Who is bertram cates

Even though things happen to Cates, his character is the same at the end of the play as it is at the beginning. Cates, who clearly represents John Scopes, is the defendant.

Although they share the same role, that of defendant, Scopes volunteered to be arrested so that the Butler Law could be tested and never went to jail. The people in Dayton also never shunned Scopes; in fact, his teaching position was still open to him after the trial.

Cates spends the duration of the trial in jail. Never having been in any kind of trouble before, he is frightened, and, even though he is morally innocent and unrepentant, he is unprepared for the reaction of the townspeople.

Because he is a proud man, he is embarrassed to have Rachel see him in jail. His strength of character is evident when he portrays a sense of humor to put her at ease. He jokes about the quality of food in jail as compared to the awful food at the boarding house where he's been living and the crime wave that would take place each summer if everyone knew how cool it was in the jail.

When Rachel pressures him to admit that what he did teach evolution to his sophomore science class was wrong, Cates doesn't get angry or defensive. He simply tries to explain to her that "It isn't as simple as that. Good or bad, black or white, night or day. Literature Poetry Lit Terms Shakescleare. Download this LitChart! Teachers and parents! Struggling with distance learning? Our Teacher Edition on Inherit the Wind can help.

Themes All Themes. Symbols All Symbols. Theme Wheel. Everything you need for every book you read. The way the content is organized and presented is seamlessly smooth, innovative, and comprehensive. Cates, represented by famous progressive lawyer Henry Drummond , is showed to be a sensitive, thoughtful teacher, one who might even believe in God but believes, more importantly, that science ought to be taught in science classes.

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:. Act 1, Scene 1 Quotes. Related Themes: Science vs. Page Number and Citation : 8 Cite this Quote.

Explanation and Analysis:. Page Number and Citation : 33 Cite this Quote. Act 1, Scene 2 Quotes. Related Themes: Morality, Justice, and Truth. Page Number and Citation : 49 Cite this Quote. Related Themes: David vs. Page Number and Citation : 53 Cite this Quote. Act 2, Scene 1 Quotes. Page Number and Citation : 66 Cite this Quote. Act 2, Scene 2 Quotes. Related Symbols: Monkeys.

Page Number and Citation : 69 Cite this Quote. Page Number and Citation : 76 Cite this Quote. Page Number and Citation : 79 Cite this Quote. Act 3, Scene 1 Quotes. Page Number and Citation : Cite this Quote. Bertram Cates is found guilty as charged!

Related Characters: Bertram Cates speaker. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance. Act 1, Scene 1. Just a little. Come on. It won't hurt. The water's fine. Bert gets pretty scared during the trial, as he starts to realize he might be looking at a future full of group showers and cellmates who killed their grannies.

But he sticks to his guns. He turns out to be a pretty courageous guy, even if he's not as showy as the lawyers. I was a schoolteacher. With difficulty I feel I am…I have been convicted of violating an unjust law. I will continue in the future, as I have in the past, to oppose this law in any way I can. III, Even though Bert sometimes seems like a small-town pawn in big-time players Drummond and Hornbeck's game, Bert really isn't so simple as that.

Bert is willing to swim against the tide of his town, so to speak. And his status as on outsider contributes to the play's overall themes because, throughout history, revolutionary new ideas have often come from the fringes. Ideas like: the earth is round, the sun is at the center of the universe, you can wear white after Labor Day.

At one time or another, people have thought that all of these concepts were totally batty. So, yes, Drummond and Hornbeck are using Bert's trial to grandstand—to heat up the controversy over Darwin's ideas and, eventually, get that law against teaching evolution changed.

But Bert clearly believes in what he taught. Plus, at a higher level, you could say that it's really the playwrights who are using Bert. They're telling this story in order to spotlight those brave souls who face punishment for standing up for what they believe in.

And you've gotta appreciate what they did here, because defending free thinkers was a dangerous thing to do in Keep on rockin' in the free modern world, Shmoopers.