Harper Lee

Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.

Best way to clear the air is to have it all out in the open.

Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win.

Things are never as bad as they seem.

Daylight, in my mind, the night faded.

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.

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 see it through no matter what.

The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.

Real courage is when you know you’re licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.

Prejudice, a dirty word, and faith, a clean one, have something in common: they both begin where reason ends.

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.

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.

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.

Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit ’em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.