The theme of prejudice in 'To Kill a Mockingbird' can best be perceived through the symbol of the Mockingbird. When advising his children about shooting, Atticus says: “shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit’em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird”. The bluejays are those who discriminate such as Bob Ewell, Mockingbirds are Tom Robinson and Boo Radley. The mockingbird is used because it is innocent and its only intention is to sing beautifully. Although Tom is the obvious mockingbird in the story, in some ways, Boo Radley is a more significant one. He is unjustly seen as an evil person and the victim of malicious stories: “(He) dined on raw squirrels,…his hands were blood stained,…his eyes popped out and he drooled most of the time.” Despite all the prejudice he endured throughout the novel, he emerged the hero as he saved Jem from Bob Ewell. Boo kept his morally strongly in tact and did not hold any hostility towards the children. When Atticus asked scout if she understood why Boo was not arrested for Bob’s murder, she replied: “Well it’d be sort of like shootin’ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?” This is a perfect example of why Lee called the book 'To Kill a Mockingbird'.
Jem and Scout are not directly the victims of immense prejudice but they do go through many tough experiences, which could lead them to hold misguided views. The siblings, although they may have not noticed it held prejudices of their own. They listened to the stories about Boo and how he stabbed his father in the leg. Culpurina did not help with the situation as she describes him as “the meanest man ever God blew breath into”. They hold this prejudice against him until he saves their lives. At the end of the book, Jem and Scout are very wise, they have seen many prejudices which may have been terrible at the time but have taught them to be better people.
‘The Color Purple’ is a novel of abuse, rape, incest and exploitation. Racial tension is a key theme in the novel. Celie is the daughter of a successful black store owner, lynched by white men for no other reason than his financial success. All the characters in Celie's family and the extended family she comes into contact with through Shug and her husband's children are the poor exploited blacks of the American South. They are almost all ill educated, badly housed, and lack the means to better themselves. The exceptions to the rule, Nettie's friends, Samuel and Corinne, are unable to progress in their homeland, having to travel to Africa to be "successful". Paradoxically, they are not taken seriously by the Olinka people who they set out to save, being regarded by them in the same way as they see white men - interfering and useless. When they go to Europe they are treated with suspicion and unease by the white church people.
When Mary Agnes dresses up to visit her uncle to try to get Sofia released from prison, she looks "like she a white woman, only her clothes patch." There is obviously a huge inequality in terms of education. Nettie and Celie go to school but only while they are not needed for domestic activities given to them by their abusive father. As soon a Celie is married, her education stops. We can see here how different this culture is to that in ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’. The white characters in Lee’s book are well educated, especially Atticus who is very keen on his daughter going to school, unlike Celie’s father. Most of the characters are not terribly well housed and are segregated from the white population. They have their own separate community with their own cemetery; church and school and have to wait in line in shops until whites are served. It is common for white residents to treat blacks as though they were animals. Incredibly offensive things are said and done to them. When Nettie is going to Africa, a white bystander remarks "Niggers going to Africa... now I have seen everything”. There is a parallel with ‘To Kill a Mockingbird here’ as the black community in Maycomb are treated in much the same way as those in ‘The Color Purple’. Tom Robinson is not tried as a real person just because he is black. A white man in the same circumstance would not have been convicted.
Even the poorest of the whites consider themselves superior to any black, no matter how successful. The story of Sofia is the main episode in the novel which illustrates the hazards of being black in Southern USA in the thirties. She is a prime example of a character who remains morally stable regardless of the abuse she endures. Sofia is, in contrast to Celie, strong, assertive, and independent as a result of her troubled upbringing. However, she is reduced to total helplessness when she dares to answer back to the mayor's wife. The beating she receives is out of all proportion to the offence she committed but the white ruling class shows no mercy. The fact that all of her friends accept what has happened to her shows the extent of the madness of the society of the time. She is saved from a lengthy prison sentence, but it does not condone the fact that there was no justification at all for the severity of what was done to her. The incident of the Christmas visit home shows how ignorant the whites really are, since Miss Millie has no idea that she is being unfair when she insists on being driven home. Slavery in fact was abolished after the Civil war but it lived on in all but name for almost a century. The white people of this time do not seem to think this applies to blacks.
The few characters in the story that manage to change their fortunes only emphasise the troubles of the rest. Shug Avery is a successful blues singer with a life of comparative luxury, able to travel and earn money. Some of this prosperity comes also to Mary Anne, and eventually to Celie when she begins her dressmaking business. Nettie is lucky to be fostered by Samuel and Corinne and with their help achieves a career and education, but the majority of the people have to struggle to survive from day to day, trapped by poverty. Shug brings strength into Celie’s life. She becomes a close friend and at times lover. The emotional support and love that Celie has never had from any man, she finds in Shug. Celie is the main success story of the novel. She begins as a victim of rape and abuse from her father and husband. She is scared to speak out as she believes that in a way, they have a right to treat her like this. Shug teaches Celie to explore herself sexually and mentally. It is this new found confidence that allows Celie to break out of Albert’s grasp and make a new life foe herself. Despite her terrible past, Celie keeps her morals in tact and ends up on top as the novel finishes. She is even able to kindle a friendship with the man who once treated her as if she was nothing.
Through Eleanor Jane, Alice Walker manages to show that it is possible for black and white to have friendships and to understand and accept one another. By the end of the novel Eleanor Jane and Sofia are able to relate like equal women rather than black servant and mistress. However, this only comes after Sofia has been brutally honest with the younger woman about the reality of the way she feels about her and her child. Eleanor Jane begins to realise that Sofia is a woman, not a faceless black person like all the rest of her race. This is an important message in the book and it is an issue that Atticus attempts to portray in Lee’s novel. By defending a black man, he is making a statement saying that black people are no different to white, they should be treated in the same way. The unfairness of the trial and the killing of Tom goes to show that in this novel, whites and blacks fail to be together as one, and that inequality will never end.
The two novels are presented in very different ways. Harper Lee uses continuous prose where as Alice Walker chose to tell the story through a series of letters. Walker’s style is unusual for a novel as the letters are written phonetically. Celie is a poorly educated working class girl who has a distinct dialect. This character comes over extremely well because of the style walker uses. The letters let us into the character’s head allowing the reader to feel her emotions and really sympathise with her. Because of these factors, Celie’s courage and strength is amplified to a height that will move any reader. In 'To Kill a Mockingbird', the prejudice and abuse does not come over as strongly as in 'The Color Purple', but the issue is still prominent. Lee gives a child’s perspective on the events. The racial issues are from Scout’s point of view. We do not see the effect of prejudice on the characters in this book quite as much because the narrator does not know how it feels to be the victim of such abuse.
These two novels show immense changes in the characters. In some cases such as Celie, prejudice makes them stronger, in others it proves too much and Tom looses his life. Those who emerge triumphant deserve much admiration, as it is difficult to emerge morally strong if you have been the victim of terrible abuse. At the beginning of 'To Kill a Mockingbird' Scout is fairly ignorant of the enormity of prejudice in Maycomb. By the end of the novel, she has learnt how harsh humans can be. Both novels have strong morals behind them, not to judge people by the colour of their skin or their lifestyle but by what is inside. The famous quote from Martin Luther King comes into mind: “I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character.” I think the main characters in both novels have this dream also.
