Quote 1
"Conservative resistance to change, that's all," said Jean Louise behind a mouthful of fried shrimp. (4.9)
Jean Louise doesn't like change. In what ways is Jean Louise conservative? Socially? Politically? Sexually? In terms of her views on race? How about her views on class?
Quote 2
"I just don't like my world disturbed without some warning." (5.222)
It seems that a big part of Jean Louise's issue with discovering Atticus's racism is that it came without warning. Maybe if he sent her a postcard first, of himself in a KKK hood or something, she wouldn't have been as upset about it.
Quote 3
"I despise you and everything you stand for." (17.149)
You can open Chapter 17 to any page and pick out a quote in Jean Louise and Atticus's battle of the principles. Here, she shuts down her father because of his beliefs. Is that fair?
Quote 4
"When you happened along and saw [Atticus] doing something that seemed to you to be the very antithesis of his conscience—your conscience—you literally could not stand it. It made you physically ill. Life became hell on earth for you. You had to kill yourself, or he had to kill you to get you functioning as a separate entity." (18.93)
This is the ultimate revelation for Jean Louise in the book. She learns that in order to stand alone, she has to believe in her own principles on her own… not because someone else does. If they are strong enough, she can be an independent person.
Quote 5
"Jean Louise, I've had to scratch since I was a kid for the things you and Jem took for granted. I've never had some of the things you take for granted and I never will. All I have to fall back on is myself." (16.58)
This line is the culmination of the Jean Louise vs. Society and Class conflict. She has to face her entitlement. But we're not sure if she accepts it or not, considering how angry at Henry she is for other reasons.
Quote 6
"I don't care what they think when I go around in slacks." (2.50)
Sure Jean Louise loved overalls as a child, but as an adult, we have to wonder why she wears pants. Because she likes them? Or because she still wants to rebel?
Quote 7
"We have a system of checks and balances and things, but when it comes down to it we don't have much check on the Court, so who'll bell the cat?" (17.39)
This is Jean Louise talking. She believes they've set up something dangerous. In other words, the first domino in a chain of events that will end the legacy of the South.
Quote 8
"Cal, Cal, Cal, what are you doing to me? What's the matter? I'm your baby, have you forgotten me? Why are you shutting me out? What are you doing to me?" (12.189)
Okay, let's get this straight. Jean Louise, a young white woman, is putting herself first, before Calpurnia's biological son, a young black man, by asking her what she's doing to her?We understand that Jean Louise is upset at "losing" her mother figure, but is this the time to be having her existential crisis? When Calpurnia's son is facing severe legal consequences? What do you think?
Quote 9
"I don't know anything about that bunch except that some misguided clerk sent me some NAACP Christmas seals last year, so I stuck 'em on all the cards I sent home." (2.94)
At first you might applaud Jean Louise's progressive politics here, until you learn that she actually despises the NAACP. She doesn't put those seals on her letters to make a progressive statement about race. She does it to be annoying. To her, making a joke is more important than having respect for another race.
Quote 10
"Yes, indeedy," said Jean Louise wryly. "I especially liked the part where the Negroes, bless their hearts, couldn't help being inferior to the white race because their skulls are thicker and their brain-pans shallower—whatever that means—so we must all be very kind to them and not let them do anything to hurt themselves and keep them in their places." (8.26)
This is Jean Louise's sarcasm here; she is repulsed by these beliefs. Although she doesn't use the term eugenics, which is the hateful philosophy Atticus is studying.
Quote 11
"Cousin Edgar still courtin' you, Aunty?" asked Jean Louise. "Looks like after eleven years he'd ask you to marry him." (2.24)
If Jean Louise knows anything, it's how to tease people. And Aunt Alexandra is basically perfect (at least, she thinks and acts as though she's perfect), so Jean Louise picks up on one flaw: her marriage.
Quote 12
"She wants a father instead of a husband, then." (4.25)
This is a complicated statement about marriage. Jean Louise definitely wants a man like her father to marry. However, she realizes she greatly misunderstands her father. Henry actually is very similar to Atticus, but once Jean Louise realizes she doesn't like Atticus all that much, she definitely doesn't want to marry Henry.
Quote 13
"I'm so afraid of making a mess of being married to the wrong man—the wrong kind for me, I mean." (4.30)
What does Jean Louise mean here by "the wrong kind"? The racism issue hasn't come up yet, and she doesn't seem concerned by class differences. What, then, makes Henry the wrong kind?
Quote 14
"If we married […] I'd be churched to death, bridge-partied to death, called upon to give book reviews at the Amanuensis Club, expected to become a part of the community." (13.66)
Jean Louise doesn't want to lose part of her identity. If she stays in Maycomb, she will. And if she marries in Maycomb, she might as well kiss everything goodbye.
Quote 15
"I see a scared little man; I see a little man who's scared not to do what Atticus tells him, who's scared not to stand on his own two feet, who's scared not to sit around with the rest of the red-blooded men—" (16.80)
Considering the efforts Jean Louise goes to in order to protect her own identity as a woman, she is exceptionally insensitive—and dare we say, hypocritical—of Henry's identity as a man. She even taunts him for not being masculine enough, saying, "I expect you to be a man, that's all!" (16.90) Yet if anyone told her to be a woman, she would lash out at them.