Atticus Finch Changes In To Kill A Mockingbird

As Atticus decides to defend Tom Robinson, who is a black man. Many citizens of Maycomb don't understand his choices for doing so. Atticus is questioned by Scout, she asks him “If you shouldn’t be defendin’ him, then why are you doing it?” Scout says that to Atticus because people from Scouts school have been telling her that defending a black man is a negative thing to do. By asking Atticus this, it shows that others see black people as lower class compared to others. As the majority of Maycomb see them that way, they don't understand why Atticus should and would defend them. Atticus sees the whole situation as him just “Simply defending a Negro,” because he sees everyone nas an equal which everyone else should too. As the citizens of Maycomb don't understand why Atticus is defending Tom, some finally start to see the trial just like Atticus. In chapter 15, a mob is called upon Atticus for defending Tom. It is led by Mr. Cunningham, who has a son named Walter, which Scout goes to school with. While the mob is after Atticus because of him defending Tom, Scout is able to stop the mob. She stops the mob by telling Mr. Cunningham about his son and how Atticus has helped their family, which then calms him down to see the mob isn't right. As Scout’s kindness towards Mr. Cunningham helps him decide to call off the mobs, it also helps him to see Atticus is a good person for defending and helping Tom Robinson because Atticus did the same towards him. Atticus’ choice to defend and help black people is hard to understand for many, butin the end it is important to realise why he choses to defend

Mockingbirds do not do anything but to make music for everyone to enjoy. In a society where people tend to discriminate another; mockingbirds represent the innocent ones who are being victimizes upon. Harper Lee’s novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, emphasizes the fact that lives are not always equal and also to remind people that it is a sin to accuse someone of a crime based on personal opinion. Everyone likes to gossip, and everyone likes to spread rumors for their own entertainment. For this reason, the town of Maycomb insists to degrade Atticus Finch because he chooses to defend Tom Robinson, an African American worker. Atticus symbolizes a mockingbird in multiple ways, including taking the blame for teaching his child, being a disgrace when trying to defend Tom, having difficulties, discipline Scout and Jem, and constantly

Atticus’ fairness also shows he is a good father because he believes that everyone deserves a chance to be understood and all have reasons for their actions. For example, after revealing the news to Jem and Scout of Tom’s death, he says, “Depends on how you look at it. What was one Negro, more or less, among two hundred of ‘em? He wasn’t Tom to them, he was an escaping prisoner” (Lee 235). This passage shows Atticus's fairness because he always tries to put himself in other people’s shoes in order to give everyone a chance at being understood, as he teaches Jem and Scout to do. He gave up his respectable reputation among many of the whites in Maycomb to defend Tom Robinson, and still speaks highly of the men who killed him. When he says this, he is trying to make the children see that the men who killed Tom did not know him as a person, but as a Negro who committed a crime, so cannot be discriminated upon for doing their job. Along with Atticus’ sense of fairness, his Teaching also characterizes him as a good father to Jem and Scout.

A town in itself has a personality like that of a living being. Its personality is a result of its past experiences, its occupants, and surrounding influences. These forces combine and act in a complicated way to move a city, like an organism, through growth and change. Significant forces such as the great depression influence attitudes, such as racism, toward others as individuals compete to survive. In To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee, Scout, the daughter of a lawyer by the name of Atticus Finch, tells the story of growing up in the small southern town of Maycomb, Alabama. Through her eyes, the reader discovers many of the struggles of the period faced by its inhabitants and resembled

In Maycomb County, Atticus Finch is not protected from social and legal codes, the town of Maycomb and close family of Atticus treat him with poor respect because of his choice to defend a black man. Atticus is thought for bringing disgrace to his family by the other white residents of Maycomb for protecting and supporting Tom Robinson. Sheriff Tate warns Atticus that there were men who were angry about Atticus representing Tom. To extend, Scout experiences a lynch mob ( a band of people who want to

It's a sin to kill a mockingbird because they don't do anything to hurt people; they only help farmers out and sing beautiful songs. To Kill a Mockingbird is about a little girl named Scout who sees her town as a beautiful place where nothing unpleasant happens until accusations of rape occur. Then she realizes how racist and negative her town people can be. This occurs when her dad defends an innocent African American man. She realizes that Macomb has deplorable individuals living there, and this reality hit her hard. Atticus Finch, Tom Robinson, and Boo Radley are metaphorically portrayed as mockingbirds.

"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."Jem has changed from a childish little boy to a 12 year old young adult and is able to make smart decisions.

Atticus, however, was a brave Christian man with moral values. He was polite and humble, and saw everyone as equals. Scout said of her father, “It was times like these when I thought my father, who hated guns and had never been to any wars, was the bravest man who ever lived.”Atticus shows that he is above the people of Maycomb when he took Tom Robinson’s case, rather than sharing their racist feelings. However, he still respected their choice; “They're certainly entitled to think that, and they're entitled to full respect for their opinions... but before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.” Even when he and his family were deemed as outcasts, he didn’t drop his case. He discouraged his

“‘Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit'em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird”’(Lee 90). Atticus Finch tells his children it would be a sin to kill a mockingbird because the act would be taking away the purity or life of something so innocent. In Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, Lee uses an extended metaphor to reveal the theme of not everyone is as they seem, by comparing Boo Radley, Tom Robinson and Atticus Finch to mockingbirds.

Atticus Finch father of two children, always stood up for what was right in his beliefs. For example, Atticus explained to Scout that she could not hate Hitler for what he has done. Atticus never harmed anyone, which mockingbirds also do Also, after the he defended Tom Robinson, and many disliked him for it, Atticus was still elected a state legislature in his town because of his good values. . "'But it's okay to hate Hitler?' 'It is not,' he said. 'It's not okay to hate anybody.'" (246) Atticus describes to his daughter that it is not right to hate anyone even if they had done anything as terrible as Hitler would have had done. Mockingbirds also do not give any hate on anyone."'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.'" (90) Neither Atticus nor a mockingbird would intentionally hurt someone nor something. When Atticus does not show hatred, he resembles a mockingbird. Atticus was also emotionally damaged. After Tom's trial, Atticus was emotionally hurt, because an innocent black man was charged guilty. Also, when Bob Ewell was embarrassed about an event that happened upon Atticus in the trial, Bob targeted Atticus' children. Wile his children were being targeted, Mr. Finch was emotionally damaged that an event about him, affected his loved ones. "...'It's not time to worry yet.' "(213) Atticus explain when the children ask about the night before when Tom was declared guilty. Atticus explains that the case was not over yet, because of the amount of time the judge was kept when deciding the fate of the defendant. Knowing he was cheated out of the case because of the defendants' race, Atticus produced emotional damage. The actions of Atticus Finch did not only affect him, but the people around him. When Atticus lost the trial, Bob

For the most part, what Atticus believes can be boiled down to a single simple phrase. “I do my best to love everybody” (Lee 144). Unlike most citizens in the community of Maycomb who are racist and obsessed with social status or position, Atticus looks at everyone as an individual- a human being- even those outcast by the members of their own society (including, but not limited to, Boo Radley, the blacks, and poor of the community). He tries to see the good in everyone and is dedicated to making his children have the same perspective he has. In every sense of the word, Atticus Finch is a wise and kind man, one who doesn’t cause the reader of To Kill a Mockingbird to question his actions, intents, or motivations. In the novel, Atticus makes a very powerful statement that shows his position about racial hatred, and his view of the case, regardless of what the rest of the county thinks about him. “This is a truth that applies to the human race and to no particular race of men” (Lee 273). Atticus’s understanding of equality allows him to really see clearly that the case of Tom Robinson has been motivated by racial hatred/discrimination. In general, as a lawyer, he is as much as he is a father- focused on justice, equality, and imbued with the special talent of seeing from a multitude of angles in every situation. Atticus is a man who has a firm belief in racial equality and

The people we surround ourselves with will eventually greatly influence how we develop and change over time. In Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird we follow a young girl named Jean Louise Finch or commonly known as Scout. As she goes through life she comes across many events that will being to shape how her character will turn out to be. Her moral decisions and reactions to the controversial events that occur, play a big role in the way she develops as a person.

However, Tom Robinson is not the only mockingbird in the story. Boo Radley is another harmless creature who falls victim of cruelty. He is unjustly regarded as an evil person and used as the scapegoat for all the bad happenings around town. Women are afraid of him and so are children. When the sheriff decided that he would not arrest Boo Radley for killing Bob Ewell and that would present his death as an accident, Atticus asked Scout if she understood the meaning of this decision. Scout replied that she did. Her exact words were: "Well, it'd be sort of like shootin' a mockingbird, wouldn't it?" (282). Boo here is also compared to the gentle bird and again it would be a 'sin' to punish him. The symbol of the mockingbird can be applied to Boo Radley from another point of view as well. The mockingbird has no song of its own. It just imitates other birds. Therefore it makes itself present and is seen through other birds. In the same way, Boo Radley is seen through the eyes of other people. He does not have a character of his own. What the reader knows about him is what other people say. He is believed to " dine on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, his hands were

To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. In the seemingly monotonous town of Maycomb County a certain family's lives will be altered forever. Atticus Finch, a lawyer of Maycomb County, and a father to two. Jean Louise Finch, also known as Scout, is the daughter of Atticus, who may need to dress more ladylike, at least according to her aunt Alexandra and, Jem Finch, her brother, an adventurous boy going through “changes in his mind and body.” Everything was going great, or at least normal, until Atticus got a case where he had to defend a colored man named Tom Robinson. While explaining to Scout why he was defending Tom he said; “Scout, simply by the nature of the work, every lawyer gets at least one case in his lifetime, that affects him personally.” This case affected him personally, because by him defending a colored man, he must show how he feels towards them, as in does he think they’re equal? Does he have sympathy for them? Or does he think of them as many others seen them at that time, as in trash and not humans. He does not just have to show the court justices, but the entire town how he feels towards them.

Prejudice within the white community is another theme that is explored in the novel. In the novel the member of the white community being singled out is Boo Radley. Boo Radley is singled out by almost everyone in the white community including Scout. Scout singling out Boo is important because it is part of the novels narrative which is that the events are seen from the innocent, non biased point of view (Scout). The innocence of scout is made apparent when she says “I think there’s just one kind of folks” which is her unknowingly occurring the values that Atticus has installed in her. This links to the characterisation of racial divide which is an important feature of the novel. Also as aforementioned this is an example of Scout subconsciously portraying her innocent personality. The quote “when they finally saw him, why he hadn’t done any of those things...” , “Atticus he was real nice” Is again an example of Scouts innocence.