How Jem Matures After the Trial

How Jem Matures After the Trial

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird is a coming-of-age story about two siblings, Jeremy “Jem” Finch and Jean Louise “Scout” Finch. They are the children of Atticus Finch, a lawyer who is known for being able to defend people without bias. In the beginning of the story, the two adolescents are fascinated by the story of Arthur “Boo” Radley, Macomb County’s very own ghost story. According to the town legends, Boo stabbed his father in the leg, then was kept inside his house as to not have any of the townsfolk be injured. Jem and Scout weren’t sure of what to believe, but that didn’t stop them from constantly daring each other both to touch and to try to look inside the Radley house. Their obsession begins to die down as midway through the book, Jem and Scout’s father is charged with a particularly difficult case. The town’s judge knew that Atticus is the only one that would listen to the defendant, an African-American man named Tom Robinson, who is accused of raping a white woman. There is no evidence on any side, and it becomes the word of the white against the word of the black. Brought down by social prejudices, the jury finds the African-American man guilty and sentences him to jail. After the trial, there is a discussion between Jem and Scout. This conversation between the two siblings shows how much Jem is maturing mentally and becoming his own person, while also beginning to understand some of the nuances in his culture.

In the matter of maturing mentally, Jem Finch is a near perfect of example of how children’s brains develop through their adolescence. At his age, kids base most judgments on concrete rules of right and wrong, or good and bad, because they are developing a stronger sense of themselves morally (Anthony 1). With this comes the all-or-nothing outlook on life, which Jem shows when he says, “There’s four kind of folks in the world. There’s the ordinary kind like us and the neighbors, there’s the kind like the Cunninghams out in the woods, the kind like the Ewells down at the dump, and the Negroes” (Lee 226). Jem, after having his whole view on the way things worked in life flipped upside down, struggles in trying to make sense of it all. By distinguishing people into groups, he’s trying to learn what makes people different, and why they “go out of their way to despise each other” (Lee 227). Also, around age 12 for boys, which is when the story is taking place for Jem, there is a surge in the production of gray matter in the frontal cortex. This is where executive functions are housed. Executive functions include the ability to think, organize thoughts, and problem solve, which is what Jem is trying to do by grouping the people in his town into categories (Normal Development 1).

Jem is becoming his own person, but is doing so in a way that is more subtle to the readers of the novel. During his conversation with Scout, he seems conflicted. In trying to explain his reasoning to his sister, Jem is subconsciously pushing for someone to talk to. However, the matter that Jem wants to discuss is more serious than he is fully sure that he wants Scout to deal with. Jem still feels the need to protect her, as he shows when he tells off his aunt when talking about drunks, saying, “Aun-ty… she ain’t nine yet” (Lee 224). Later, Jem asks Scout if she will take up sewing, in the hopes that their aunt would like her more (Lee 225). This back and forth of wanting to protect Scout and wanting to tell her everything shows the growth of Jem. He is thinking about the way what he says will impact her, or at least is trying to spare her the discomfort of dealing with their aunt. All of this combined, however subtle it may be, shows that Jem cares about his sister in a way that he would not think about in the beginning of the book.

As a part of him developing socially and beginning to understand what drives people, Jem is also becoming more aware of how prejudice influences decisions. Jem is starting to be able to comprehend more abstract thoughts such as racism, even though it’s difficult for him to fathom such a concept. He was brought up to view everyone equally, so the thought that something as simple as skin color would have such a big impact on people’s opinions is simply preposterous. Unlike Scout, Jem understands that they aren’t the same as people like the Cunninghams, even though he doesn’t know why. In his conversation with his sister, Jem attributes peoples’ differences to their backgrounds. He then goes on to explain that “background doesn’t mean Old Family… it’s how long your family’s been readin’ and writin’” (Lee 226). They don’t agree on this, but don’t argue about it, which is also something that shows their maturity.