“It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare,” said Mark Twain. The novel To Kill a Mockingbird is a coming of age story about two young children, Jem and Scout Finch, growing up in Alabama in the 1930s and learning what real courage is through their father, Atticus, and the people of Maycomb. They learn to see the world from other points of view, which is also how they express empathy towards others, persevering and standing up for what you believe in, and putting yourself in danger to help others.
One message that Harper Lee provides us with is that courage is when you persevere to do something even when it gets more difficult. Atticus believes that Mrs. Dubose is the bravest person he ever
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Everyone in the town, not just Atticus, think that Tom Robinson has courage trying to escape from prison. Mayella and her father lie about the night of _____, and the jury couldn’t see past the fact that Tom was a black man, so they threw him into jail under false pretences. “Tom’s dead. The guards told him to stop. They fired a few shots in the air, then to kill. They got him as he went over the fence. They said if he’s had two good arms he’d have made it, he was moving that fast. Seventeen bullet holes in him” (235). It was very unnecessary to kill him because he wasn’t trying to harm anyone, but the guards saw him as a prisoner trying to escape, not Tom Robinson.You should stand up for what you believe even if other people think that it isn’t the right decision. Tom believed that he deserved to be free because and he didn’t deserve to be treated with such indecency. If he had gotten away and they captured him again, he would have gotten worse punishment because him escaping meant that he was guilty, in the white man's eye. Tom was a scapegoat because he was blamed for a crime that he didn’t commit which was beating and raping Mayella Ewell. It was actually Mayella’s father, Bob, that beat her up after he caught her trying to get intimate with Tom. Atticus is not only standing up for what he believes in when he takes Tom Robinson’s case, but he is also standing up for his family. He is a kind man that doesn’t believe in using violence and believes that everyone should be treated equally. That is another reason why he chose to defend Tom Robinson. Atticus thought that Tom deserved a fair trial, and even though he knew that they probably weren’t going to win the case, he wanted to try for the sake of Tom and his family. “‘If you shouldn’t be defendin’ him, then why are you doin’ it?’ ‘For a number of reasons,’ said Atticus. ‘The main one is, if I didn’t I couldn’t