In describing Maycomb in this manner, Harper Lee captures the novel's historical era as well as its setting in the deep South. Maycomb, like the rest of the country, is mired in the Great Depression of the 1930s. There is no economic growth or development in Maycomb; there is no money to maintain or improve conditions in the stagnant little town:
In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square.
Daily life in Maycomb was slow, partly as a result of the oppressive Alabama heat; as Lee writes, "Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer's day . . . ." The slow pace, however, also resulted from the nature of the town--and the times--in general:
People moved slowly then. They ambled across the square, shuffled in and out of the stores around it, took their time about everything. A day was twenty-four hours long but seemed longer. There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County.
Maycomb just seems worn down and worn out at this time in its history, hanging on until better times arrived.
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