Atticus - a Roman of great culture living in Athens, known for his tolerance.

 

Scout:"He liked Maycomb...he knew his people, they knew him...Atticus was related by blood and marriage to nearly every family in the town"

 

Atticus: ""You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view...until you climb into his skin and walk around in it"

 

Miss Maudie: "Atticus Finch is the same in his house as he is on the public streets." 46

 

Atticus: "So if spitting in my face and threatening me saved Mayella Ewell one extra beating, that's something I'll gladly take. He had to take it out on somebody and I'd rather it be me than that houseful of children out there." 211

 

Reverend Sykes: "Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passin'." 211

 

Atticus: "This case, Tom Robinson's case, is something that goes to the essence of a man's conscience-Scout, I couldn't go to church and worship God if I didn't try to help that man." 104

 

Atticus: "Every lawyer gets at least one case in his lifetime that affects him personally...Try fighting with your head for a change..."

 

Atticus: "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." 112

 

 

Atticus - write all of these in paragraph form

 

Age, appearance, profession, position in the community

 

Character traits: strengths, weaknesses

 

How others regard him: who agrees and disagrees with him and why?

 

Important Actions or comments of his that drive the story

 

 

 

Atticus is old “he was feeble: he was nearly fifty”. In Maycomb County he was a well respected man. His family had been living in the county for generations and their name meant something – in fact later we learn that Atticus thinks that it is all the family had “all we’ve got’s background and not a dime to our names”. He is a single father who is doing his best to bring up his daughter and son, whilst trying to teach them ethics and a strict moral code by which they can conduct themselves.

Atticus’s strength is that he is able to be non -discriminatory and see that people don’t always do horrible things because they are bad but because it is essentially human nature…

 

 

 

 

ALI 

 

Atticus is portrayed in the book as a wise man, respected by most in the community. He is fifty years of age and a lawyer, but because of the little income in Maycomb Atticus is not the riches for a job of such status. Atticus is the father of Jem and Scout, who admire Atticus and learn a lot from their father. He is their main teacher and is a very good role-model. For Scout, Atticus teaches her to read and, because of ehr young and tender age, teaches her life lessons like not fighting with fists and not to discriminate against people. For Jem, Atticus is God. Throughout the book Jem's perspective on his father changes but he is always looking up to him and uses his father as an example to why you should do things "I'm a gentleman just like Atticus".

 

 

Atticus has many strengths, as well as weaknesses. It seems like he struggles with parenting. He doesn't treat Jem and Scout like other parents treat their children; he talks to them like they're adults and whne they as difficult questions like "what's a nigger lover" and/ or "what's rape" he will tell them the truth whether the answer is edited or not. These parenting methods are debatable about whether they are a strength or a weakness. But I believe that Atticus is a "satisfactory" father and his ways of dealing with his children, in the long run, work.

 

 

Other folk in the community regard Atticus as a well mannered, kind and caring citizen. Although after word gets around that he's defending a black man, many of the residents at Maycomb tend to talk about him behind his back and abuse him for what he is doing. However, we know that he is the only person in the town who could have defended a black man and got the jury and community thinking about his innocence.

 

 

DENNIS

Atticus is regarded by his family and close friends as an honest man who is the same in the house as he is on the public streets. Atticus's children agree with the things he does and the reasons he does them. The town's people of Maycomb County disagree with Atticus's actions, they regard him as a "Nigger Lover because he defends a negro. They think it is demoralising to defend a coloured person against a white person.

 

"If you shouldn't be defending him why are you?" - Scout

"For a number of reasons, the main one, if I don't i couldn't hold my head up in town" - Atticus

 

Atticus couldn't live with himself for discriminating against a coloured person because of his race. Atticus Finch is a very respectable man and he doesn't let people push him around. He stands up on his own two feet and lives the way he wants to live. He doesn't let things people say get to him. "This case, Tom Robinson's case is something that goes to the essence of a man's conscience - Scout I couldn't go to church and worship God iif I didn't try to help that man" - this shows Scout that it is a discrace to discriminate against people for their colour or race.

 

One error of judgement made by Atticus is not believing that Bob Ewell would do what he threatened to do. Because of Atticus' traits he believed Bob only needed to let off some steam and that they "dont have anything to fear from Bob ewell. He got it all out of his system that morning". Unfortunately Bob Ewell does go through with his threats and tries to kill Scout and Jem.

 

JESS

Atticus is a lot older than a lot of the men in Maycomb, and this embarrasses his
children. But because of his age, he is very well respected in the small town, and a
lot of people put their trust in him and turn to him in times of doubt or trouble.
He is a lawyer, and this was upsetting for his family because he was the only Finch
to stray away from the Finch cotton farming. Jean Louise (Scout) and Jem respect
Atticus because he always seems to be full of helpful advice for the children and
knows right from wrong. He practices the ethic of sympathy and understanding that he
preaches to them and never holds a grudge against the people of Maycomb, although
they do turn on him. 

Character traits: strengths and weaknesses.

As one of the most prominent citizens in Maycomb during the Great Depression,
Atticus is relatively well off in a time of widespread poverty. Yet he does not let
it go to his head. Atticus has weaknesses in the way he treats people. Like when the
people of Maycomb turn on him, he trusts in them that they would come back to him.
Although it happens, this could be considered a weakness as they could have not come
back to him and he would have been not the same moral backbone as he once was.
Strengths? He has many of them. Weakness could also be strength, and also that he is
such a good father to Scout and Jem to show that he can practice what he preaches,
and this is how he teaches it to them. We see this throughout the novel, so know it
is this way.

How others regard him: who agrees and disagrees with him and why.

Everyone in the town regards him as some sort of hero, and they follow him like
sheep until he agrees to defend Tom Robinson in the case of a black man supposedly
raping a white girl. The town is hugely racial and although Atticus proves that this
doesn't happen, Tom is still proven guilty and sentenced. In these days, people were
very prejudice about race and social standing. And because black people were way
down the bottom of the 'Social Ladder' and Atticus defended a black man, this caused
uproar in the town. Because of this, the Maycombians turned on him. At the end of
the novel, they forget about it and worship him again, but it still isn't the same.

Important actions or comments of his that drive the story.

Atticus taking on the Tom Robinson case was an extremely important action because if
he hadn't, there wouldn't have been much of a story line to follow, as the whole
story is about the Great Depression and The Scottsboro Trials (The case where 5
black men 'supposedly' raped 2 white girls - this was proven untrue but the boys
were tried and convicted anyway. The girls ended up being prostitutes.)

Any errors of judgement made by him.

Taking on the Tom Robinson case may have been an error in judgement because it
turned the town against him and nearly got his children killed by Bob Ewell.