When he was nearly thirteen, my brother Jem got his arm badly broken at the elbow.

Jem gave a reasonable description of Boo: Boo was about six-and-a-half feet tall, judging from his tracks; he dined on raw squirrels and any cats he could catch, that's why his hands were bloodstained - if you ate animal raw, you could never wash the blood off. There was a long jagged scar that ran across his face; what teeth he had were yellow and rotten; his eyes popped, and he drooled most of the time.

Rest assured, as long as I am alive any book purporting to be with my cooperation is a falsehood.

It's not necessary to tell all you know. It's not ladylike -- in the second place, folks don't like to have someone around knowin' more than they do. It aggravates them. Your not gonna change any of them by talkin' right, they've got to want to learn themselves, and when they don't want to learn there's nothing you can do but keep your mouth shut or talk their language.

I came to the conclusion that people were just peculiar, I withdrew from them, and never thought about them until I was forced to.

I just thought you'd like to know I can read. You got anything needs readin' I can do it.

I didn't know how you were going to do it, but from now on I'll never worry about what'll become of you, son, you'll always have an idea.