During Tom's cross-examination, Dill starts crying, and Scout has to escort him out of the building. When they get out of the building, they run into Mr. Dolphus Raymond, who offers Dill his Coca-Cola bottle. Scout warns Dill about the rumors about Mr Raymond and his whiskey, but Dill assures her that it is just Coca-Cola, and Mr. Raymond tells Dill and Scout that only kids would understand why he hangs out with African Americans. He prefers their company over the whites, and he also tells them that he acts drunk all the time so he could give the whites a reason why he hangs out with African Americans. Since he is acting drunk, he is putting fraud upon himself. He does this so his life would not a full of people asking him about his preferred company of blacks.
Mr. Raymond is trying to make his life better. The reason he prefers blacks over whites are that their company is better in his opinion. The reason he says that kids would understand it is that their childhood innocence has not been taken away yet by the ignorance and racism of Maycomb. He has strong empathy for Dill's feelings about Mr. Gilmer's talking down to Tom. Scout, on the other hand, says that Mr. Raymond is an evil man, because of his mixed children, his drunkenness, and his company of African Americans. This shows that Scout has already lost some of her childhood innocence because of the way that she has lived, as a tomboy, the Tom Robinson case, especially the lead up, and her aunt's movements on making her a woman. This is really sad for Scout because at this young of an age, possibly single-digits, you should not have lost childhood innocence, but she has already, because on how she has lived, and how others in her life contribute to this.
Reflections on Harper Lee's classic novel "To Kill a Mockingbird" from Blessed Trinity 8th graders.
Good job with your blog post here, Toby. I really enjoyed reading your views, thoughts, and opinions in this blog. I like how you said that Mr. Raymond is putting a fraud upon himself. For some reason, I really respect Mr. Raymond. He makes himself be looked upon poorly just so he can hang out with African-Americans. He doesn't care what other people think, and he even puts a fraud upon himself just so he can hang out with the people who he genuinely like. I like your idea of how Scout has already lost some of her childhood innocence. I agree on the fact that, Scout most likely knows more about the reality of the life of ignorance and racism in Maycomb since she may have been through more in her life than Dill with events such as the Tom Robinson case. Overall, this is a great blog post.
ReplyDeleteI really thought that your blog post was very interesting and great, I like how you went into depth on what happened between Dill and Scout. I personally like Mr. Dolphus he prefers the company of African Americans over whites, married a African American women, and even had children with her. However, because of this people always assume that he acts this way because he is always drunk, like you said in your post Dill said it was only coca-cola. He only does this to give people a reason why he prefers African Americans over whites. In my opinion he shouldn't have to give anyone a reason on what he decides to do. If he prefers African Americans over whites so be it, but this was in the 1930s it doesn't apply in 2018 though. Overall, good blog post.
ReplyDeleteI really liked reading your thoughts on Mr. Dolphus and your opinions on him. I myself like Mr. Dolphus Raymond because he hangs out with everyone mostly blacks. Mr. Dolphus only carries a bottle in a bag so that he can make an excuse why he hangs out with the African Americans. Mr. Dolphus carries cola instead of alcohol because he is seen as the towns drunk. Overall this blog post was good.
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