To Kill a Mockingbird — Chapter 20

Narration Prompt

In a paragraph, retell the structural architecture of this chapter as Harper Lee builds it: Mr. Dolphus Raymond's confession beneath the live oak, the children's return to a courtroom mid-cross-examination, the rhetorical phases of Atticus's closing argument from the three forensic propositions through the undressing to 'In the name of God, believe him,' and Calpurnia's interruption of the speech's exalted final line.

Discussion Questions

1. Atticus's relocation of 'all men are created equal' from anthropology to courtroom procedure — from a description of human nature to a performance of an institution — converts Jefferson's axiom into something closer to a liturgy than a metaphysic. What does it mean for a foundational political claim to survive only inside a building, and what does this conversion make of the rest of American civil life?
2. Read the rhetorical phases of Atticus's closing argument as a five-part oration: forensic exordium (the three propositions), corporeal interlude (the undressing of vest and collar), narratio (Mayella's broken code, Mr. Bob Ewell's left hand), peroration (Jefferson and the courts as great levelers), and the whispered private prayer ('In the name of God, believe him'). Which classical model does this most resemble — Cicero, Quintilian, or the homiletic tradition of the American Protestant pulpit — and what does Harper Lee gain by hybridizing them?

+ 2 more questions in the complete study guide