During the chapter eight through eleven in To Kill a Mockingbird I found my self curious to why Mrs. Dubose wanted Jem to read to her whom we figured out in the end of chapter eleven that she was a morphine addict. “What’d she want? Asked Jem. She’s dead son, said Atticus. She died a few minutes ago Mrs. Dubose was a morphine addict said Atticus” I think she just wanted to teach Jem a lesson when she made him read to her for a month. I found this passage very important because I thought it was an important part of this section showing what she died from and that she could have helped herself and not have died if she would have just stopped taking morphine. I was also thinking about what was really wrong with the mad dog, maybe he could have been taken to a vet instead of being shot. How would the owner react when he got home and found out his dog had gone mad and Mr. Finch shot it. “Mr. Tate jumped off the porch and ran to the Radley Place. He stopped in front of the dog, squatted, turned around and tapped his finger on her forehead above his left eye. You were a little to the right, Mr. Finch, he called.” I found this part of the section important because it was showing that Mr. Finch shot the mad dog that was going down the street looking sick.
The most important ideas from this section would be the snow and how they really don’t get snow a lot so when they did they were very excited and wanted to save it and not step on it, and take some from other yards to make a snowman. I found that kind of strange because when we get snow here we are usually excited the first time but were not as excited as they got and not stepping on it to save it. There were some more important details like Mrs. Dubose dying and showing that she was a morphine addict. Also the mad dog was important showing that Atticus would protect the neighborhood from getting hurt by the dog even if he would get in trouble for doing so.
If Scout was in the literary circle I would have asked her why did Atticus get arrested for shooting a mad dog if it could have hurt someone? In our literary circle we discussed how Scout and Jem got guns and Atticus said they could shoot any bird but not the mockingbird because it was a sin. Then we discussed how that relates to the title and maybe Mr. Radley killed a mockingbird and now he is in his house because he broke a sin. I never really thought of that part of the section as an important detail but now I do and I believe it makes sense and maybe that is what really happened. We also talked about how Jem had to read to Mrs. Dubose and how it relates to real life because it is showing if you do something wrong there will be a consequence. To be a part of the community of Maycomb I think it means you have to be respectful to everyone and it doesn’t matter if they are really old and you don’t like them you still do the right thing.
