The story begins introducing the characters, from Scouts perspective who is 6 at the time, we learn about the family home, and about Culpurnia, the closest thing Scout has to a mother as her mum passed away when she was 2 years old. Culpurnia is the family's cook, and although in the community her skin colour may determine her status within the community, the children would never dare to disobey her due to her 'tyrannical presence'.
Scout talks about the arrival of a boy called Dill who arrives that summer, he is the nephew of Miss Rachel Haverford, who lives next door.; the children quickly form a friendship with the young 7 year old boy and he is accepted into the community.
Another important character is Boo, also known as Arthur, Radley. After getting in trouble with the wrong crowd at the age of 15 and disappointing his father with his behaviour, years pass by and no one see's Boo leave the house, or even see him in the house. This intrigues the children and by the end of the summer Dill dares Jem to run across the front yard and touch the house, which he does.
When September
arrives Dill returns home and Scout starts school at first she’s quite excited,
but after her first day she never wants to back after she gets in trouble with
her teacher Miss Caroline for being
smart and also trying to explain why Walter Cunningham, the boy with know lunch
wont accept money for food. The Cunninghams don’t accept help from anyone as
they cannot repay, whilst Scout thinks she is being helpful explaining to her
new teacher who isn’t from the area and doesn’t understand the background of
families in Maycomb, her teacher punishes her and she gets her hands slapped by
a ruler. Class is dismissed and Scout leaves to go home.
In the playground Scout decides to
teach Walter a lesson as she blames him for getting in trouble, she is beating
him when Jem comes over and stops her, which she doesn’t like; she is even more
upset when Jem invite him over for lunch. At the table Scout is humiliated by
Culprina for making of the way Walter eats and receives a scolding from the
cook. When she returns to school Miss Caroline is in quite a state after
finding a louse in Burris Ewell’s hair, she tells him to go home and clean up,
but the young boy quickly presents a temper and insults the teacher and reduces
her to tears before leaving. After dinner, Scout confronts Atticus and begs him
to teach her everything she needs to know so she won’t have to go to school
anymore, but Atticus sits her down and talks to her and persuades her
otherwise.
Scout finds herself getting bored of
school as her intellectuality is clearly higher than that of her peers. One day,
she is walking home from school and passes the Radley house, and in the hollow
of the large oak tree that is on the corner of the garden, inside she spots two
pieces of chewing gum. She puts them in her mouth after carefully checking
they’re okay to eat, however when Jem finds out he is furious and convinced
they were poisoned by Boo Radley. On the last day of school Jem and Scout are
walking home and find two shiny pennies in the tree. Dill returns two days
later to stay for summer and the three of them continue their fascination with
Boo, they decide to create a play based on his life, but they are nearly caught
by Atticus.
Scout gets upset when Jem and Dill
start to exclude her from their secret plans; as a result she begins to spend
time with Miss Maudie Atkinson, their next door neighbour, the two engage in
many conversations, however Scout is fascinated when Miss Maudie comes to the
defence of Boo or Arthur (his real name) and we learn a lot about Miss Maudie
and her life regarding cakes, gardening and her love for the outdoors. Scout
also discovers Jem and Dills plan to pass a note to Boo Radley through the
crack in the window at the side of the house and before she knows it, she is
dragged into the mists of things. The plan is going well until they are caught
by Atticus, and scolds the children, especially Jem, who forbids them to go
near the Radley house again and says too leave Mr Radley alone.
It’s the last night of summer and Dill
will be returning home in the morning and the children return to school. Jem
and Dill have one last idea, figuring if they get killed they miss out on
school and not their summer holiday, Scout protest snap Jem grows quickly
frustrated with her and her girlish ways and tells her to either be quiet of to
go home. They reach the house but are fired at by Nathan Radley, who thinks
they’re intruders, they run back through the hole in he fence in which they
came through and head back home, gathering outside the Radley house with the
rest of the neighbourhood just in time. Suddenly they realize Jem is missing
his trousers as they were caught on the fence. Dill steps in quickly and says
they were playing strip poker, which Atticus is not pleased with and sends them
home, telling Dill to give Jem his trousers back, they head home, not suspected
having anything to do with the events that night. On the way home Jem tells the
others that he caught his pants trying to crawl back through the fence avoiding
getting shot. That night Jem goes back to the fence so that his trousers aren’t
found, getting them all in trouble. Scout begs him not to go, but he does,
leaving her alone and terrified for her brother. He returns and goes back to bed,
not saying a word.
