Harper Lee Case

There always seems to have at least one perplexing and eerie individual who is rumored about throughout a town. They are never understood below the surface. In To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, the character Arthur "Boo" Radley fulfills this role. Boo is Scout and Jem's recluse neighbor that is not seen very often which leaves the townspeople fabricating ideas about him. After the trial of a black man falsely accused of rape, the Finch children begin to perceive their recluse neighbor, Boo Radley, as a good-hearted man and not as a "malevolent phantom"(10) like they once had.

When Boo Radley was first introduced to Dill (their neighbor's nephew who was visiting the town), Scout described him as an evil ghost. She went on to inform Dill some of the small violations Boo had been blamed for. Boo was rumored to have mutilated chickens even though "the culprit was Crazy Addie" (10). Boo Radley had not committed the crime but "people still looked at the Radley place, unwilling to discard their initial suspicions" (10-11). The kids talked about him as if he were a horror movie character but deep down yearned to have a connection with him. It was evident the kids wanted to get to know Boo when Dill planned on asking him on a note to come out of his home and explains to Scout and Jem's father "[the kids] thought [Boo] might enjoy them"(65). Scout and Jem's father Atticus stops them from leaving the note which leaves them with many questions. Scout, Jem, and Dill begin to consider he may be a true human even if he doesn't have an active part in the Maycomb community.

Scout and Jem perceived Boo Radley in an entirely different manner after the trial of Tom Robinson. Tom Robinson was a black man wrongly accused of raping a white woman. Scout acknowledged Tom was a honest, gentle, and polite man even when he was being accused of the assault. Scout points out Tom Robinson "seemed to be a respectable Negro, and a respectable Negro would never go up into somebody's yard of his own volition" (257). After the kids stopped "tormenting" (65) Boo Radley they recognized he was a kind man. He had left them gifts in a tree knothole, he had mended Jem's pants when they got stuck on chicken wire, and had put a blanket around Scout on the night Miss Maudie's house caught on fire. Just like the Tom Robinson case, Boo proved himself to be a good person by his actions and character. He was not the monster Maycomb County had described him as. Jem concludes that the reason Boo Radley stayed in his house was "because he [wanted] to stay inside" (304). Who can blame him for wanting to stay