How to Be a Lady

‘F old your hands.” “Cross your ankles.” “Don’t shout.” These and many other points of etiquette used to be pounded into girls from an early age. Words and phrases such as “decorum” and “proper comportment” were inescapable, but perhaps the most-used term was “ladylike.” With so much confusion around “woman” and “female” today, we’ve completely forgotten what it means to be a lady, and when we do happen to think of the word, it often connotes only outward show. Yes, there are certain actions that a lady should remember, but truly being a lady goes much deeper than mere outward appearances.

In Harper Lee’s monumental work, To Kill a Mockingbird, Jean Louise Finch (a.k.a. Scout) is raised primarily by her father, her mother having died when she was a baby. Atticus Finch is an excellent parent, but there are some things Scout must learn from the women in her life. She is often seen pushing back against these lessons, her tomboyish, seven-year-old self rebelling at the thought of dresses and soft voices. There are four women whom Scout watches closely, however, and it is through them that she comes to understand the true characteristics of a lady.

Much of the credit for raising his children goes to Atticus, but Calpurnia deserves plenty of praise as well. Cal, as Scout and her brother Jem call her, is the family’s cook and housekeeper, and she’s worked for the Finches in some manner for her entire life. She oversees the children’s manners and cleanliness, ruling the roost with an iron hand and loving heart. Calpurnia stands out because of her dignity and self-respect, and she expects the children to cultivate these traits as well.

It’s not just personal dignity either, as we learn early on. Scout invites one of the country children, who has no food, home for a meal during lunch break. He starts pouring syrup over everything on his plate, prompting shocked comments from Scout, who is swiftly marched to the kitchen by Calpurnia. She is informed in no uncertain terms that when someone is your guest, you do not remark on their manners or make them feel ashamed. Scout is mortified and sulky, but Calpurnia’s message makes its mark.

If Calpurnia governs the children’s actions in the home, Miss Maudie Atkinson has her eye on them in the neighborhood. Some of the book’s most humorous moments come from Miss Maudie, the Finches’ neighbor and long-time Maycomb resident. Known for her love of nature, Miss Maudie has been at war with garden weeds and foot-washing Baptists for much of her life, taking great joy in rooting out the one and wielding Scripture against the other. Her sharp wit is renowned in the town, but her wisdom lies in what she doesn’t say.

Scout and Jem ask her at one point if their father has any talents. Atticus’s knowledge of literature and the law may be formidable, but Jem is disappointed because Atticus is too old (he’s in his 50s during the tale) to play football — the outward sign of manhood to a twelve-year-old. Miss Maudie leads the children through a few areas their father excels in, but they’re still not convinced. Later that day, a rabid dog comes down the street, and the children witness their father — who has, to their knowledge, never held a gun — shoot it straight through the head in one swift motion.

After their father leaves the scene:

Miss Maudie grinned wickedly. “Well now, Miss Jean Louise,” she said, “still think your father can’t do anything? Still ashamed of him?” “Nome,” I said meekly. “Forgot to tell you the other day that besides playing the Jew’s Harp, Atticus Finch was the deadest shot in Maycomb County in his time.”

Clearly, the children didn’t know about their father’s prowess with a gun, and Miss Maudie realized this. In her prudence, she understood that Atticus held back certain knowledge from his children, and she respected his discretion. This is a direct contrast to the town gossip, Miss Stephanie Crawford, who, in one particular instance, tells the children that their father has been personally threatened by a dangerous man. While Miss Maudie’s prudence ends up increasing the children’s respect for their father, Miss Stephanie’s lack of this virtue only induces fears and worries.

Calpurnia and Miss Maudie are sympathetic, enjoyable characters in this book, but we can also learn from the story’s seemingly nasty inhabitants as well. Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose, another Finch neighbor, terrorizes the children — Jem in particular. They can’t walk past her house without being subjected to rude personal remarks, snide comments, and finally, direct attacks on their father’s character (due to his controversial position defending a black man accused of raping a white woman). In a fit of rage, Jem destroys her camellia plants and as punishment must spend one month reading aloud to her. As he sits in a dark room with Mrs. Dubose, readers come face to face with a very sick woman and learn of her fight against a drug addiction.

“Son, didn’t you know what her fits were?” Jem shook his head. “Mrs. Dubose was a morphine addict,” said Atticus. She took it as a pain-killer for years. . . . She’d have spent the rest of her life on it and died without so much agony, but she was too contrary. . . . She said she was going to leave this world beholden to nothing and nobody. Jem, when you’re sick as she was, it’s all right to take anything to make it easier, but it wasn’t all right for her. She said she meant to break herself of it before she died, and that’s what she did. . . . You know, she was a great lady.”

“A lady?” Jem raised his head. His face was scarlet. “After all those things she said about you, a lady?”

“She was. She had her own views about things, a lot different from mine, maybe . . . son, I told you that if you hadn’t lost your head I’d have made you go read to her. I wanted you to see something about her — 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. . . . She was the bravest person I ever knew.”

While she’s not as vocal as Mrs. Dubose, Atticus’s sister, the children’s Aunt Alexandra, is a terror in their eyes. She’s stiff and starched and disapproving, wants to fire Calpurnia, and disagrees with Atticus about nearly everything. Scout appalls her by wearing overalls, playing in the dirt, and wanting to be friends with the wrong people. Aunt Alexandra comes to live with the Finches the summer of the infamous trial, and Scout feels the stifling embrace of starched petticoats closing in around her. Whatever Aunt Alexandra’s faults may be, though, Scout learns a powerful lesson through her actions in a moment of crisis.

During a missionary-circle meeting, in which the town women gather to discuss the plight of poor African children (a conversation topic that opens Scout’s eyes to the meaning of hypocrisy), Atticus comes in and requests Alexandra’s and Calpurnia’s presence in the kitchen. He breaks the horrible news that Tom Robinson, the man he’d been defending and whom the Maycomb jury had condemned on insufficient evidence, was dead. Aunt Alexandra sits quietly for a few moments with her head in her hands, prompting Scout to think she’s weeping. But she lifts her head and shows only weariness, no tears. Miss Maudie then says that it’s time to return to their company:

Aunt Alexandra rose and smoothed the various whalebone ridges along her hips. She took her handkerchief from her belt and wiped her nose. She patted her hair and said, “Do I show it?”

“Not a sign,” said Miss Maudie.

The three then go back out to the diningroom, and Scout watches as her aunt, head held high, begins serving her guests like her “only regret was the temporary domestic disaster of losing Calpurnia.” This impresses Scout, prompting her next action:

I carefully picked up the tray and watched myself walk to Mrs. Merriweather. With my very best company manners, I asked her if she would have some. After all, if Aunty could be a lady at a time like this, so could I.

“If Aunty could be a lady at a time like this, so could I.” Scout realizes that personal tragedies do not mean the world has ended for everyone else. She sees in her aunt the necessity of controlling her emotions and carrying on, saving her sorrow for a later time when it can be appropriately dealt with. This characteristic is built upon dignity, prudence, and courage, a kind of culmination of each virtue that Scout has been presented with throughout the book.

Outward appearances certainly matter. Having clean nails, brushing your hair, and wearing ironed clothes are all signs of good hygiene and self-care. But while woman means “adult human female,” lady isn’t simply the clothes you wear or the manners you outwardly present. It is a set of virtues we must learn to cultivate and maintain, holding ourselves to a higher standard and treating everyone around us with respect. Of the countless lessons To Kill a Mockingbird has to offer, learning how to be a lady is indeed a noble and necessary one.