In my last post I blogged about Maggie O’Farrell’s latest novel, The Marriage Portrait, inspired by My Last Duchess by Robert Browning, a poem which I taught frequently during my career as a secondary school English teacher.
The text that inspired this post – Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird – was also one I taught frequently (as well as also studying it when I was at school).
Lee’s novel, published in 1960 and recipient of the Pulitzer prize the following year, is a modern American classic that, until 2015 was commonly studied for public school exams in the UK (in 2015 the UK exam boards brought out new syllabuses in response to demands from the then Secretary of State for Education, the Conservative MP Michael Gove, that the study of English Literature in schools should focus primarily on works written by writers from the British Isles).
To Kill a Mockingbird is set in 1930s Alabama, in a small town called Maycomb, and is loosely based on events from Lee’s own childhood. At the centre of the novel is Atticus Finch, a progressive and principled lawyer who is a single father to two children: Jeremy (known as Jem), who is nearly ten when the story begins and Jean Louise (Scout), four years his junior. The novel unfolds over three years, and can be read as a ‘coming of age’ story in which the children are forced to confront harsh realities about the racial and social prejudices of the society in which they live.
The principal event in the novel is the trial of a black man, Tom Robinson, accused of raping a young white woman, Mayella Ewell. Whilst Tom’s innocence is obvious to everyone (readers and characters alike), in this deeply racist society he stands no chance, despite the best efforts of his lawyer, Atticus. The mockingbird in the title is a reference to the innocent Tom Robinson – one Christmas Atticus gives the children air rifles and then says to them: ‘”I’d rather you shot at tin cans in the back yard, but I know you’ll go after birds. Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ’em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird“.’ Miss Maudie Atkinson, a neighbour who always has time for the children and whose compassionate views are similar to Atticus’s, elaborates further: ‘”Your father’s right… Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don’t eat up people’s gardens, don’t nest in corncribs, they don’t do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.”‘.
Despite the prejudiced and blinkered views of many people in the town, Maycomb is still a close and generous community. Atticus epitomises generosity in his ability to see the world through other people’s eyes, even when he does not agree with their views, an attitude that he tries to pass down to his children. As he tells Scout after she has clashed with her teacher on her first day at school: ‘” if you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you’ll get along better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.”‘
Whilst that ability to see situations from other perspectives is not one shared by many in Maycomb, generosity is still demonstrated in other ways. When Miss Maudie’s house catches fire one winter night, the community come to her aid: ‘The men of Maycomb, in all degrees of dress and undress, took furniture from Miss Maudie’s house to a yard across the street‘.
Food also provides an opportunity to show generosity. When one of Scout’s classmates, Walter Cunningham, who comes from a poor farming family, turns up on his first day at school with no lunch, Jem invites him to come home with them to eat. And when Scout protests at the amount of syrup that Walter pours over his meat and vegetables she is dragged into the kitchen by the housekeeper, Calpurnia, and reminded of the generous hospitality she should show: ‘”That boy’s yo’ comp’ny and if he wants to eat up the table cloth, you let him, you hear?“‘
Good and generous cooking also compensates for deficits in other areas. Atticus’s sister, the children’s Aunt Alexandra, is a formidable woman with little understanding of children, particularly of Scout: ‘Aunt Alexandra was fanatical on the subject of my attire. I could not possibly hope to be a lady if I wore breeches‘. However, as Scout notes when they go to stay with Aunt Alexandra and Uncle Jimmy for Christmas: ‘her cooking made up for everything: three kinds of meat, summer vegetables from her pantry shelves; peach pickles, two kinds of cake and ambrosia constituted a modest Christmas dinner’.
And Miss Maudie, as well as exhibiting generosity of compassion and understanding, is also generous (and talented) on the food front, particularly where cakes are concerned.
She is renowned for her Lane Cake – a layered sponge cake with a fruit and nut filling steeped in alcohol (traditionally Bourbon whiskey), the recipe for which is a closely-guarded secret. Scout describes a Lane Cake that Miss Maudie makes as a welcome gift to Aunt Alexandra when she comes to stay: ‘Miss Maudie Atkinson baked a Lane cake so loaded with shinny [strong liqueur] it made me tight [drunk].‘
And she bakes specifically for the children. Scout comments: ‘She made the best cakes in the neighbourhood. … every time she baked she made a big cake and three little ones, and she would call across the street: “Jem Finch, Scout Finch, Charles Baker Harris [Jem and Scout’s friend], come here!” Our promptness was always rewarded.‘ On another occasion when Scout goes round to talk to Miss Maudie, at the end of their conversation, Miss Maudie asks: ‘” How’d you like some fresh poundcake to take home?“‘ And Scout is in no doubt – ‘I liked it very much‘.
Pound cakes date back to the early 18th century and are thought to originate from Northern Europe. A recipe appeared in The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy by the English cook, Hannah Glasse, which was first published in 1747. The book was apparently very popular in America, and a recipe for pound cake is included in the first known US cookery book American Cookery published in 1796.
Pound cakes are so named because they are traditionally made with a pound in weight of each of the ingredients (of which there are only four): butter, sugar, flour and eggs. They are simple plain cakes, but with a delicious butteriness (particularly on the day of baking). Slices can also be toasted – and butter added – on subsequent days. You can also add other ingredients – cherries, lemon zest and juice – if you wish, but I like the traditional version.
Reasoning that using a pound of each of the ingredients would make too big a cake for any of my cake tins, I went for a half-pound option which was ideal for my loaf tin (and made enough for 8 slices).
(HALF) POUND CAKE
Ingredients:
250g unsalted butter (softened)
250g caster sugar
4 medium eggs (which should weigh approximately 250g), lightly beaten
245g plain flour + 1 teaspoon baking powder, sieved
Method:
Preheat the oven to 175C, 155C (fan) or Gas mark 4.
Beat together the butter and sugar in a large bowl until pale and creamy.
Add the eggs to the butter and sugar mixture in about four batches, beating thoroughly after each addition and adding 1 tablespoon of the flour mixture each time.
Fold the remaining flour into the mixture, stopping as soon as it is combined.
Spoon the cake mixture into a greased and lined loaf tin, and smooth the top with the back of the spoon.
Bake in the preheated oven for 60-70 minutes, until well-risen, dark gold in colour and a cake tester or skewer comes out clean. If the top is browning too quickly, cover with a piece of foil and continue to bake.
