P1+AKidane

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Tolerance, to accept others or something for what or who they are. In our world today, the theme of tolerance is very well needed because of all the different people and their strange lifestyles. In Harper Lee’s novel “To kill a Mockingbird”, he shows many forms of tolerance in people. The narrator, Scout, learns to become more tolerant of others progressing through the book. Another person that shows the theme of tolerance in the book is the crazy lady next door, Mrs. Dubose. Lastly, for brief moments in novel you can say Tom Robinson was another person that showed tolerance in novel as well.

In the beginning of the book we have to use Scout, the narrator, as someone to give us information of what is going on in Waycomb County. You really can’t trust her judgment because she is only six years old at the time which would most likely make her an unreliable narrator. On page 11 she says, “If Mr. Radley did not take Boo back, he would die from mold from the damp.” Obviously you cannot die from mold from the damp, so it shows the intelligence of the narrator is very limited. In novel we mostly see it through a child’s point of view, so sometimes we don’t know what really happened since sometimes children have habits of getting the truth confused with their imagination. On page 11 she also says, “He was a thin leathery man with colorless eyes…” Now that   is basically telling me that he is blind, but he is able to walk to town and back everyday by himself. When you are blind you need help walking places so you don’t get hurt, so of course Scout had to of exaggerated the truth. This goes to show how you really can’t believe every thing she says, but you actually have to reinterpret what she is really trying to say. Once you get into the book a little more, you start to see a growth or a maturity in Scout and she starts using a little more logic. During the trial of Tom Robinson, before assuming all the rumors were true like the rest of the town did, Scout went to a source and asked questions about the incident. She had asked Atticus, “Do you care for niggers?” Even though she uses the N-word, it’s still better than having her going around always assuming things. It’s good that she was tolerant enough to not assume, but actually be more open and like Atticus said she put herself in someone else’s shoes.

The person who also emphasizes the theme of tolerance is Mrs. Dubose. She is the average everyday little, old, crazy lady from next door. When you first meet Mrs. Dubose she seems to be very rude towards anyone, but once you compliment her or something of hers she will calm down but not be curtious towards the compliment given. When you first meet her in the book she is on her porch and Jem, Scout, and Dill are walking by. When Scout tires to be nice by saying hi she replies, "Don't say to me, you say hello you ugly girl." That cleary shows she is not tolerant to peolpe, but that does not mean she cannot be tolerant towards death. Mrs. Dubose had been diagnose with cancer, but she refused to take any painkilling medicine because she felt if she took those pills then she would be dieing unpurely. So she had to learn how to be tolerant of all that pain that she had to go through so she would not be temped to take the pain medication.

One last example of tolerance was shown through a small portion of the book was shown through Tom Robinson. He was sadly charge of beating and raping Mayella Ewell. Even though you could clearly see that she was lieing Tom Robinson still did not say any mean or dishonest things about Mayella and her father. When he had to testify he actually said, "He felt bad for her." If you feel bad for someone you wouldn't rape them and Tom Robinson did not rape her at all. He was tolerant enough not to lose his composure when his life was at stake and still tolerated people who sat in front of and bailtently.