Skip to main content

How do I write a monologue on Scout Finch from To Kill A Mockingbird?

Scout wears a dress to Aunt Alexandra's missionary tea party in chapter 24. She mostly attends the party because Jem and Dill go skinny-dipping and it wouldn't be appropriate for her to be with them while they are undressed. So, in the monologue, Scout could grumble about missing out on swimming in the beginning. Then Scout offers to help Calpurnia and takes in a coffee pitcher to the women. This is when Aunt Alexandra invites her to sit down with them. There are two paragraphs where Scout describes the women's clothing and make-up which would be fun for a monologue. For example, Scout wonders, "why ladies put on their hats to go across the street" (229). She also explains that she controls herself by "tightly gripping the arms of the chair, and waited for someone to speak to me" (229). These phrases could be adapted to show how Scout not only notices a lot from her childlike perspective, but also does her best to blend in.


Next, you could mention the fact that Miss Maudie notices Scout's dress and asks where her pants are. Scout's response is "under my dress" (229). You could include that everyone laughed as she realized what she had just revealed. It's cute, and again, shows Scout's childlike personality. The cuteness can't go on forever, though, because Miss Stephanie baits Scout with a question about what she wants to be when she grows up. Miss Stephanie says she thought Scout would want to be a lawyer since she's already been to court. The ladies laugh.


Scout then witnesses a very prejudiced conversation dominated mostly by Mrs. Merriweather. Depending on the tone for your monologue, you may want to consider how it develops and ends first. Do you want the monologue to be serious or fun-loving? If you choose the latter, then don't go any further into chapter 24 for material. Not only does the conversation turn prejudiced, but Atticus then comes home with news of Tom Robinson's death. Either event could destroy a happy monologue centered around Scout's childlike characteristics.


If you want to dive into the serious topics of the chapter and contrast it with Scout's innocent behavior, that could be a powerful technique. It's as if Scout was dressed for a party, but she went to a mud-slinging fest and comes out feeling dirty. Then, to add insult to injury, Scout learns Tom died, which would make her brightly-colored dress feel very inappropriate for the sadness of the situation.


Therefore, you could focus on the dress as the center of the monologue. Scout first pretends she is a maid by bringing in the coffee pitcher. Then, she's invited to be a lady at the party, but experiences disillusionment when she winds up getting metaphorical dirt on her dress from all the prejudiced talk being thrown around. Finally, her pink dress becomes a poorly chosen one worn to be worn at a funeral, which is how Scout feels when she learns of Tom's death.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is there a word/phrase for "unperformant"?

As a software engineer, I need to sometimes describe a piece of code as something that lacks performance or was not written with performance in mind. Example: This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. Based on my Google searches, this isn't a real word. What is the correct way to describe this? EDIT My usage of "performance" here is in regard to speed and efficiency. For example, the better the performance of code the faster the application runs. My question and example target the negative definition, which is in reference to preventing inefficient coding practices. Answer This kind of coding style leads to unmaintainable and unperformant code. In my opinion, reads more easily as: This coding style leads to unmaintainable and poorly performing code. The key to well-written documentation and reports lies in ease of understanding. Adding poorly understood words such as performant decreases that ease. In addressing the use of such a poorly ...
Post a Comment
Read more

A man has a garden measuring 84 meters by 56 meters. He divides it into the minimum number of square plots. What is the length of the square plots?

We wish to divide this man's garden into the minimum number of square plots possible. A square has all four sides with the same length.Our garden is a rectangle, so the answer is clearly not 1 square plot. If we choose the wrong length for our squares, we may end up with missing holes or we may not be able to fit our squares inside the garden. So we have 84 meters in one direction and 56 meters in the other direction. When we start dividing the garden in square plots, we are "filling" those lengths in their respective directions. At each direction, there must be an integer number of squares (otherwise, we get holes or we leave the garden), so that all the square plots fill up the garden nicely. Thus, our job here is to find the greatest common divisor of 84 and 56. For this, we prime factor both of them: `56 = 2*2*2*7` `84 = 2*2*3*7` We can see that the prime factors and multiplicities in common are `2*2*7 = 28` . This is the desired length of the square plots. If you wi...
Post a Comment
Read more