Go Set a Watchman
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Go Set a Watchman: From an Editor's Perspective
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Greg, Back in July and August I was reading the reviews of GSAW on Amazon. Sometimes I thought people felt they ought to like the book based on HL's reputation and their love of TKAM. They said they would try to read GSAW a second time because they didn't get it. One candid reviewer said that people could jump on him for not liking the book. I wrote a comment to his negative review, with a link to the professional reviews cited on Wikipedia, and I mentioned he was in good company. Professional reviewers have given GSAW the harshest criticism I have read anywhere.
On Wikipedia, section on "Reception."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Set_...
CS wrote: "Greg, Back in July and August I was reading the reviews of GSAW on Amazon. Sometimes I thought people felt they ought to like the book based on HL's reputation and their love of TKAM. They said t..."
CS, thanks for this link, very harsh reviews indeed! (Theroux's "Good God, no" must be the harshest.) Initially, I had no intention of reading GSAW, as a member of my bookclub said it was terrible. But she also said I MUST read it to understand how awful it is. I was shocked: it was worse than awful, and I do suspect that the publication borders on the illegal, given the Wikipedia discussion of the publication history. (Then again, I do know Wiki is not 100% reliable.) Just wanted to say, though, that I've been posting extensively on what I think is by far the best fiction of the year, "A Little Life". I'm very much enjoying this back and forth, worse vs. best discussion as a good intellectual exercise about good vs. bad fiction. And I am sure other people think GSAW is the best of the year, Little Life the worse. Most glowing reviews of GSAW here on goodreads reference TKAM and Lee, though, and that's very telling.
That's a very thorough Wikipedia article. Thanks, CS!
I haven't read and am not going to waste time with the Wiki reviews of this travesty. Additionally, I wager that it is already fading from some of the red hot attention it had piled on its stink-ing-ness earlier this year. Wasting much more time on it at this point serves little purpose.The review I wrote in August 2015 could have been worse, harsher, more abrupt, your choice! so I'll leave most of the comments from it there, (see link below if you wish) but will finish as I did with the review:
The book is at best a curiosity!
Review Link-> https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
CD, re: one of the observations in your review."This is not the same town and story as To Kill a Mockingbird! As much as we want more of the Scout, Atticus, Calpurnia, Jem, Boo, etc. These are different characters with the same names in a different story."
I felt that way also when I read GSAW. Then I did some research about first-time mega-hit authors, most notably Amy Tan and her novel Joy Luck Club (upthread msg 38, my post 12/1/15). AT wrote a short story as a beginning writer, and her teacher criticized--and observed--that the story contained a mishmash of different stories, not just one story. Yep, that single story contained the seeds of ideas for the multiple stories in JLC. This phenomenon did start me wondering: was GSAW basically the same thing? A beginner's effort that contained the ideas for two novels, not just the one?
One of the novels we know well as TKAM. It was the child's story of one man's stand for justice against the racism in a 1930s Southern small town. The seed for this novel occurred in the flashbacks of GSAW. I think HL's editor, Tay Hohoff, felt the vividness and energy of these scenes, the feeling of life in the flashbacks, and realized there was a novel to be mined there.
But what of the other potential novel? Look at the basic characters and story line of GSAW. A young woman (not the Scout we know) returns to her Southern hometown (not Maycomb) to visit her father (not Atticus) in 1954. She's been living in the Big City up north and she's full of it. She's contemptuous and critical of the people she grew up with, very sure she is politically correct, sympathetic and color-blind when it comes to race relations. Her father, meanwhile, is a patronizing racist who goes along to get along. He is a KKK sympathizer. Her father and this world of the Southern small town are afraid and wary of the changes they see rushing towards them. Do you see enough conflict and potential for growth here, in the characters and their situation, to set up another novel on its feet? another novel, like TKAM, that could explore the subjects of racism and social change? I sure do.
That second novel was never developed and written, of course. It's a sad thing about HL that she never wrote a second book after TKAM. Charles Shields' biography, Mockingbird, recounts how HL stumbled along for years, saying she was writing another book, yet never delivering a page to her publisher. She was a very self-critical writer, so that didn't help. But I have also wondered if she would have fared better if she had gone back to GSAW and written the 1950s race novel hidden in it. I perceive that some of her writing energy was still packed away in that book's incipient story. Something to think about.
CD wrote: "I haven't read and am not going to waste time with the Wiki reviews of this travesty. Additionally, I wager that it is already fading from some of the red hot attention it had piled on its stink-in..."CD, your review was honest, and that's refreshing. I pretty much trashed this book in my review but resisted a few, choice, four letter words.
CS wrote: "CD, re: one of the observations in your review."This is not the same town and story as To Kill a Mockingbird! As much as we want more of the Scout, Atticus, Calpurnia, Jem, Boo, etc. These are di..."
CS, definitely something to think about. And you've hit upon one reason why so many people thought GSAW was great: they thought about what it might have been.
Greg wrote: "CS, definitely something to think about. And you've hit upon one reason why so many people thought GSAW was great: they thought about what it might have been. "Sorry, Greg, I have to disagree. From my reading of the reviews on GR and Amazon, I think the 4- or 5-star reviewers were uncritical about GSAW and nostalgic for TKAM. They liked GSAW just as it is. They're entitled to their opinions, of course! But I won't give them credit for something that wasn't expressed in their reviews.
CS wrote: "Greg wrote: "CS, definitely something to think about. And you've hit upon one reason why so many people thought GSAW was great: they thought about what it might have been. "Sorry, Greg, I have to..."
CS, such a great discussion! You're right, everyone is entitled to their opinions! I do love to debate books!
I absolutely love this thread. As a former newspaper editor, it was very obvious to me that GSAW is a first polished draft for submission to a publisher. The plot is choppy, lacking in smooth transitions and too episodic. I suspect that if Ms. Lee were reallly as lucid as they claim, she would never agreed to publication. I think that it was interesting as a first draft and, as CS suggested, an excellect academic exercise would be to see the metamorphise of GSAW into TKAM. A PhD. thesis?The publication of this work was a complete disservice to Ms. Lee.
As a side note, what will all those parents of Atticuses do now that the character is not the pillar of decency we once thought?
Janet wrote: "...what will all those parents of Atticuses do now that the character is not the pillar of decency we once thought? "Actually, I think Atticus in TKAM is still a character of decency and justice, and Atticus in GSAW is a differently conceived character who is racist (and sophist also). I mentioned upthread that I think Atticus in GSAW is closely modeled upon HL's father, AC Lee, but Atticus in TKAM shows the influence of HL's editor, Tay Hohoff, and her concept of a hero (my msg #18, 9/28/15).
Other reviewers have made the distinction also. The characters have the same names but different personalities in the two books. It makes sense with the different stories that HL is telling in GSAW and TKAM. After all, Atticus is fictional, not a real person, so he and other characters changed dramatically in HL's imagination during her revisions from GSAW to TKAM.
CS wrote: "Janet wrote: "...what will all those parents of Atticuses do now that the character is not the pillar of decency we once thought? "Actually, I think Atticus in TKAM is still a character of decenc..."
Yes, your point is true. However it's arguable that Atticus in GSAW is the same person, but one who has evolved into the Atticus of TKAM under HL's editor's suggestions. I don't beleve the draft is independant of the final result just like a caterpiller is independant of the butterfly it becomes. It's the same creature, just a different state. It's just an opinion. I'd rather call my son John, or Paul or George for that matter.
Not Ringo, eh? Sigh...The caterpiller/butterfly analogy only works here if we are talking about the same organism in the same fictional world, but these two Atticuses seem to exist in two different timelines in two different Maycombs. I would have been so much happier, if GSAW had told the story of the adult Julie Mae Robbins going back to Maconville and discovering that her aging father, Cassius Robbins, had transformed into an unsavory racist that she could hardly recognize as the father from her childhood.
That book would still have been the publication of a crappy manuscript unworthy of all the hype it received this summer, but it wouldn't have been such a sin against the author and the readers of Mockingbird. And I might have even added a star to my review of it!
Petergiaquinta wrote: "...I would have been so much happier, if GSAW had told the story of the adult Julie Mae Robbins going back to Maconville and discovering that her aging father, Cassius Robbins, had transformed into an unsavory racist that she could hardly recognize as the father from her childhood."Not only that, but once separated from the baggage of Mockingbird, this new story could be told with freshness and power if it was rewritten.
Janet wrote: "...it's arguable that Atticus in GSAW is the same person, but one who has evolved into the Atticus of TKAM under HL's editor's suggestions. I don't beleve the draft is independant of the final result just like a caterpiller is independant of the butterfly it becomes. It's the same creature, just a different state."That's not always true. A book and its characters can be completely reconceived, especially in the long revision period (2 years) that occurred between Watchman and Mockingbird. HL is believed to have completely rewritten her manuscript three times, each time telling the story from a different character's point of view. Also remember that HL did not keep the story line of Watchman, but used the flashbacks in Watchman as a jumping-off point for another story entirely.
In Watchman, I notice that the voice of young Scout is the only thing that is consistent with Mockingbird. I think Scout was the central inspiration and touchstone for HL in writing Mockingbird, not the character of Atticus. Everything else in Watchman was subject to change in Mockingbird, and was changed, IMO.
There's discussion upthread comparing the two books, especially how Watchman is not a sequel to Mockingbird. Pls see msgs 6-9, 14, 15. Nobody is going to stop you if you decide to merge the two characters of Atticus. However, that merger is at odds with important facts in both books. Also, a character that is empathetic and brave in Mockingbird, but racist and conformist in Watchman, is not particularly believable. People don't change that drastically in their lives unless there's good reason for it, and HL gives us no reason in Watchman.
CS wrote: "Janet wrote: "...it's arguable that Atticus in GSAW is the same person, but one who has evolved into the Atticus of TKAM under HL's editor's suggestions. I don't beleve the draft is independant of ..."CS, great point, "HL gives us no reason..." for that drastic personality change. Of course, I'm sure there is, somewhere, someone working on a fan fiction work to explain it all!
Greg wrote: ""HL gives us no reason..." for that drastic personality change. Of course, I'm sure there is, somewhere, someone working on a fan fiction work to explain it all!..."Further confusing the characters and story of TKAM, I assume. Any fanfic would be a suitable companion book for GSAW. Some Amazon reviewers have questioned GSAW's authorship (they believe it's not HL), and they say GSAW reads like fanfic. I get where they're coming from.
CS wrote: "Greg wrote: ""HL gives us no reason..." for that drastic personality change. Of course, I'm sure there is, somewhere, someone working on a fan fiction work to explain it all!..."Further confusing..."
Interesting that some would say GSAW reads like fanfic, cause fanfic sometimes is pretty bad, so I can see their point, like you. And one has to hand it to GSAW, and to any book which gets people to read (Twilight, Fifty Shades, etc), cause that's always a good thing.
I think some Amazon reviewers called GSAW fanfic because it appealed to nostalgia for a certain fictional world and characters, and when compared to the main book (TKAM), it was shallow and undeveloped. Also these reviewers don't believe GSAW was written by HL, but by a lesser writer.Greg wrote: "...one has to hand it to GSAW, and to any book which gets people to read (Twilight, Fifty Shades, etc), cause that's always a good thing. "
We'll have to agree to disagree. IMO, it's better to watch good television rather than read a bad book. Or take a walk rather than read a bad book. Or do nothing rather than read a bad book. Reading isn't sacred. It matters what you're putting into your mind and how you spend your time.
I wouldn't call GSAW that bad. It's worth reading as a literary artifact, if you're curious about the development of TKAM. It's substandard as a literary novel on its own merits.
Sad news today, but let's see how long it takes now before we can get an Atticus Finch action figure, a set of Mockingbird bedsheets, or a Harper Lee beer coozie you can take fishing with you down at Barker's Eddy. Watchman was just testing the waters. Let the venal rush to merchandizing begin!
The vultures have been circling for the last year or more. At least HL is personally out of that now. Did you see the announcement that TKAM will appear as a Broadway play next year? The producer has been very careful to say that Atticus will be the TKAM version, not his evil twin in GSAW.
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/11/the...
An attempt to rehab Atticus by HL's greedy attorney? Maybe she has realized--too late--that Atticus the unlikeable racist isn't a prime marketing opportunity after all.
CS wrote: "I think some Amazon reviewers called GSAW fanfic because it appealed to nostalgia for a certain fictional world and characters, and when compared to the main book (TKAM), it was shallow and undevel..."CS, you do have a good point: "It matters what you put into your mind." For me, for example, I don't like violent images (TV shows, movies) in my house, so I gave up television "news", almost every prime time TV show, and don't watch violent movies at home. So yes, reading a bad book can be a bad thing.
Petergiaquinta wrote: "Sad news today, but let's see how long it takes now before we can get an Atticus Finch action figure, a set of Mockingbird bedsheets, or a Harper Lee beer coozie you can take fishing with you down ..."Peter, ironic that TKAM now comes with some seriously heavy baggage. Sad isn't it that we may never indeed be able to purchase Mockingbird bedsheets? As far as a Broadway play, I'd prefer to just see "Mama Mia" again.
Not sure what I think about Aaron Sorkin rewriting the Mockingbird script, taking "liberties" with "new dialogue" and developing "fleshed-out scenes" alluded to in the novel...I've seen the original play performed in Stratford, Ontario, and I've used parts of it with my students to supplement our study of the novel. It's okay, and it is, as the article notes, remarkably faithful to Lee's novel. The problem with any dramatic adaptation of Mockingbird is getting a Scout who appears young enough and right for the role but who has the range and depth as an actor to pull off the part live in front of an audience.
Mary Badham is remarkable in the movie, but probably couldn't have played the role on stage.
I'm not such a stick-in-mud that I reject out of hand revisiting and reworking the script by Sorkin or anyone else, but the cynical part of me questions the timing again, and when I see the names Tonja B. Carter and Andrew Nurnberg talking about what Harper Lee "finally decided," I become skeptical.
Petergiaquinta wrote: "How about Ken Kesey with One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest? He might have had a tad more formal training as a writer than Lee, but not a lot more, and he burst onto the scene right about two years af..."Re J.D. Salinger, you may like the bio Salinger by David Shields, but the style takes getting used to. It's like a collage of quotes and commentary, rather than quotes embedded in commentary. Vague, I know, but it's hard to explain.
I am obviously coming late to this discussion, and I understand that this particular thread was from an editor's point of view. I haven't read everybody's comments but I will just throw in my two cents.I loved To Kill a Mockingbird and as a teacher who sometimes taught Grade 10 English where Mockingbird is part of the curriculum, I made sure to use it every chance I had.
If I hadn't been a big fan of Mockingbird, I wouldn't have read Watchman and to be honest I wouldn't have missed anything. It is not that great a book and thankfully some editor realized that and thankfully Harper Lee was able to rewrite it into the classic she did.
But I quite enjoyed reading Watchman, not as great literature, but more as an historical document. I liked looking for the things that were different in the two stories. I liked seeing how Lee was able to change and adapt certain situations. I loved the fact that Boo Radley and Tom Robinson, next to Atticus and Scout the most important figures in Mockingbird, were not in the original. Could Lee have created those characters if Watchman had been published in the first place?
So just seeing how a story can develop was intriguing for me.
As well, I enjoyed reading about Scout's questioning of her father's support of segregation. Atticus is the iconic father figure and in Watchman that gets shattered although I can separate the two books enough to still hold one character in high regard and the other not.
Still, it was interesting looking at how Harper Lee developed the character of Atticus. I just found it fascinating that Lee would develop a character whose views were at odds with an adult Scout and then turn around and make Atticus a much more perfect human in the eyes of the six year old Scout. Which is exactly what happens all the time. As we get older we see some of the flaws that may exist in adults that we thought were ideal. For me it wasn't so much Scout coming to terms with Atticus but me as a reader and long time "friend" of Atticus coming to terms with him as well.
No question that Go Set a Watchman - in isolation - pales in comparison to any of the top books of 2015 let alone Mockingbird. It certainly wasn't the top book of the year. However, I am glad it was published and I am certainly glad I had the opportunity to read it.
Dale wrote: "I am obviously coming late to this discussion, and I understand that this particular thread was from an editor's point of view. I haven't read everybody's comments but I will just throw in my two c..."Dale, a member of my book club told me GSAW was bad, but that I should still read it just for the sake of discussions. Like you, I'm glad I read it, and this is an interesting discussion of a book!
Dale wrote: "... I just found it fascinating that Lee would develop a character whose views were at odds with an adult Scout and then turn around and make Atticus a much more perfect human in the eyes of the six year old Scout. Which is exactly what happens all the time. As we get older we see some of the flaws that may exist in adults that we thought were ideal. ..."We're not really sure about the development of Atticus from Watchman to Mockingbird. I hope some literary scholars are combing through both books to give us a better (but still speculative) idea of how Mockingbird happened. If you have a chance to read some posts upthread, others have made thoughtful comments on this subject.
I myself doubt that HL changed Atticus because she switched from adult to child point of view. The two characters of Atticus are fundamentally different, like two different personalities. Merely changing that point of view shouldn't result in such radical differences in a character. For example--If I made a visit home and my parents changed from easygoing lifelong Democrats to ranting racists, I'd wonder if they were on drugs. Or going into senile dementia. I have very clear memories from my childhood of what they were like then: the politics they talked about; how they voted and why; the politics of their friends; what people thought of them and why. None of that would match up to their suddenly becoming racist.
Do you notice how Jean-Louise doesn't go back in her memories and ask, Why is my father racist now? If I were confronted with my parents' sudden racism, I'd be asking myself, Did I miss something from back then? Are there incidents from the past I should have paid attention to? As I recall, JL never does that.
I think HL was fishing around for a plot for her novel. It's a common problem for writers at the beginner's level. HL came up with Horrors! My father is really racist! It's an implausible idea, and fortunately her editors gave it the ax. In real life, HL knew that her father AC Lee was racist and pro-segregation all her life. So her novel actually contradicted her own experience. That was my conclusion after reading Charles Shields' biography of HL.
I think HL changed the character of Atticus as part of the normal development of her book. She needed a different kind of Atticus to move readers in Mockingbird, so she created him--with her editor. I view Atticus of Mockingbird as a composite creation of HL and her editor Tay Hohoff.
As you know, HL shows a small body of work outside Mockingbird. We have Watchman, and we know she contributed to Truman Capote's In Cold Blood. Later she tried to write a crime novel that was never brought to fruition. Watchman, In Cold Blood, the unfinished crime novel--All these books are dark. They say to me that HL was concerned with the questions, What is evil? What is the power of evil? I see that as the perspective she brought to Mockingbird. On the other side of the equation, HL's editor Tay Hohoff was an optimist and a Quaker who believed in human betterment. Hohoff would likely ask the questions, What is good? What is the power of good? She herself wrote a biography of a hero, a social reformer in the 1920s. The two met, collided, and collaborated on a great American novel about race relations. That's how I see it.
CS wrote:"Also, a character that is empathetic and brave in Mockingbird, but racist and conformist in Watchman, is not particularly believable. People don't change that drastically in their lives unless there's good reason for it, and HL gives us no reason in Watchman."
This is definitely an interesting discussion and I admit right off that I have no expertise in any of this, no background on Harper Lee, no knowledge of anything else she may have written etc. On top of that I am Canadian with little knowledge of the Southern mentality except what I might have read in books or seen in movies or TV and how much of that is stereotypical vs real, I certainly can't say.
So I am questioning you more for discussion sake rather than taking the opposite side in a debate.
Could the Atticus of the six year old Scout in Mockingbird be the same person as the Atticus as seen by the 25 year old Jem Louise in Watchman? Does it require a complete change in personality without a reason or could it be the same guy.
Could a segregationist be kind to his African-American maid? Could a segregationist defend a black man of a trumped up rape charge? Could a segregationist defend a black man from a lynch mob? Could a segregationist be respected by the black community for being fair and just. I really don't know, but some slave owners were quite kind to their "help" even while participating in and thereby condoning a barbaric practice.
Could a younger Scout have just missed the clues? Could she have idealized her father so much that she failed to witness his flaws? I don't see that as being particularly far-fetched.
As to a trigger. The Maycomb of the 1930s described in Mockingbird is hardly integrated. Blacks over there. White trash over here. Dirt poor but decent whites down there. Upright, respectable whites up here.
As much of a segregationist as someone may be it is easy to prefer a hardworking Tom Robinson to a slimy Bob Ewell - especially when Tom has to STAY OVER THERE. But the 1950s were different. Brown vs Board of Education seems to be the trigger for Atticus in Watchman.
As Bob Dylan sang humourously
Now, I’m liberal, but to a degree
I want ev’rybody to be free
But if you think that I’ll let Barry Goldwater
Move in next door and marry my daughter
or Phil Ochs more bluntly
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
As long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me
Love me, I'm a liberal
There is plenty of hypocrisy out there. There are plenty of inconsistencies in character by all sorts of people. And that is what intrigued me most about Watchman.
Watchman by itself is not that great a book. But what appealed to me the most was this different viewpoint of Atticus. If Mockingbird had never been written, this whole discussion would be moot as Watchman would have been long forgotten. Just another mediocre book about a daughter coming to terms with her flawed father.
But the fact that it is about an iconic literary figure, maybe the most admired character in literature made the reading of Watchman that much more interesting. Are the two Atticuses incompatible? I will let scholars figure that out. But for me, I found it interesting to sort out my own feelings not just about Atticus but about people who have their own conflicting personalities or conflicting viewpoints.
Anyway, thanks for letting me ramble.
Dale,You ask some good questions, and I don't have time to talk through the book here, but I will toss out a couple of observations about Atticus:
1) At the end of Chapter 10, Scout overhears Atticus tell Jack that he hopes his children can get through the difficulties of the trial without "catching Maycomb's usual disease."
That terminology Atticus uses for racial prejudice doesn't sound like something that a segregationist would use, no matter how "just" his sense of the law might be.
2) Later (in Chapter 14), in defense of Calpurnia whom Alexandra is pushing Atticus to get rid of, Atticus says, "Alexandra, Calpurnia's not leaving this house until she wants to...She's a faithful member of this family, and you'll simply have to accept things the way they are....I don't think the children've suffered one bit from her having brought them up. If anything, she's been harder on them in some ways than a mother would have been....Cal's lights are pretty good--and another thing, the children love her."
I can't see a segregationist saying these things about his cook, no matter how much he valued the work she did around the house for him.
There's more, but that's all the time I have now. The Atticus of TKM could not be called a "segregationist" by any stretch of that word, and I don't see how he could grow into the older man of Watchman. I really don't think we need scholars to help us see the incompatibility between the two characters.
Dale wrote: "...I really don't know, but some slave owners were quite kind to their "help" even while participating in and thereby condoning a barbaric practice."If anyone wishes to dispute the "kindness" of slave owners, pls send a personal msg to Dale or start another msg board. This subject is off-topic. I greatly appreciate your cooperation in this matter. Thank you. CS Barron
CS @82 I want to apologize for my comment. It was poorly worded and insensitive even though that was not my intent.I was just trying to understand how or if a person can appear to be one way but still hold conflicting views especially when seen by a young person growing up.
Some people can appear to be supportive of minority groups or the less fortunate, can even show kindness, but once those others start to gain some power, their true nature comes out. Someone could sympathize with a Tom Robinson, defend a Tom Robinson, be kind to a Tom Robinson UNTIL Tom's kids come to his kid's school. A child viewing her father before a decision like Brown vs the Board of Education might be seeing a different person than the one she views after.
However, my inclusion of a comment about the different treatment of slaves was not only unnecessary; it was just plain stupid. I sincerely apologize and I appreciate your calling attention to it.
Peter @81. Thank you for the insights. That helps me compare the two novels. However, I still liked the fact that we are now able to read about two different Atticuses whether or not they are consistent from one novel to the other. I guess I am just fascinated by the idea that people could be viewed in two very different ways and how we as individuals have to come to terms with that. In isolation, Go Set a Watchman has done a poor job with that idea. But because it dealt with an iconic figure that we all know, I found it much more interesting to read than others obviously did.
Dale wrote: "Some people can appear to be supportive of minority groups or the less fortunate, can even show kindness, but once those others start to gain some power, their true nature comes out." (underlined text mine)Who knows about Atticus? He's a fictional character, GSAW is a draft and HL was a beginning writer. I believe her story and her characters were not yet fully formed in her mind.
Most of your questions (msg 80) are trying to argue that Atticus of GSAW and TKAM are the same person. We've compared the differences of the two Atticuses upthread, and discussed whether GSAW is/is not a sequel, also upthread.
When I've read reviews on GR and Amazon, I've noticed some people are very attached to the idea of a flawed Atticus. Their reasons seem to be personal, and on occasion, political. Some people say they prefer Atticus as a racist because that makes him seem more real to them. Fine, if that's what you need. Others who appear to be politically right wing take delight in bringing down a liberal icon. My response: it's a free country.
Dale, How you interpret a book is totally up to you. If you wish to merge the two Atticuses and view the hero of TKAM as a racist, and if you find this character emotionally satisfying, nobody is going to stop you.
Not so very long ago, the original version of Look Homeward Angel was published under its original title, O Lost. It was the book that Maxwell Perkins decided needed a lot of work to be publishable. Who cared though? English majors, and not even very many of them.
Dale, How you interpret a book is totally up to you. If you wish to merge the two Atticuses and view the hero of TKAM as a racist, and if you find this character emotionally satisfying, nobody is going to stop you.I guess I haven't been clear, I am not trying to merge the two Atticuses and I certainly do not find a racist Atticus emotionally satisfying. I have no problem viewing the two books as completely separate entities.
People have trashed GSAW for various reasons, one being that it was a rough draft and should never have been published in the first place. I get that. But as I said in my original post, that was the big appeal for me. I enjoyed seeing the writing process developed. And I was particularly intrigued by the radical change in the character of Atticus from a racist to the epitome of a non-racist.
And i wondered if that could be possible in real life. The questions I was asking in post 80 were not specific to Atticus. I was wondering if a man who treats his maid like family and defends an innocent black man could still be a segregationist. Could a man behave in such a way that his child can't see his true beliefs and then is shocked when realizing the truth. You and Peter and others have pointed out the inconsistencies of the two Atticuses and how they can't be the same. I certainly understand that.
But I am not thinking that when I am reading GSAW. That comes later. I am emotionally connected to the story not because it is a particularly good story about a woman coming to terms with her racist father. She is coming to terms with ATTICUS FINCH. And because I am connected to Atticus through my reading of TKAM, I am more emotionally involved in how it all gets resolved. That's the appeal - at least for me.
Of course, I have been suckered by the publishers. They likely knew there would be thousands like me prepared to read GSAW for the curiosity alone.
But because the book was about a very different Atticus, as poorly written as it may have been, and as inconsistent as it may have been to TKAM I was able to take the time to reflect on changing perspectives and how we deal with them. How some people's beliefs may not be consistent with their public persona. How we might feel if the image of somebody we loved didn't
match our understanding of them over time.
I know I am reading way too much into GSAW, but I can't help it given the legacy of TKAM.
Hope this makes some sense.
Dale wrote: "Of course, I have been suckered by the publishers. They likely knew there would be thousands like me prepared to read GSAW for the curiosity alone. "Closer to millions, it seems, so you aren't alone.
I guess I wasn't "suckered"; I knew what I was getting into, and although I disapproved of the book's publication I still raced to the store on the day it was released. I read the book with a guilty sense of pleasure and curiosity, and there are aspects of it that I find intriguing, although the book troubles me and I reject its publication on moral or ethical grounds. Nonetheless, and hypocritically so, I laid my money down and devoured it, finishing it in a day.
I suppose what I like most about the novel (beyond its value as a historical artifact) is the way Lee explores the difficulty we human beings have with accepting change, good change, bad change, any kind of change. Atticus the Alabama state legislator can't accept his state's loss of sovereignty in deciding its affairs; he can't handle the extension of civil liberties granted to his black neighbors. Jean Louise struggles with the changes she doesn't recognize in her aged father, his health concerns, his mental state, his seemingly newfound racist tendencies. Uncle Jack rejects the shift the Methodist Church is experiencing at the time, in particular the changes his precious hymns have undergone. (The scene in the church and the conversation between Jack and the music director might be my favorite part of the novel.)
Changes abound in Watchman: Jem is dead; Calpurnia has left; Finches Landing has been sold; the Finch house in town is torn down and an ice cream store stands in its place; even the Cunninghams seem to have left the isolation of the woods of Old Sarum and moved into Maycomb. It's all quite disturbing to Scout, to Atticus, to Uncle Jack and to that fatuous interloper Hank Clinton.
So, this might have been a mildly appealing book had Harper Lee dusted the manuscript off, reworked (and renamed) its characters, and turned it into a separate work set in a separate world, a work exploring the disappointments that go along with the changes to a world we thought we knew. But she didn't do any of that, and instead we have this fraudulent "sequel" that is published in the last year of poor Harper Lee's life.
OK Peter, now you might have me rereading GSAW. Nah, probably not, but thank you for taking the time to express the positives of the book despite your negative feelings.
And thank you CS for starting this thread which is being followed 6 months later. I have had a chance to read many more of the posts and have learned a great deal.
Dale wrote: "I was particularly intrigued by the radical change in the character of Atticus from a racist to the epitome of a non-racist...And i wondered if that could be possible in real life. The questions I was asking in post 80 were not specific to Atticus..."I'm reminding you that this discussion is about two books, not about certain kinds of people, what they are "really" like, and how they behave. This is a literary discussion, not a discussion about the psychology of certain groups that you have selected.
I and others here have interpreted GSAW and TKAM as literary works and referenced material in the texts and other sources to support our opinions. You are expected to do the same.
Dale wrote: "I was able to take the time to reflect on changing perspectives and how we deal with them. How some people's beliefs may not be consistent with their public persona. How we might feel if the image of somebody we loved didn't match our understanding of them over time. I know I am reading way too much into GSAW..."
I suggest that you start a new discussion about GSAW on Goodreads and pursue your speculations there. Your questions in msg 80 could be contained in your opening post. You are contemplating what GSAW says about human nature, a topic that is really another discussion. Pls reread my opening post to review the issues that prompted me to begin this msg board. regards, CSB
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Mary, like you, I love to read. When you state you feel like "Watchman" was a 'novel of the fifties' I don't understand that. I was born and grew up in the South, and although I didn't start grade school until 1960 (and had already taught myself to read on Agatha Christie's mysteries), I knew very early in life that racism was wrong. I never encountered (to my recollection) ANY educated person, any teacher, any pastor with Atticus's ridiculously outdated views. If anything, I found "Watchman's" politics particularly inflammatory and absolutely not representative of that time. Could you elaborate as to why you felt this was a "novel of the fifties." I'm honestly confused as to what others see in this book. I'm with Theroux: "God, no," but unlike Theroux I forced my way through it. But I am a person who will change my mind, because one should, and even broke down and read "Twilight" ten years after its first publication. (And I gave it a two-star review!)