Comparrative Essay- to Kill a Mockingbird vs. the Chrysalids

Teacher: Mr. Bodkin
Due: Tuesday May 25th, 2011
By: Colin Jansen
Novel Comparison Essay
To Kill A Mockingbird And The Chrysalids
Both novels To Kill A Mockingbird, written by Harper Lee, and The Chrysalids, written by John Whyndham, are comparable in many different ways. Both novels feature a young narrator that the reader grows up with. Both stories are told through the narrators eyes, use the same styles of writing and deliver the same messages in their novels. Theses devices will be used to compare the two novels by showing examples from each.
In both novels the main characters, including the two narrators, Scout from To Kill A Mockingbird, and David from The Chrysalids, start out as young children. As eah novel progresses, the children begin to question the prejudice ways of their communities as they grow up. In the novel To Kill A Mockingbird, the children grow up in a community that discriminates against black people in a time such prejudice was tolerated and even encouraged. Scout and the other main characters are raised in Maycomb County, a community in which black and white people live. This gives the characters many opportunities to interact with black people. These opportunities for interaction create experiences that challenge the assumption that black people area bad. Dolphus Raymond, a white man who married a black women, explains to Scout that kids are better able to understand when something is wrong in a society then adults, as adults often take things for granted. Raymond states “ Because you’re children and you understant it” (Lee 201). In the novel The Chrysalids, the children grow up in a community in which people who are disfigured are called deviations. These deviations are discriminated against. At the start of the novel, David finds out about Sophie’s sixth toe. He is able to look beyond this disfiguration and sees that it does not impact who she is as a person. David states “ A blasphemy was, as had been impressed upon me often...