SAY-level questions
Dill feels like his parents ____________ him, which makes him sad.
ignore
Dill describes why he ran away:
"That wasn't it, he--they just wasn't interested in me."
That was the weirdest reason for flight I had ever heard. (161)
Explain two things:
What does Scout think is weird?
Why or how is Dill's reason for flight actually quite logical or understandable?
1. that his parents ignore him
2. if parents ignore you, that's sad!
Harper Lee describes Dill as he imitates what his parents said to him:
"Dill tried to deepen his voice. 'You're not a boy. Boys get out and play baseball with other boys, they don't hang around the house worryin' their folks'" (162).
Boys sometimes feel pressure to act more masculine, which means being sporty and running around outside of the house.
What object is Scout describing when she says that it "pinched in her waist, flared out her rear, and managed to suggest that Aunt Alexandra's was once an hour-glass figure"?
a corset
"I felt the starched walls of a pink cotton penitentiary closing in on me" (155).
What literal object does this implied metaphor refer to?
a dress
"Dill?"
"Mm?"
"Why do you reckon Boo Radley's never run off?"
Dill sighed a long sigh and turned away from me.
"Maybe he doesn't have anywhere to run off to…." (163)
We should try to step into someone else's shoes and understand where they come from.
When Scout learns that Aunt Alexandra will come stay with her in order to give her a "feminine influence," Scout immediately thinks of whom?
Calpurnia
Throughout these two chapters, Atticus takes two different approaches with Scout. First, he ______, and then he ______. What are these approaches, and why does he end up switching from one to the next?
First, he tries to get Scout to follow Aunt Alexandra's norms about being polite...and then he abandons that idea and warms up to the kids, hugging them. He switches b/c Scout cries and also acts kindly toward him, and he seems to recognize how unnecessary the first approach is.
When Atticus is talking about expectations of their family, the text reads: "Atticus paused, watching me locate an elusive redbug on my leg.
'Gentle breeding,' he continued, when I had found and scratched it, 'and that you should try to live up to your name--' Atticus persevered in spite of us: 'She asked me to tell you you must try to behave like the little lady and gentleman that you are.' … Presently I picked up a comb from Jem's dresser and ran its teeth along the edge. …
'Your stomach's growling,' I said. … 'You better take some soda'" (151, 152).
There are many ways to be a true "lady." (Scout ends up giving her dad compassionate advice in a motherly fashion...even though she didn't, previously, follow gender roles when she was scratching at a bug and making annoying noises with the comb.)
When Aunt Alexandra judges people, she always assumes their issues come from what/where? And how do these kinds of assumptions affect how she treats people?
their families / she pre-judges people
In a way, Dill and Boo and have something in common in this chapter. What?
parents who don't seem to understand or appreciate them for who they are
"I now know what Atticus was trying to do, but Atticus was only a man. It takes a woman to do that kind of work" (152). What was he trying to do? (He realizes it was a mistake.) What does Scout mean about "it takes a woman to do that kind of work"?
Atticus was trying to change the kids b/c he felt persuaded by Aunt Alexandra to do this… And then explain how maybe Scout is herself subscribing to social norms by saying that changing kids in this way is a WOMAN's job…i.e. Aunt Alexandra's job. (tongue in cheek)