Lots and lots of hype today about the publication of a second Harper Lee novel, Go Set A Watchman, featuring Scout and Atticus Finch 20 or so years on from her first which was the legendary To Kill A Mockingbird.
The publication of a second book by HL is something of a literary sensation given that for decades she had seemingly refused all atempts to get her to pen another story. This is all part of the mythology which has grown up around both her and her masterpiece first, and apparently only, novel.
Except she did, sort of, write a second novel as we now know which at the time was rejected, boxed up, forgotten about and then found in a dusty attic somewhere years later. Except she didn't because TKAM was a second draft of a story with GSAW being the first draft of the same tale. The story goes that GSAW was submitted to an editor but returned unpublished with suggestions for improvement which led to certain aspects of GSAW being emphasised, Scout's innocent take on events as they unfolded around her being the main one, and others reduced, the plot being widely torn apart and revised and the whole thing being set in an altogether different era. As re-writes go it is extreme in alteration.
The kicker here being that the liberal, compassionate lawyer hero of TKAM, Atticus, is revealed some years on to be anything but and is in fact pro-segregation, anti-civil rights and to all intents and purposes not the all-round good guy of lore but a rather nasty, ingrained, stubborn racist and there's been quite a kerfuffle about it.
I can't understand why. There's a couple of rather obvious facts here that simply seem to be escaping many who have commentated on it. Firstly Atticus Finch is not a real person; he is an invention; he could be anything the writer wants or needs him to be for narrative purposes; his opinions did not evolve over the time gap between TKAM and GSAW from one thing to another. Secondly GSAW is not a sequel to TKAM which a literal interpretation of the chosen eras for each story would suggest and nor is it a prequel due to it having been written before TKAM. The two stories are two discrete realisations of the same thematic ideas, and they are what matter, that Harper Lee had at the time.
I'm annoyingly het up about this having been forced to study TKAM for my O levels many years ago. "Here we go" I thought on being issued with the text "this is going to be a load of old crap". But it wasn't. I was hooked on it from reading the first page, took the book home, read it cover-to-cover and had completed it by the time we had our second lesson and I went on to read it many times. It had a huge impact on me just as it had a huge impact on so many people worldwide. It was, and remains, an unflinchingly brutal examination of the racism so deeply entrenched in American, but not just American, society. It is a wonderful novel beautfully plotted and realised and all seen through the eyes of Scout as a little girl who doesn't really understand much of the horror that is unfolding around her. If you've never read it then get a copy and read it. It really is as good as the hype around it suggests. If there is a Great American Novel* then this is it.
So do I feel cheated or betrayed or whatever by Atticus The Racist in GSAW. No. I don't really care. Am I keen to read GSAW? No. Its existence proves the value of a good editor without whom TKAM would never have been written. Reading it would be a bit like listening to one of those posthumous LPs cobbled together with a few dodgy live recordings, some demo tracks, unfinished studio work and songs that didn't make the cut to go on the earlier albums. There may be some good bits and they may be of interest to completist obsessives but mostly they are just a marketing ruse to exploit the legacy bequeathed by the good stuff that is already out there.
*The Catcher In The Rye is another often lauded as the Greatest American Novel. Don't bother with it is my advice. It's phoney.
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Tue Jul 14, 2015 10:36 pm
