May 21, 2010

I recently saw To Kill A Mockingbird at the Hale Center Theater in Orem. It was an excellent play, and I was inspired to re-read the book, which I haven’t read since I was a kid.

Following in the footsteps of my friend Matt, who regularly posts unique words, as well as favorite quotes, from books he reads, I decided to do something similar with Mockingbird.

Here are some quotes that I really liked:

“Grandma says all men should learn to cook, that men oughta be careful with their wives and wait on ‘em when they don’t feel good” – cousin Francis to Scout (93)

“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.” – Atticus to Scout (120)

“Its never an insult to be called what somebody thinks is a bad name. It just shows you how poor that person is, it doesn’t hurt you.” – Atticus to Scout (124)

“I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what.” – Atticus to Jem in regards to Mrs. Dubose (128)

I liked this quote on Dill – I feel like this is the definition of love.

“Summer came and Dill was not there…The fact that I had a permanent fiancé was little compensation for his absence: I had never thought about it, but summer was Dill by the fishpool smoking string, Dill’s eyes alive with complicated plans to make Boo Radley emerge; summer was the swiftness with which Dill would reach up and kiss me when Jem was not looking, the longings we sometimes felt each other feel. With him, life was routine; without him, life was unbearable.” – Scout, narrating (132)

More:

“One must lie under certain circumstances and at all times when one can’t do anything about them.” – Scout, narrating (146)

“In Maycomb, if one went for a walk with no definite purpose in mind, it was correct to believe one’s mind incapable of definite purpose.” – Scout, narrating (169)

I really liked Scout & Jem’s debate on different types of people. Jem is trying to figure out what Aunt Alexandra means when she says a family has ‘background’. He comes to the conclusion that there are four types of people, some with and some without ‘background’. Scout concludes differently:

“Naw, Jem, I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.”
Jem turned around and punched his pillow…He was silent for a while.
“That’s what I thought, too,” he said at last, “when I was your age. If there’s just one kind of folks, why can’t they get along with each other? If they’re all alike, why do they go out of their way to despise each other?” (259)

Miss Maudie explaining to Aunt Alexandra about how much of the town feels about what Atticus did for them in defending Tom Robinson:

“Whether Maycomb knows it or not, we’re paying the highest tribute we can pay a man. We trust him to do right. It’s that simple.”
“Who?” [asked] Aunt Alexandra.
“The handful of people in this town who say that fair play is not marked White Only; the handful of people who say a fair trial is for everybody, not just us; the handful of people with enough humility to think, when they look at a Negro, there but for the Lord’s kindness am I…The handful of people in this town with background, that’s who they are.” (269-270)

Scout asking Atticus about Hitler:

“But it’s okay to hate Hitler?”
“It is not,” he said. “It’s not okay to hate anybody.” (282)

More:

“I thought Jem and I would get grown but there wasn’t much else left for us to learn, except possibly algebra.” – Scout, narrating, near the end of the book, after spending some time in Boo Radley’s shoes (321)

“Atticus, he was real nice…”
“Most people are, Scout, when you finally see them.” -Atticus and Scout at the end of the book (323)

Harper Lee is generous in her use of interesting vocabulary, which enriched the book, as well as increased its educational potential. Here are my words:

obstreperous, trousseau, philippic, inderdict, palliation, calomel, asafoetida, a roto-gravure print, amanuensis, elucidate, champertous connivance

I genuinely enjoyed the book – I got so much more out of it this time than I did when I was a kid. If you haven’t re-read it yourself in a while, this summer might be the perfect time!

book review, Life

next post: « UTA Bike to Work Day previous post: Modern Family »