Journal Entry of to Kill a Mockingbird

Category: Journal Entry, To Kill a Mockingbird

Last Updated: 18 Apr 2023

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Dear Diary, Damn I hate school! To be honest “I never looked forward more to anything in my life”, but everything went wrong. My teacher is Ms. Caroline Fisher. I don’t think she’s more than twenty-two. “She … wore a red-and-white-striped dress. She looked and smelled like a peppermint drop ”. She began reading a very funny story about cats that wore clothes. When she was done, she wrote the alphabet on the blackboard and asked me what they were. I read the letters to her and she got mad at me and told me to tell Atticus that he was teaching me wrong! Atticus never taught me how to read, Jem said I was born reading but Ms. Caroline must’ve thought I was lying. It would be so hard not ready, “reading was something that just came to me … Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read”. After that everyone laughed at me because Ms. Caroline whipped me. Why? Because she tried to give Walter Cunningham a quarter so he could buy lunch. EVERYONE knows the Cunninghams never take anything from anyone because they can’t payback. I was so mad at him so I beat him up. I told Jem but he invited him to have lunch at our house. At first, Walter doubted but Jem told him I was crazy. Who does he think he is?

When we were eating Walter drowned his food in syrup. “I … asked what the sam hill he was doing”. Atticus shook his head and Calpurnia called me to the kitchen. “She was furious, and when she was furious Calpurnia’s grammar became erratic”. She gave me a lesson about what tolerance was but I’m still kinda confused. When we went back to school Ms. Caroline started complaining ‘cause she saw a cootie on Burris Ewell’s head. She made such a fuss about it! When she told him to go home and wash his hair so no one else would catch 'em (although I think most of the other kids had some too) “[Burris] stood up. He was the filthiest human I had ever seen. His neck was dark gray, the backs of his hands were rusty, and his fingernails were black deep into the quick”, and started sayin’ that no one was sending him home, that he was about to leave because he only went the first days of school and never went back ‘till the next year. Then he got real mad and insulted Ms. Caroline and made her cry. We were tryin’ to cheer her up again but all we got from her was a “Thank you, darlings”. “Had her conduct been more friendly toward me, I would have felt sorry for her ”.

When we finally got home, I told Atticus I didn’t want to go to school anymore. He must’ve been surprised because all I ever wanted was to start school. “[W]hat’s the matter? ” he said. And “[b]it by bit, I told him the day’s misfortunes”. He solved my reading problem by making a compromise, which is an agreement. He said that if “[I] concede[d] the necessity of going to school, we’[d] go on reading every night just as we always ha[d]. I was so happy! Thanks to him I can be writing right now and will be a secret me and Atticus will keep. I hope nobody at school ever finds my diary or I’ll be in big trouble!

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