Maycomb's Quotes

#1. The jail was Maycomb's only conversation piece: its detractors said it looked like a Victorian privy; its supporters said it gave the town a good solid respectable look, and no stranger would ever suspect that it was full of niggers. As

Harper Lee

#2. Colonel Maycomb's misplaced self-confidence and slender sense of direction brought disaster to all who rode with him in the Creek Indian Wars.

Harper Lee

#3. It's like bein' a caterpillar in a cocoon, that's what it is ... Like somethin' asleep wrapped up in a warm place. I always thought Maycomb folks were the best folks in the world, least that's what they seemed like

Harper Lee

#4. There was also a phrase for him: pick at random any citizen from Maycomb County and its environs, ask him what he thought of Atticus Finch, and the answer would most likely be, "I never had a better friend." Atticus

Harper Lee

#5. In Maycomb, if one went for a walk with no definite purpose in mind, it was correct to believe one's mind incapable of definite purpose.

Harper Lee

#6. It might be because he knows in his heart that very few people in Maycomb really believed his and Mayella's yarns. He thought he'd be a hero, but all he got for his pain was ... was, okay, we'll convict this Negro but get back to your dump.

Harper Lee

#7. I didn't go overseas, but I saw a lot of this country. I didn't have the itch to get back, so after the war I stayed away for ten years, but the longer I stayed away the more I missed Maycomb. I got to the point where I felt like I had to come back or die. You never get it out of your bones.

Harper Lee

#8. His first two clients were the last two persons hanged in the Maycomb County jail. Atticus had urged them to accept the state's generosity in allowing them to plead Guilty to second-degree murder and escape with their lives, but they were Haverfords, in Maycomb County a name synonymous with jackass.

Harper Lee

#9. I just know Maycomb. I'm not in the least sensitive about it, but good Lord, I'm certainly aware of it.

Harper Lee

#10. I may not be much, Mr. Finch, but I'm still sheriff of Maycomb County, and Bob Ewell fell on his knife.

Harper Lee

#11. The Radleys, welcome anywhere in town, kept to themselves, a predilection unforgivable in Maycomb. They

Harper Lee

#12. What on earth could Ewell do to me, sister?" "Something furtive," Aunt Alexandra said. "You may count on that." "Nobody has much chance to be furtive in Maycomb," Atticus answered.

Harper Lee

#13. She looked at Maycomb, and her throat tightened: Maycomb was looking back at her.

Harper Lee

#14. Didn't you know? Hasn't Atticus gotten around to telling you that? Why, I'm amazed at Zandra not . . . good heavens, I thought all of Maycomb knew that." "Knew what?" "I was in love with your mother." "My mother?

Harper Lee

#15. Atticus said professional people were poor because the farmers were poor. As Maycomb County was farm country, nickels and dimes were hard to come by for doctors and dentists and lawyers.

Harper Lee

#16. Integrity, humor and patience were the three words for Atticus Finch. There was also a phrase for him: pick at random any citizen from Maycomb County and its environs, and ask him what he thought of Atticus Finch, and the answer would most likely be, I never had a better friend.

Harper Lee

#17. For a while' in Maycomb meant anything from three days to thirty years.

Harper Lee

#18. You're gonna see change, you're gonna see Maycomb change its face completely in our lifetime. Your trouble, now, you want to have your cake and eat it: you want to stop the clock, but you can't.

Harper Lee

#19. I'll never forgive you for what you did to me. You cheated me, you've driven me out of my home and now I'm in a no-man's-land but good - there's no place for me any more in Maycomb, and I'll never be entirely at home anywhere else. Her

Harper Lee

#20. Atticus took his career in his hands, made good use of a careless indictment, took his stand before a jury, and accomplished what was never before or afterwards done in Maycomb County: he won an acquittal for a colored boy on a rape charge. The chief witness for the prosecution was a white girl.

Harper Lee

#21. The southern edge of town. Tim was a liver-colored bird dog, the pet of Maycomb. "What's he doing?" "I don't know, Scout. We better go home.

Harper Lee

#22. There was no finer young man, said the people of Maycomb, than Henry Clinton. Jean Louise agreed.

Harper Lee

#23. Below her, on rough benches, sat not only most of the trash in Maycomb County, but the county's most respectable men.

Harper Lee

#24. When she dressed, she put on her Maycomb clothes: gray slacks, a black sleeveless blouse, white socks, and loafers. Although it was four hours away, she could hear her aunt's sniff of disapproval." (Chapter 1)

Harper Lee

#25. (When Alabama seceded from the Union on January 11, 1861, Winston County seceded from Alabama, and every child in Maycomb County knew it.) North Alabama was full of Liquor Interests, Big Mules, steel companies, Republicans, professors, and other persons of no background.

Harper Lee

#26. I thought she was going to spit in it, which was the only reason anybody in Maycomb held out his hand: it was a time-honored method of sealing oral contracts. Wondering what bargain we had made, I turned to the class for an answer, but the class looked back at me in puzzlement.

Harper Lee

#27. Atticus had urged them to accept the state's generosity in allowing them to plead Guilty to second-degree murder and escape with their lives, but they were Haverfords, in Maycomb County a name synonymous with

Harper Lee

#28. While" in Maycomb meant anything from three days to thirty years. Jem and I exchanged glances. "Jem's growing

Harper Lee

#29. Until comparatively recently in its history, Maycomb County was so cut off from the rest of the nation that some of its citizens, unaware of the South's political predilections over the past ninety years, still voted Republican.

Harper Lee

#30. Well, your father and I decided it was time I came to stay with you for a while." "For a while" in Maycomb meant anything from three days to thirty years. Jem and I exchanged glances. "Jem's

Harper Lee

#31. As I inched sluggishly along the treadmill of the Maycomb County School system, I could not help receiving the impression that I was being cheated out of something. Out of what I knew not, yet I did not believe that twelve years of unrelieved boredom was exactly what the state had in mind for me.

Harper Lee