Examples Of Courage In To Kill A Mockingbird

Ainsley Schmidhausler
Ms. Deslauriers
English I Honors
November 1, 2013

Courage Against Prejudice
In the words of Elie Wiesel, “There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest ” (Brainyquote). In the 1930s, social and racial prejudices were prominent aspects of everyday life. People were stereotyped by gender, social class and economical status. Racism was a way of life for many, and standing up against it was unheard of. Many small towns in the south were cruel towards African Americans and treated them with no respect. The justice system was supposed to be the one place where every human was truly equal, but unfortunately, Negroes were still discriminated against.
Dubose shows courage in To Kill a Mockingbird because she contradicts the ways of society and is proactive in making the end of her life the best she could. This brave, elderly woman shows courage by conquering her morphine addiction when no one thought it was possible. When Jem destroyed her flowers after he was infuriated at her vulgar comment about Atticus, his punishment was to read to Mrs. Dubose everyday after school for two hours for a month. Each day a timer goes off, and each time Jem and Scout read to the frail, sick woman, the timer goes off later and later. Jem later finds out that this timer was how long she could go without a dose of painkiller, and as time went by she was getting stronger without it. "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. You rarely win, but sometimes you do. 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" (Lee 149). Mrs. Dubose was also courageous because she stood up for what she knew was right and even though it was challenging and painful, she overcame her adversity. She could have easily given up and left the world in pseudo bliss, but she showed unbelievable strength in accomplishing an extremely honorable attainment. “‘She said she was going
He shows courage by doing his very best to stand up and defend Tom Robinson, who was charged for rape and assault of a white woman, on account of her guilt and embarrassment of a poor decision. “‘.. well all I can say is, when you and Jem are grown, maybe you’ll look back on this with some compassion and some feeling that I didn’t let you down. 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… 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’” (Lee 139-140). Atticus is one of the bravest people in Maycomb, not only because he chose to defend Tom, but because he’s devoted to passing down honorable and wholesome virtues. He teaches his children to value everybody and that all men are created equal. This is against common belief in this time period, so it was extremely courageous to bring up his children with solid morals, but he knew it was the right thing to do. This conversation between Scout and her father shows how he taught her solid morals and had enough courage to teach his children the right thing to do and how to treat people. “‘You aren’t really a n*****- lover, then, are you?’