Atticus Finch
Encyclopedia
Atticus Finch is a fictional character
in Harper Lee
's Pulitzer Prize
-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird
. Atticus is a lawyer and resident of the fictional Maycomb County, Alabama, and the father of Jeremy Atticus "Jem" Finch and Jean Louise "Scout" Finch. Atticus is a central character in the novel. In an interview once held with Harper Lee, she indicated that she had based Atticus's character after her close friend Nick Velillari, who was also a lawyer. In 2003, Atticus Finch, as portrayed by Gregory Peck
in the 1962 film adaptation
, was voted by the American Film Institute
to be the greatest hero in American film
.
in legal circles and is treated almost as if he were an actual person." Examples of Atticus Finch's impact on the legal profession are plentiful. Morris Dees
of the Southern Poverty Law Center
cites Atticus Finch as the reason he became a lawyer, and Richard Matsch, the federal judge who presided over the Timothy McVeigh
trial, counts Atticus as a major judicial influence. One law professor at the University of Notre Dame
stated that the most influential textbook he taught from was To Kill a Mockingbird, and an article in the Michigan Law Review claimed, "No real-life lawyer has done more for the self-image or public perception of the legal profession," before questioning whether, "Atticus Finch is a paragon of honor or an especially slick hired gun."
In 1992, Monroe Freedman, a legal ethics expert published two articles in the national legal newspaper Legal Times calling for the legal profession to set aside Atticus Finch as a role model. Freedman argued that Atticus still worked within a system of institutionalized racism
and sexism
and should not be revered. Freedman's article sparked a flurry of responses from attorneys who entered the profession holding Atticus Finch as a hero, and the reason they became lawyers. Critics of Atticus such as Freedman maintain that Atticus Finch is morally ambiguous and does not use his legal skills to challenge the racist status quo in Maycomb. Freedman's article sparked furious controversy. Further, in 1997, the Alabama State Bar
erected a monument dedicated to Atticus in Monroeville marking his existence as the "first commemorative milestone in the state's judicial history."
's list The 100 Best Characters in Fiction Since 1900 lists Atticus Finch as the 7th best fictional character
of the 20th Century.
In the film adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch was played by Gregory Peck
. Lee became good friends with Peck and even gave him her father’s watch. For his performance, Peck received the Academy Award for Best Actor
. In 2003, Atticus Finch was voted by the American Film Institute
to be the greatest hero in American film
, beating out such famous film heroes as Indiana Jones
, Rocky Balboa, Superman
, Mohandas K. Gandhi
, Tarzan
, James Bond
and Robin Hood
. In 2008, Atticus Finch was selected by Empire magazine as one of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. Premiere magazine also ranked Finch number 13 on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time. On their list of the 100 Greatest Fictional Characters, Fandomania.com ranked Finch at number 32. Entertainment Weekly
placed Finch on their list of The 20 All Time Coolest Heroes in Pop Culture. Peck, a civil rights activist and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom
award, who favored the role of Finch over all his other roles, had this to say about his performance:
“I put everything I had into it – all my feelings and everything I'd learned in 46 years of living, about family life and fathers and children. And my feelings about racial justice and inequality and opportunity." Lee loved his portrayal of Finch and said of it: "In that film, the man and the part met."
Finch's line "If you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you'll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it" was one of 400 film quotes nominated by the AFI
for its 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes
, but was not included in the final list. The line was spoken exactly as it appears in the book.
Entertainment Weekly
wrote that "[Finch] transforms quiet decency, legal acumen, and great parenting into the most heroic qualities a man can have." It also stated that the character Jake Tyler Brigance from the film A Time to Kill
is a "copycat descendant" of Atticus Finch.
, an organization for straight allies
of the LGBT rights movement.
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
in Harper Lee
Harper Lee
Nelle Harper Lee is an American author known for her 1960 Pulitzer-Prize-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird, which deals with the issues of racism that were observed by the author as a child in her hometown of Monroeville, Alabama...
's Pulitzer Prize
Pulitzer Prize
The Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper and online journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City...
-winning novel To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird
To Kill a Mockingbird is a novel by Harper Lee published in 1960. It was instantly successful, winning the Pulitzer Prize, and has become a classic of modern American literature...
. Atticus is a lawyer and resident of the fictional Maycomb County, Alabama, and the father of Jeremy Atticus "Jem" Finch and Jean Louise "Scout" Finch. Atticus is a central character in the novel. In an interview once held with Harper Lee, she indicated that she had based Atticus's character after her close friend Nick Velillari, who was also a lawyer. In 2003, Atticus Finch, as portrayed by Gregory Peck
Gregory Peck
Eldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
in the 1962 film adaptation
To Kill a Mockingbird (film)
To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 American drama film adaptation of Harper Lee's novel of the same name directed by Robert Mulligan. It stars Mary Badham in the role of Scout and Gregory Peck in the role of Atticus Finch....
, was voted by the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
to be the greatest hero in American film
AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains
AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains is a list of the 100 greatest screen characters chosen by American Film Institute in June 2003. It is part of the AFI 100 Years… series. The series was first presented in a CBS special hosted by Arnold Schwarzenegger...
.
Impact on the legal profession
Claudia Durst Johnson noted about available critique of the novel that, "a greater volume of critical readings has been amassed by two legal scholars in law journals than by all the literary scholars in literary journals." Alice Petry remarked that "Atticus has become something of a folk heroFolk hero
A folk hero is a type of hero, real, fictional, or mythological. The single salient characteristic which makes a character a folk hero is the imprinting of the name, personality and deeds of the character in the popular consciousness. This presence in the popular consciousness is evidenced by...
in legal circles and is treated almost as if he were an actual person." Examples of Atticus Finch's impact on the legal profession are plentiful. Morris Dees
Morris Dees
Morris Seligman Dees, Jr. is the co-founder and chief trial counsel for the Southern Poverty Law Center , and a former direct mail marketeer for book publishing. Along with his law partner, Joseph J...
of the Southern Poverty Law Center
Southern Poverty Law Center
The Southern Poverty Law Center is an American nonprofit civil rights organization noted for its legal victories against white supremacist groups; legal representation for victims of hate groups; monitoring of alleged hate groups, militias and extremist organizations; and educational programs that...
cites Atticus Finch as the reason he became a lawyer, and Richard Matsch, the federal judge who presided over the Timothy McVeigh
Timothy McVeigh
Timothy James McVeigh was a United States Army veteran and security guard who detonated a truck bomb in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Building in Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995...
trial, counts Atticus as a major judicial influence. One law professor at the University of Notre Dame
University of Notre Dame
The University of Notre Dame du Lac is a Catholic research university located in Notre Dame, an unincorporated community north of the city of South Bend, in St. Joseph County, Indiana, United States...
stated that the most influential textbook he taught from was To Kill a Mockingbird, and an article in the Michigan Law Review claimed, "No real-life lawyer has done more for the self-image or public perception of the legal profession," before questioning whether, "Atticus Finch is a paragon of honor or an especially slick hired gun."
In 1992, Monroe Freedman, a legal ethics expert published two articles in the national legal newspaper Legal Times calling for the legal profession to set aside Atticus Finch as a role model. Freedman argued that Atticus still worked within a system of institutionalized racism
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
and sexism
Sexism
Sexism, also known as gender discrimination or sex discrimination, is the application of the belief or attitude that there are characteristics implicit to one's gender that indirectly affect one's abilities in unrelated areas...
and should not be revered. Freedman's article sparked a flurry of responses from attorneys who entered the profession holding Atticus Finch as a hero, and the reason they became lawyers. Critics of Atticus such as Freedman maintain that Atticus Finch is morally ambiguous and does not use his legal skills to challenge the racist status quo in Maycomb. Freedman's article sparked furious controversy. Further, in 1997, the Alabama State Bar
Alabama State Bar
The Alabama State Bar is the integrated bar association of the U.S. state of Alabama.The Alabama State Bar was established in 1923 and is part of the 1975 Alabama Code, §§ 34-3-1 to 34-3-89....
erected a monument dedicated to Atticus in Monroeville marking his existence as the "first commemorative milestone in the state's judicial history."
Film adaptation
Book MagazineBook Magazine
Book Magazine was an American bi-monthly popular literary magazine founded in 1998 by Mark Gleason and Jerome Kramer and published by West Egg Communications...
's list The 100 Best Characters in Fiction Since 1900 lists Atticus Finch as the 7th best fictional character
Fictional character
A character is the representation of a person in a narrative work of art . Derived from the ancient Greek word kharaktêr , the earliest use in English, in this sense, dates from the Restoration, although it became widely used after its appearance in Tom Jones in 1749. From this, the sense of...
of the 20th Century.
In the film adaptation of To Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus Finch was played by Gregory Peck
Gregory Peck
Eldred Gregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1980s. His notable performances include that of Atticus Finch in the 1962 film To Kill a Mockingbird, for which he won an...
. Lee became good friends with Peck and even gave him her father’s watch. For his performance, Peck received the Academy Award for Best Actor
Academy Award for Best Actor
Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...
. In 2003, Atticus Finch was voted by the American Film Institute
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
to be the greatest hero in American film
AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains
AFI's 100 Years... 100 Heroes and Villains is a list of the 100 greatest screen characters chosen by American Film Institute in June 2003. It is part of the AFI 100 Years… series. The series was first presented in a CBS special hosted by Arnold Schwarzenegger...
, beating out such famous film heroes as Indiana Jones
Indiana Jones
Colonel Henry Walton "Indiana" Jones, Jr., Ph.D. is a fictional character and the protagonist of the Indiana Jones franchise. George Lucas and Steven Spielberg created the character in homage to the action heroes of 1930s film serials...
, Rocky Balboa, Superman
Superman
Superman is a fictional comic book superhero appearing in publications by DC Comics, widely considered to be an American cultural icon. Created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian-born American artist Joe Shuster in 1932 while both were living in Cleveland, Ohio, and sold to Detective...
, Mohandas K. Gandhi
Gandhi (film)
Gandhi is a 1982 biographical film based on the life of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, who led the nonviolent resistance movement against British colonial rule in India during the first half of the 20th century. The film was directed by Richard Attenborough and stars Ben Kingsley as Gandhi. They both...
, Tarzan
Tarzan
Tarzan is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungles by the Mangani "great apes"; he later experiences civilization only to largely reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adventurer...
, James Bond
James Bond
James Bond, code name 007, is a fictional character created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short story collections. There have been a six other authors who wrote authorised Bond novels or novelizations after Fleming's death in 1964: Kingsley Amis,...
and Robin Hood
Robin Hood
Robin Hood was a heroic outlaw in English folklore. A highly skilled archer and swordsman, he is known for "robbing from the rich and giving to the poor", assisted by a group of fellow outlaws known as his "Merry Men". Traditionally, Robin Hood and his men are depicted wearing Lincoln green clothes....
. In 2008, Atticus Finch was selected by Empire magazine as one of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters. Premiere magazine also ranked Finch number 13 on their list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time. On their list of the 100 Greatest Fictional Characters, Fandomania.com ranked Finch at number 32. Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
placed Finch on their list of The 20 All Time Coolest Heroes in Pop Culture. Peck, a civil rights activist and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom
Presidential Medal of Freedom
The Presidential Medal of Freedom is an award bestowed by the President of the United States and is—along with thecomparable Congressional Gold Medal bestowed by an act of U.S. Congress—the highest civilian award in the United States...
award, who favored the role of Finch over all his other roles, had this to say about his performance:
“I put everything I had into it – all my feelings and everything I'd learned in 46 years of living, about family life and fathers and children. And my feelings about racial justice and inequality and opportunity." Lee loved his portrayal of Finch and said of it: "In that film, the man and the part met."
Finch's line "If you can learn a simple trick, Scout, you'll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it" was one of 400 film quotes nominated by the AFI
American Film Institute
The American Film Institute is an independent non-profit organization created by the National Endowment for the Arts, which was established in 1967 when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act...
for its 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes
AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes
Part of the AFI 100 Years... series, AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes is a list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema. The American Film Institute revealed the list on June 21, 2005, in a three-hour television program on CBS...
, but was not included in the final list. The line was spoken exactly as it appears in the book.
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
wrote that "[Finch] transforms quiet decency, legal acumen, and great parenting into the most heroic qualities a man can have." It also stated that the character Jake Tyler Brigance from the film A Time to Kill
A Time to Kill (film)
A Time to Kill is a 1996 film adaptation of John Grisham's 1989 legal thriller novel of the same name. Directed by Joel Schumacher, the film features an ensemble cast that includes Sandra Bullock, Samuel L...
is a "copycat descendant" of Atticus Finch.
Social references
Atticus Finch's willingness to stand up for the socially outcast is the eponymous inspiration for the Atticus CircleAtticus Circle
Atticus Circle is a not-for-profit organization whose mission is to educate and mobilize fair-minded straight people to advance equal rights for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender partners, parents and their children....
, an organization for straight allies
Straight ally
Straight ally is a colloquial term that describes a heterosexual person who supports equal civil rights, gender equality, LGBTQ social movements, and challenges homophobia. A straight ally believes that LGBT people suffer discrimination and thus are socially disadvantaged...
of the LGBT rights movement.