Mayella Is Powerless In To Kill A Mockingbird

Power? Power is the ability to do something or act in a particular way, especially as a faculty or quality. Many people have power like the President, parents, the law, but not as much power as of what happens in the book “To Kill a Mockingbird” This story is about a great trial involving a man named Tom Robinson and a lady name Mayella. The story is based on a trial because the man Tom Robinson was accused of rape and the beating of Mayella. Mayella is going to be powerful and powerless.

In the book, To Kill a Mockingbird, Power can be refer to as the ability to influence or change one’s opinion base on how an individual is being viewed by the human specie. The book, To Kill a Mockingbird, is simply about a girl, Scout, whose life is influenced both positively and negatively as a result of how society was created. In this book there is a side character, Mayella,; and because of her class and gender, she is powerless, but her race makes her powerful.

Is Mayella Powerful? Be honest, have you ever felt like you’re better than everyone else? How much do you desire power? What is power?

In the novel To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Mayella Ewell is a powerful character. Mayella get’s her power from her class,race,and gender. Her power mostly comes from her race. Tom Robinson has been accused of rape by Mayella Ewell.

Is Mayella Ewell powerful or not? Mayella Ewell, the poorest girl in the town of Maycomb, Alabama, living on a pig farm with her abusive father and in an abandoned Negro shack. The Ewell’s are the lowest of the low in the town of Maycomb, in rank wise and are not respected too much either. Bob Ewell, father of Mayella Ewell is an abusive man, sexually and physically and has an alcoholic problem. Mayella is usually beaten and sexually assaulted by him, especially when he is drinking, but Mayella has a plan that will let her be free from Bob. One would say she is not powerful because she is enclosed from the world, beaten by her father, and not very respected.

One day in Maycomb, Alabama during the great depression a young girl named Mayella Ewell was raped. This shows Mayella is one powerful young girl in the story To Kill A Mockingbird. It will show how she is power through class, race, and gender.

In Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird Mayella Ewell's is a powerful young teenager. In the 1930’s in Maycomb, Alabama Mayella set news to the small town, she made allegations of rape against Tom Robinson. Mayella is as powerful as the ocean when it takes you underwater. In Harper Lee’s, To Kill A Mockingbird will show Mayella’s  power by using Class, Race, and Gender. Power is or means having control over someone or something.

In the novel, “To Kill A Mockingbird”, Harper Lee categorizes power using class, race and gender.

At some point in an individual's lifetime, they will be faced with the judgement of race, class, and gender. These three classifications will cause people to be looked down upon, or become a praised individual. Also, you can receive unjust treatment in certain cases, such as someone thinking they are somehow better than another person. In “To Kill A Mockingbird”, there is a character by the name of Mayella Ewell, who is a poor, white woman that is abused. Mayella is a un-powerful character in the fact that she is a female, and she is very poor.

But she said he took advantage of her, and when she stood up she looked at him as if he were dirt beneath her feet.” Mayella’s loneliness and powerlessness drove her to have an affair with a black man, breaking a societal code. She is a victim of poverty because of the hatred and discrimination occurring in Maycomb. Although some might view Mayella Ewell as a victim, others might view her as a villain because she broke a societal code by attempting to have an affair with a Negro.

Mayella, injured beyond repair by the forces of poverty and by the hatred that surrounds her and her family Mayella’s father forces her to lie about what really happened between her and Tom Robinson Although Mayella knows that she can tell the truth about the trial her father forces her to lie about what Tom Robinson really did. All Mayella wants is attention from someone because she has never felt that feeling before because of the way her father treats her. Although Mayella has her flaws, she does not deserve to be harmed and mistreated because truly she has not harmed anyone. This leads to the ultimate act of innocence displayed by Tom

Mayella was powerless in gender because she was always abused. “Mayella was beaten savagely by someone who lead almost exclusively with his left” (Document B). Based on this quote it shows that Mayella’s father had beaten her sexual, verbally, and physically. Tom Robinson also was crippled in his left hand which shows her father beat her. During the trial Atticus questions Mayella about if she loves her father and she response “he tollable, except when he is drinking” (Document B).

Abuse has a bad effect on children everywhere causing them to lash out in different ways as Mayella did in her environment. For example, kids that come from negligent families often have trouble connecting with others. Throughout the story, Mayella has shown signs that prove that she lacked simple social skills to understand who she should trust or when people are being nice to her. Further, Mayella exhibits attachment issues and tendency to take risky sexual decisions such as she had done with Tom Robinson, which essentially can be attributed to be consequence of abuse perpetrated by Bob Ewell and his out of control drinking habit. The fact that she knew the consequences of abuse should have been a deterrent to her misbehavior with Tom Robinson During Mayella’s testimony, Mayella’s father is exposed as an alcoholic who is intolerable when drunk.

Power, isn’t it something we all want? This court case, we set in a rape crime that has supposedly been committed by a young black fellow named Tom Robinson. The victim of this crime is Mayella Ewell and she’s white and a young girl. In the 1930s racism was a big factor in this case. Now does Mayella have more power because of race?

Tom Robinson is a young African-American who's been accused of raping and abusing Mayella Ewell, a young and closeted white woman. Racial discrimination is hinted throughout Tom’s trial as Atticus Finch explains to Jem that a white man’s word will always win over that of a black man’s - "... In our courts, when it's a white man's word against a black man's, the white man always wins. They're ugly, but those are the facts of life" (220). Atticus explains to Jem that in the courts of Maycomb, a black man’s state of innocence or guilt is truly determined by a white man’s testimony.