Respect for others is as foreign to Ewell as personal hygiene. His statement of Tom's supposed crime is couched in the most offensive terms possible, calculated to stir up people's emotions and fears to evidence-ignoring levels of irrationality.
See " Race " in " Quotes " for more on Ewell's accusation of Tom. After the trial, Ewell isn't satisfied to have gotten Tom sentenced to death; he wants revenge on those that would give him a fair trial.
It's likely that Ewell is the shadow Judge Taylor sees at his house one night, but Atticus and Helen get the brunt of his rage. Atticus doesn't say much about his confrontation with Ewell, so his kids get the Miss-Stephanie-enhanced version: "Atticus was leaving the post office when Mr.
Ewell approached him, cursed him, spat on him, and threatened to kill him" Well, when we put it like that, it's probably not enhanced at all. We can definitely buy that Ewell would say that. While the Maycomb community is happy enough to return to ignoring the Ewells after their day in court, Ewell won't go quietly back to the dump.
He's had a taste of power, and he wants to keep asserting it through threats of violence to anyone associated in his mind with Tom Robinson. It's as if what Tom did in Ewell's mind is so horrible that destroying Tom himself isn't enough. Or maybe it's just revenge—after all, Scout and Jem don't have much to do with Tom directly, but attacking them is a powerful way to hurt Atticus.
If we believe Tom's testimony that Mayella approached him, and that Ewell's anger was directed first at her rather than Tom, why is Ewell so determined to prosecute Tom and persecute those involved with him?
Especially since it would have been pretty easy just to hush that whole thing up? Scout gives us one clue: "All the little man on the witness stand had that made him any better than his nearest neighbors was, that if scrubbed with lye soap in very hot water, his skin was white" Ewell's "nearest neighbors" are African-Americans, so racism and sexism is the only way that Ewell can feel superior to anybody. He also spits in Atticus' face and menaces Tom's widow.
Later, Ewell even attempts to murder Finch's children, Jem and Scout, while they are walking home on Halloween night by a large oak tree. His murder attempt failed, when Arthur "Boo" Radley took a kitchen knife and killed Bob Ewell to prevent him from harming the Finch children.
Ewell was stopped, but not before he broke Jem's arm and tried to kill Scout however she was saved by her ham costume from the play. Heck Tate, knowing Boo Radley killed Bob Ewell, covered this up by saying that Bob fell on his own knife, and therefore killed himself. Atticus briefly tries to stop Tate before choosing not to.
He is a strong alcoholic and poaches game to feed his family, as a result of his spending whatever money he legally gains on alcohol.
Near the end of the book when scout is grabbed by Bob Ewell she mentions that she can smell alcohol. He is one of the few residents of Maycomb committed to racial equality. When he agrees to defend Tom Robinson, a black man charged with raping a white woman, he exposes himself and his family to the anger of the white community.
Read an in-depth analysis of Atticus Finch. Four years older than Scout, he gradually separates himself from her games, but he remains her close companion and protector throughout the novel. Jem moves into adolescence during the story, and his ideals are shaken badly by the evil and injustice that he perceives during the trial of Tom Robinson.
Read an in-depth analysis of Jem Finch. A recluse who never sets foot outside his house, Boo dominates the imaginations of Jem, Scout, and Dill. He is a powerful symbol of goodness swathed in an initial shroud of creepiness, leaving little presents for Scout and Jem and emerging at an opportune moment to save the children.
An intelligent child emotionally damaged by his cruel father, Boo provides an example of the threat that evil poses to innocence and goodness. Read an in-depth analysis of Boo Radley. Read an in-depth analysis of Calpurnia.
In his knowingly wrongful accusation that Tom Robinson raped his daughter, Ewell represents the dark side of the South: ignorance, poverty, squalor, and hate-filled racial prejudice.
Dill is a diminutive, confident boy with an active imagination. He becomes fascinated with Boo Radley and represents the perspective of childhood innocence throughout the novel. Alexandra is the perfect Southern lady, and her commitment to propriety and tradition often leads her to clash with Scout. Though one can pity Mayella because of her overbearing father, one cannot pardon her for her shameful indictment of Tom Robinson. The black field hand accused of rape.
An elderly, ill-tempered, racist woman who lives near the Finches. Although Jem believes that Mrs. Dubose is a thoroughly bad woman, Atticus admires her for the courage with which she battles her morphine addiction.
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