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About This Passage
This passage is the moment Scout names the disagreement on the porch. Mr. Tate has just said, 'Bob Ewell fell on his knife. He killed himself.' His voice is quiet, but his boots are planted so solidly on the porch floorboards it seems they have grown there. Atticus walks to the corner of the porch and looks at the wisteria vine. Scout sees, for the first time in the novel, that her father and Mr. Heck Tate are in a contest she does not yet understand. The two stubbornnesses are not the same. Atticus's is the quiet stubbornness of a Maycomb lawyer who has spent his life arguing in courtrooms; Mr. Tate's is the unschooled, blunt stubbornness of a sheriff who has spent his life keeping the peace in a small Alabama town. Lee asks the reader to register that the contest is even — neither man is going to outweigh the other by office or schooling — and that what is about to be decided will be decided by which kind of stubbornness wins.
Mr. Tate’s voice was quiet, but his boots were planted so solidly on the porch floorboards it seemed that they grew there. A curious contest, the nature of which eluded me, was developing between my f...
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Discussion Questions
Narration Prompt
Tell what Mr. Tate decides about how Bob Ewell died, why Atticus does not want to hush the night up, what Mr. Tate says about Boo Radley and the angel food cakes, and what Scout says that finally settles the argument.
Discussion Questions
- Mr. Heck Tate plants his boots so solidly on the porch floorboards it seems they grew there, and he stays planted across the entire negotiation. Examine what the persistence of his physical posture reveals about the way Mr. Tate sees the difference between his authority as sheriff of Maycomb County and Atticus's authority as a lawyer.
- Mr. Tate demonstrates exactly how Bob Ewell fell on the switchblade — pretending to stumble, his left arm going down in front of him, his whole weight driving the blade into the soft stuff between his ribs. Examine how this physical demonstration in the porch lamplight serves as the chapter's most efficient piece of forensic teaching, and consider what Atticus's slow walk to the swing afterward reveals about the moment he begins to accept the demonstration.
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Vocabulary Builder
Item 1
In a calm, mild, untroubled way, as if nothing unusual were happening.
Item 2
Greatly surprised or shocked by something unexpected.
Item 3
Cheerful, casual, and unbothered, as if a light wind were carrying the speaker along.
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Critical Thinking
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