Atticus Finch is in many ways the pivotal character of To Kill a Mockingbird. Although Scout narrates, Atticus is the person who drives the story forward, giving the story multidimensional color. On the most superficial dimension, Atticus defends a man falsely accused in the courtroom, and cares for the needs of his family after he dies in an escape attempt. At another dimension, he wins the respect of his children by doing so. Even deeper, we see that he also started to soften peoples’ hearts to the plight of the black people in the community, and won the admiration of the black community. The actions of Atticus Finch show him to be a sympathetic, sensitive, and conscientious man. It is clear throughout To Kill a Mockingbird that Mr. Finch strives to be sympathetic to the experiences of other people. One particularly poignant scene occurs when he tries to inculcate the same quality in his daughter, Scout. “You never really understand a person until you see things from his point of view…until you climb in his skin and walk around in it;” he explained to her. Atticus is both sympathetic to the Ewells and yet, out …show more content…
Finch is an extremely conscientious worker. In the early chapters of the book, a cartoon appeared in the newspaper of Maysville showing that he was willing to work on the dry necessities and leave off frivolities. Further, he went well out of the comfort zone of most attorneys in pouring effort into defending a case that he was sure to lose. He also went above and beyond the call of duty when he notified Helen Robinson that her husband had died. When an official letter would have sufficed, he brought the news personally, and brought Cal along as well, making sure that the news would be broken gently. Also, he sat up at night in front of the Maycomb county jail, making sure no harm would come to his state assigned client. Few state-appointed attorneys would have done likewise. It is a self-evident fact that conscientious labor defines Atticus