To Kill a Mockingbird

Boo Radley

In To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee has Arthur "Boo" Radley mentioned often and changing the outcome of things, but without being a dominant character or even being seen for the most part. Boo is a quiet and reclusive character in the novel. He is implied to be a very lonely and sad old man. As a child, Boo befriended a bad group of kids, which ultimately led to his dad keeping him locked up in the house. Boo is very important because he affects To Kill a Mockingbird by being so ominous to everyone that lived in the small town of Maycomb.

Being such a mysterious character, Boo draws attention from the people in Maycomb, and many rumors were created which are unrealistic.

This is Jem's description of Boo, which was based off all of the rumors that he gathered from Maycomb:

Boo was about six-and-a half feet tall, judging from his tracks;

he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that's why his hands were bloodstained-

if you ate an animal raw, you could never wash the blood off.

There was a long jagged scar that ran across his face; what teeth he had were yellow and rotten; his eyes popped, and he drooled most of the time.(16)

This word painting of Boo is what Jem and Scout, the main characters in the novel, picture him being. Boo supposedly leaves his house at night and watches people and stabbed his dad in the leg with scissors and continued cutting the news paper afterwords. All of these rumors were created about Boo when he stayed hidden for years. He has such a bad reputation, even from kids, for being a grown man that would rather to stay home than to leave.

Throughout the novel, Boo Radley continues to get more important. Sometimes the kids would see a shadow around the broken shutters when they were close to the house At one point, Boo was leaving things for Scout and Jem in a tree hole like gum, pennies, soap figurines, and a pocket watch, that was broken, attached to a knife. When the kids were ready to leave a letter in the tree for Boo, the hole was cemented shut by Nathan Radley, Boo's older brother. Also, when Scout rolls into the Radley's yard, she hears laughing, which came from Boo.

At the end of the book, Jem and Scout are attacked by Bob Ewell. He is a crazy drunk who was disliked in Maycomb and he was prepared to kill them. Luckily for the kids, someone showed up from nowhere and killed Bob, but Scout did not know who it was and Jem was unconscious. Eventually, Scout realized that Boo Radley saved her, and her brother. Boo was never seen before that, but he was always affecting the novel.

Throughout the whole novel, even when Boo was only a few feet away from Scout, he remained in the shadows. He was always hidden