To Kill A Mockingbird: Courage is perseverance
Anna Quindlen, an American author, once said, “Acts of bravery don’t always take place on battlefields. They can take place in your heart, when you have the courage to honor your character, your intellect, your inclinations, your soul by listening to its clean, clear voice...” There is no one form of courage. Courage is doing something when you know you might fail. This is exactly what Atticus Finch, one of the main characters of Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, tries to teach his son. The book is about Jean Louise Finch, Atticus’s daughter, discussing the circumstances involving her father and his legal defense of Tom Robinson. Tom was a local black man falsely accused of raping a white woman. …show more content…
Harper Lee's characterizes Mrs. Dubose as an unpleasant old woman who takes out her unhappiness on the children. This sets the readers against her from her introduction, and it only gets worse when she says terrible things about Atticus. However, in Chapter 11, Atticus returns from Mrs. Dubose's and tells Jem of her passing. Atticus also reveals that Mrs. Dubose had an addiction to morphine and how it has caused her to become sick. She only had a few months to live so she wanted to break her morphine habit with the help of Jem’s reading before she died. Atticus says, “‘She had her own view about things, a lot different from mine...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... Mrs. Dubose won, all ninety-eight pounds of her. According to her views, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew.’”(112). Mrs.Dubose was very sick and in pain, but instead of giving in and taking morphine to dull her pain, she faced it in order to die free of her addiction. It takes a great amount of self-confidence to be able to recognize that you have a flaw and even more to do something about it. She shows us how courage is something that anyone can achieve with willpower and self confidence. This situation also shows us how even though Atticus might not approve of Mrs.Dubose’s beliefs, he wants to show his children the true meaning of bravery and
Anna Quindlen, an American author, once said, “Acts of bravery don’t always take place on battlefields. They can take place in your heart, when you have the courage to honor your character, your intellect, your inclinations, your soul by listening to its clean, clear voice...” There is no one form of courage. Courage is doing something when you know you might fail. This is exactly what Atticus Finch, one of the main characters of Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird, tries to teach his son. The book is about Jean Louise Finch, Atticus’s daughter, discussing the circumstances involving her father and his legal defense of Tom Robinson. Tom was a local black man falsely accused of raping a white woman. …show more content…
Harper Lee's characterizes Mrs. Dubose as an unpleasant old woman who takes out her unhappiness on the children. This sets the readers against her from her introduction, and it only gets worse when she says terrible things about Atticus. However, in Chapter 11, Atticus returns from Mrs. Dubose's and tells Jem of her passing. Atticus also reveals that Mrs. Dubose had an addiction to morphine and how it has caused her to become sick. She only had a few months to live so she wanted to break her morphine habit with the help of Jem’s reading before she died. Atticus says, “‘She had her own view about things, a lot different from mine...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... Mrs. Dubose won, all ninety-eight pounds of her. According to her views, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew.’”(112). Mrs.Dubose was very sick and in pain, but instead of giving in and taking morphine to dull her pain, she faced it in order to die free of her addiction. It takes a great amount of self-confidence to be able to recognize that you have a flaw and even more to do something about it. She shows us how courage is something that anyone can achieve with willpower and self confidence. This situation also shows us how even though Atticus might not approve of Mrs.Dubose’s beliefs, he wants to show his children the true meaning of bravery and