Malcolm Gladwell and Atticus Finch
For some reason I never read To Kill a Mockingbird when I was young, and for years I intended to fix that omission. (Despite my degree in English and American Literature and Language, I haven’t read Pride and Prejudice either—though I did read Emma for a survey course, and enjoyed it.) I had seen the movie on TV, at least in parts, and when I did finally read the book a couple of weeks ago I didn’t find much that was unfamiliar, though I was pleased with the assurance of the storytelling, the touches of humor, and the lack of cuteness (mostly).
Having just finished the book, I was surprised to open the New Yorker and see that the subject of Malcolm Gladwell’s latest essay is not quirks of human behavior that can benefit businesspeople, but To Kill a Mockingbird.
Gladwell addresses a controversy that I was unaware of, about whether it is right to see Atticus Finch (and it is impossible to read the book without thinking of Gregory Peck) as a hero for his lonely defense of a black man unjustly accused of rape. The point, which Gladwell agrees with, is that Atticus Finch would rather appeal to the better angels of our nature than work for structural change.
Finch will stand up to racists. He’ll use his moral authority to shame them into silence. He will leave the judge standing on the sidewalk while he shakes hands with Negroes. What he will not do is look at the problem of racism outside the immediate context of Mr. Cunningham, Mr. Levy, and the island community of Maycomb, Alabama.
Gladwell is right, if we take him on his own terms. Atticus Finch is not an activist, a Freedom Rider, or even a full-time civil rights lawyer. His actions, and those of people like him, were not going to get more rights for black people, let alone end racism. But I don’t think Harper Lee ever meant to say that they were.
What Finch does in his small Southern town is not everything, but it is something. It requires more moral courage than most people have. And the existence of people like Finch, and their influence on their neighbors, helps prepare the ground for change.
