion to the kids, an addiction to morphine. “According to [Mrs. Dubose’s] view, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew,” (Lee 93). Nearly all of the characters reveal a darker or lighter side to them as the story progresses, solidifying the theme of good vs.
