Quote

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

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Harper Lee
Age: 89 †
Born: 1926
Born: April 28
Died: 2016
Died: February 19
Musician
Novelist
Poet Lawyer
Prosaist
Screenwriter
Writer
Monroeville
Alabama
Nelle Harper Lee
Possible
Wish
Away
Keep
Finches
Things
Mockingbird
Never
Ems
World
Ugly
Son

More quotes by Harper Lee

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I try to give'em a reason, you see. It helps folks if they can latch onto a reason.
Harper Lee
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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
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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
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Folks were doin' a lot of runnin' that night
Harper Lee
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Some negroes lie, some are immoral, some negro men are not be trusted around women - black and white. But this is a truth that applies to the human race and to no particular race of men.
Harper Lee
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Now that I was compelled to think about it, reading was something that just came to me, as learning to fasten the seat of my union suit without looking around, or achieving two bows from a snarl of shoelaces.
Harper Lee
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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
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Real courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.
Harper Lee
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Things are always better in the morning.
Harper Lee
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My book had a universal theme. It's not a racial novel. It portrays an aspect of civilization, not necessarily Southern civilization.
Harper Lee
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It's quite a thing, if you've never been in or known a small southern town. The people are not particularly sophisticated, naturally. They're not worldly wise in any way. But they tell you a story whenever they see you.
Harper Lee
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There's just some kind of men you have to shoot before you can say hidy to 'em. Even then, they ain't worth the bullet it takes to shoot 'em.
Harper Lee
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The remainder of my schooldays were no more auspicious than the first. Indeed, they were an endless Project that slowly evolved into a Unit, in which miles of construction paper and wax crayon were expended by the State of Alabama in its well-meaning but fruitless efforts to teach me Group Dynamics.
Harper Lee
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I think I'll be a clown when I get grown.... There ain't one thing in this world I can do about folks except laugh, so I'm gonna join the circus and laugh my head off.
Harper Lee
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I say guilt, gentlemen, because it was guilt that motivated her. She has committed no crime, she has merely broken a rigid and time-honored code of our society.
Harper Lee
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Remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.
Harper Lee
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She knew full well the enormity of her offense, but because her desires were stronger than the code she was breaking, she persisted in breaking it.
Harper Lee
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...but before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself.
Harper Lee
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Let the dead bury the dead.
Harper Lee
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She's an old lady and she's ill. You just hold your head high and be a gentleman. Whatever she says to you, it's your job not to let her make you mad.
Harper Lee