1. About Dill
1.1. Jem and Scout's summer neighbor and friend. Dill is a diminutive, confident boy with an active imagination. He becomes fascinated with Boo Radley and represents the perspective of childhood innocence throughout the novel.
1.2. "Dill tried to pull himself together as we ran down the south steps..."
1.2.1. Emotional - has a heart
1.3. "...I know all that, Scout. It was the way he said it made me sick, plain sick."
1.4. Take Tom Robinson's trial. While Scout accepts Mr. Glimmer's rude treatment of Tom on the witness stand as normal, Dill starts crying uncontrollably when he sees Tom being treated so differently from the white witnesses. He can't quite explain his feelings, but Mr. Raymond can.
1.5. Dill's sensitivity to Maycomb's intolerance gives Scout (and us) a different model of how to respond to what's happening. The contrast between Dill's angry tears and Scout's justification of Mr. Gilmer's attitude with the surprisingly callous "he's just a Negro" (19.164) suggests that Scout's already been hit with Maycomb's ugly racism stick. Not even being Atticus's daughter has been enough to shield her entirely from her community's prejudices.
1.6. While Mr. Raymond predicts that Dill will grow out of crying into not caring, Dill himself comes up with a different path, hiding the tears in laughter. Both responses, however, are difficult for Scout to understand. Dill's character suggests what the limitations of Scout's perspective might be, giving the reader a broader picture of what's the matter with Maycomb through the different limitations of Dill's viewpoint.
2. Friends
2.1. Jem
2.2. Scout
2.2.1. Jem and Scout loved summer. They said it was their "best season". It consisted of "sleeping on the back screened porch in cots, or trying to sleep in the tree-house; summer was everything good to eat; it was a thousand colours in a parched landscape; but most of all, summer was Dill.
3. Characteristics
3.1. Bold
3.1.1. Isn't shy of anyone or anything; when they the Finch children first met him, he confidently introduces himself. Also Dill tell's Scout they are getting married.
3.2. Imaginative
3.2.1. Plays the imitation game of Boo Radley which requires imagination to play.
3.3. Brave
3.3.1. Participates in the 'Boo Radley' adventures.
3.4. Energetic
3.4.1. Alway's has energy to join in on any plans Jem has no matter what time of the day it is.
3.5. Secretive
3.5.1. Never gave much about his family, and even when he does the children can't seem to believe him. He doesn't share a lot about his opinion on different matters, only he cries during the procession of the Tom Robinson court case.
3.6. Strengths
3.6.1. Imaginative
3.6.2. Confident
3.6.3. Sensitive
3.6.4. Observant
3.6.5. Smart
3.6.6. Inquisitive
3.7. Weaknesses
3.7.1. Small for his age
3.7.2. Gets carried away with his imagination
4. Quotes
4.1. "I think I'll be a clown when I get grown […] There ain't one thing in this world I can do about folks except laugh, so I'm gonna join the circus and laugh my head off."
4.1.1. "You got it backwards, Dill," said Jem. "Clowns are sad, it's folks that laugh at them."
4.1.1.1. "Well I'm gonna be a new kind of clown. I'm gonna stand in the middle of the ring and laugh at the folks."
4.2. I'm Charles Baker Harris, I can read. I can read anything you got. Folks call me Dill.
4.2.1. This display's Dill's confidence.
4.3. "He wore blue linen shorts that buttoned to his shirt' his hair was snow white and stuck to his head like duckfluff; he was a year my senior but I towered over him...his blue eyes would lighten and darken; his laugh was sudden and happy; he habitually pulled at a cowlick in the center of his forehead."
4.3.1. Describing Dills appearance
4.4. Let's go down to the courthouse and see the room that they locked Boo up in. My aunt says it's bat-infested, and he nearly died from the mildew. Come on. I bet they got chains and instruments of torture down there.
4.4.1. An example of Dill's sense of adventure
4.5. "Dill Harris could tell the biggest ones I ever heard. Among other things, he had been up in a mail plane seventeen times, he had been to Nova Scotia, he had seen an elephant, and his granddaddy was Brigadier General Joe Wheeler and left him his sword."
4.5.1. He pumped up his own tires.