It is important to understand the different women in Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird. If one doesn’t understand the personality of the characters, the various viewpoints that helps shape the novel and focus the plot are lost.
Miss Maudie Atkinson
Miss Maudie is the independent, slightly eccentric, freethinking neighbor of the children Scout and Jem. Some critics consider her to be a female version of Atticus Fitch. Others see her as a counterpoint to women like Aunt Alexandra and Mrs. Dubose. Miss Maudie agrees with Atticus when he tells the children that it is a sin to kill a mockingbird and gives the reason for it when she says “"Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy...they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." (90)
Miss Maudie is a good role model and friend to the children. She never talks down to the children; instead she treats them as equals, and earns their trust and friendship. She does what she believes is right and never lets the criticism of others persuade to do what she thinks is wrong or ridiculous. Because she isn’t swayed by gossip and doesn’t allow the opinions of others affect her, Miss Maudie is a good source of information for the children. She often deciphers different social enigmas of the town to the children. She tells the children about Atticus’ childhood.
Calpurnia
Calpurnia is the black housekeeper for the Finch household. She has known Atticus since they were both small children and it was Atticus’ father who gave Calpurnia her first book. Because Scout and Jem’s mother died when they were young, she is a mother figure and disciplinarian for the children. When Aunt Alexandra tries to get Atticus to dismiss Calpurnia, he defends her position in the household by saying that she "never indulged [the children] like most colored nurses."
To keep Scout out of trouble, Calpurnia teaches her to write by letting her copy sentences out of a book in exchange for a reward if she is neat.
Through Calpurnia, Scout learns about the life of blacks and begins to realize that Calpurnia lives two lives; one life where she speaks as an educated woman and raises the two white children of an attorney and a second life where she speaks the dialect of her black community and lives in fellowship with her people.
However, while Calpurnia lives in both the black and white world, she defends the children when s he brings t hem to church they are greeted with hostility by one of the congregation. Calpurnia defends the children by saying “it's the same God, ain't it?”
Mrs. Dubose
Mrs. Dubose is a mean, racist, old woman who lives on the same block as the Finches. She terrorizes the children by yelling at them from her porch. According to her, they never do anything right. Despite the children’s complaints, both Atticus and Miss Maudie defend her.
As the trial approaches, Mrs. Dubose becomes meaner and tells the children that their father, Atticus, is a nigger-lover. Jem retaliates by destroying her hedge of camellias. As punishment, Jem is forced to read to her every day after school for a month. For six weeks, Jem and Scout go to her house and read to her. She often seems to have fits while he is reading and doesn’t seem aware of them when they leave.
A short time later, Mrs. Dubose dies and Atticus explains to the children that she had been a morphine addict and knowing that she was near death, she wanted to break her morphine addiction. Jem’s reading had helped her stay distracted while she broke her addiction.
Atticus said that they could learn from her because she was one of the bravest people he knew because bravery often consists of knowing that “you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway."
For a more on Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird read: Review of To Kill a Mockingbird
Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. Warner Books, Inc. 1982. ISBN 0-446-31078-6
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