Lee employs a repetitive story structure in three subplots to help illustrate the message that bad parenting can lead the children to be lonely. We see this message in the parent/child relationships of Dill and his parents, Boo and his father, and Mayella and Bob Ewell.
Dill's mother divorced his father, and he seems to see very little of his biological dad. His "new dad" and his mom leave him in Maycomb each summer with relatives and when they do spend time with him the rest of the year, it usually involves buying him things and letting him spend time on his own. He seems like a little boy desperate to be close to his own family. He is lonely boy because his parents simply don't care to spend much time with him.
Boo is described by Miss Maudie as being a very sweet boy when he was young, but then he pulled a childish prank and his father basically locked him up in the house. His father was also very religious, according to Miss Maudie, and this might have played a part in his reasoning for keeping Boo isolated. The result is that Boo never makes friends in town and is completely cut off from anyone his own age...anyone at all. He is desperate to reach out to Scout, Jem, and Dill through the knothole in the tree, as we see when he begins to leave them presents.
Mayella Ewell is also isolated from others in town as a result of her father, Bob Ewell, causing her to be incredibly lonely. She is physically, verbally, and probably sexually abused by Bob Ewell and is the default mother in the Ewell home, taking care of all of her younger siblings. Scout says at one point that "Mayella Ewell must have been the loneliest person in the world."
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