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Miss Emma Glenn
The white attorney who is charged with the task of defending Jefferson from execution for the crime of killing Alcee Gropé. The attorney paints a picture of Jefferson that Grant, Emma, and Reverend Ambrose spend the remainder of the novel refuting: he calls Jefferson an animal and a “hog,” and tries to convince the jury to spare his life on the grounds that it’s immoral to kill a mere animal. For much of the novel, Jefferson believes the defense attorney’s words, calling himself a hog and behaving like one.
The defense attorney Quotes in A Lesson Before Dying
The A Lesson Before Dying quotes below are all either spoken by The defense attorney or refer to The defense attorney. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Chapter 1 Quotes
Why, I would just as soon put a hog in the electric chair as this.
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The defense attorney Character Timeline in A Lesson Before Dying
The timeline below shows where the character The defense attorney appears in A Lesson Before Dying. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 1
The defense attorney argues that Jefferson was in the wrong place at the wrong time. He wasn’t involved...
(full context)
Chapter 2
...with the exception of Jefferson, who called her “Nannan.” Miss Emma tells Grant that the defense attorney called Jefferson a hog. She tells Grant that she wants him to teach Jefferson to...
(full context)
