To Kill A Mockingbird: 50 Unforgettable Quotes on Human Morality
Mockingbirds are known for their skillful ability to mimic not only the calls of other birds and animals, but also to reproduce diverse sounds such as whistled phrases or squeaking gates. In this poignant tale of innocence victimized by wickedness, prejudice and hypocrisy, the “mockingbird” represents innocence, hence these To Kill a Mockingbird quotes are a reference to it as the phrase itself is a metaphor for destroying innocence.
Published in 1960, “To Kill a Mockingbird” is a novel by Harper Lee. A Pulitzer Prize winner and one of America’s best loved novels, it is a masterpiece of American literature and a must read in school syllabuses all over the world. The book has been translated in some 40 languages, with numerous adaptations for screen and arts.
Set in a small, sleepy town, in the Depression-era segregated South, the story is about a very ethical lawyer, Atticus Finch, who despite threats from his community, defended a black local falsely charged with the rape of a white girl. The plot of Mockingbird explores the themes of racial inequality, prejudice and injustice in the American South during Jim Crow laws, a body of state and local statutes that legitimized racial segregation in the former Confederate states and existed from the post-Civil War era up to 1965.
Touching and enduring, Mockingbird left a lasting impact on American culture with its moral lessons being still relevant today. In an intolerant and broken society, poisoned with the vitriol of injustice, ignorance and poverty, Mockingbird was the catalyst that pricked the prejudice and hypocrisy, inspiring people to embrace civil rights, justice and morality, and paved the way for the civil reforms that followed.
Here we have curated for you the most inspirational quotes from this eye-opening book in order to ignite purpose. Share them with your friends and loved ones to motivate them. Ruminate upon them to open your mind and reframe your perspective for a better life!
Table of Contents
- To Kill A Mockingbird Atticus Quotes to Inspire You Stand Up against Racism
- To Kill A Mockingbird Scout Quotes on a Young Girl’s Perspective
- To Kill A Mockingbird Jem Quotes on Goodness and Honesty
- Famous To Kill A Mockingbird Quotes
- Short To Kill A Mockingbird Quotes on Big/Major Truths
To Kill A Mockingbird Atticus Quotes to Inspire You Stand Up against Racism
Atticus’s fictional character represents a kind, wise and serene man who fights for justice and opposes systemic racism, following the path of his conscience against the traditional beliefs of his community. We have collected for you the most important of his sayings to draw inspiration and courage.
- Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Best way to clear the air is to have it all out in the open. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- You just hold your head high and keep those fists down. No matter what anybody says to you, don’t you let ‘em get your goat. Try fighting with your head for a change. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- It’s 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Bad language is a stage all children go through, and it dies with time when they learn they’re not attracting attention with it. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Before Jem looks at anyone else he looks at me, and I’ve tried to live so I can look squarely back at him. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Are you proud of yourself tonight that you have insulted a total stranger whose circumstances you know nothing about? Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- This time we aren’t fighting the Yankees, we’re fighting our friends. But remember this, no matter how bitter things get, they’re still our friends and this is still our home. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don’t you forget it – whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, that white man is trash. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- But there is one way in this country in which all men are created equal- there is one human institution that makes a pauper the equal of a Rockefeller, the stupid man the equal of an Einstein, and the ignorant man the equal of any college president. That institution, gentlemen, is a court. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
To Kill A Mockingbird Scout Quotes on a Young Girl’s Perspective
Through the voice of his young heroine Harper Lee makes unexpected and uncomfortable questions on societal norms, adding his criticism on gender discrimination to the anti-racist message of his book.
- Atticus told me to delete the adjectives and I’d have the facts. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- I was born good but had grown progressively worse every year. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- I just don’t like my world disturbed without some warning. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- I learned nothing from you except how to be suspicious. I didn’t know what hate was until I lived among you and saw you hating every day. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- I was taught never to take advantage of anyone who was less fortunate than myself, whether he be less fortunate in brains, wealth, or social position; it meant anybody, not just Negroes. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- She must now go into a word of femininity, a world she despised, could not comprehend nor defend herself against, a world that did not want her. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Atticus had said it was the polite thing to talk to people about what they were interested in, not about what you were interested in. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- She did not stand alone, but what stood behind her, the most potent moral force in her life, was the love of her father. She never questioned it, never thought about it, never even realized … that whatever was decent and of good report in her character was put there by her father; she did not know that she worshiped him. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
To Kill A Mockingbird Jem Quotes on Goodness and Honesty
Having his father Atticus as his role model, Jem grows to become a courageous and honest young boy that shows empathy and love to his family. His childhood innocence and his trust to the world is shocked by people’s racial prejudice and dishonesty.
- You can choose your friends but you sho’ can’t choose your family, an’ they’re still kin to you no matter whether you acknowledge ’em or not, and it makes you look right silly when you don’t. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- 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? Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- You can’t run three hundred miles off without your mother knowin’. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Don’t see how any jury could convict on what we heard. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Atticus ain’t ever whipped me since I can remember. I want to keep it that way. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
Famous To Kill A Mockingbird Quotes
Here are the most important and well-known quotes from Harper Lee’s amazing book.
- 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. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- When a child asks you something, answer him, for goodness sake. But don’t make a production of it. Children are children, but they can spot an evasion faster than adults, and evasion simply muddles ’em. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Sometimes the Bible in the hand of one man is worse than a whisky bottle in the hand of (another)… There are just some kind of men who – who’re so busy worrying about the next world they’ve never learned to live in this one, and you can look down the street and see the results. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- There are some men in this world who are born to do our unpleasant jobs for us. Your father’s one of them. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
Short To Kill A Mockingbird Quotes on Big/Major Truths
Each of these quotes sends a powerful message in just a few words.
- I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- People in their right minds never take pride in their talents. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Things are never as bad as they seem. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- People generally see what they look for, and hear what they listen for. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- “Atticus, he was real nice…” “Most people are, Scout, when you finally see them”. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- I’m little but I’m old. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- This case is as simple as black and white. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Pass the damn ham, please. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Things are always better in the morning. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- They did the best they could with the sense they had. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- With him, life was routine; without him, life was unbearable. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- We’re paying the highest tribute you can pay a man. We trust him to do right. It’s that simple. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- There’s a lot of ugly things in this world, son. I wish I could keep ’em all away from you. That’s never possible. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- That boy is your company. And if he wants to eat up that tablecloth, you let him, you hear? Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
- Ladies in bunches always filled me with vague apprehension and a firm desire to be elsewhere. Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
“To Kill a Mockingbird” is not just a benchmark in American literature, but a moral compass and a character shaper. It is an inspirational tale of one man’s struggle for justice. A story of human morality and empathy, teaching us that when we can empathize and embrace the differences of others we can eliminate prejudice and injustice. Atticus Finch, the story’s main character, is a role model that inspires us to seek justice and morality in everything we do for a fair and equal world.
To quote Atticus’s words “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”.
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