Go Set a Watchman - Harper Lee's Lost Novel -

[*Asterisk*]

I know this doesn't come out until the 14th, but there's so much controversy about this book already I think we need to start talking about it.

The biggest thing to talk about is a spoiler, but if you've been following the news on Go Set a Watchman at all, you already know what I'm gonna talk about. That said, I'll still spoiler marker it for those of you who've been good at avoiding the news:

Spoiler

The book is about Scout's struggle with Atticus's racial prejudices. This isn't some sort of complete change where Atticus is now supposed to be a total monster. He's still the same lawyer who defended an innocent black man accused of raping a white woman and who raised his two children alone and taught them everything they know about morality. He's just a man who holds on to the old prejudices of his homeland's past because that's both the way he was brought up and he doesn't feel black people are sophisticated enough to warrant receiving liberties equal to rights, especially enforced at the hands of the feds.

Motherfuck, I don't even know where to start. On the one hand, even though he's a fictional character, I can't help but be disturbed that the book revolves around such a conflict. Atticus Finch is a hero to me regardless of the fact that he doesn't exist, so knowing the book revolves around such a nasty part of him really disturbs me.

But on the other hand, I kind of admire this being the conflict. The truth is, many of our nations, and my own, greatest heroes have quite profound dark sides directly related to this matter. Thomas Jefferson articulated the foundations of what the US should be better than anyone: he also owned hundreds of human beings; including his own children. Abraham Lincoln gave everything he had to end slavery once and for all: he also proposed those same slaves deportation as the final solution to "the Nigger Question" as it was called back in the day. LBJ used his motivation to help those who came up poor like himself spearhead some seriously powerful civil rights legislation: he also spent the first twenty years of his legislatorial career opposing those very policies and tossed around N-bombs like they were going out of style.

I really understand both sides in this. I always hate seeing the ugly side of great men even when they're not real.

I still wanna see this book. I'll reserve judgment on the quality until I read, but I'll always be happy we had the chance to peer into Harper Lee's mind like this.

Another matter I think warrants discussion is just what kind of book this is. Many call it a sequel, but I don't really see it as such. And not because of the nature of the books conflict.

What people have to remember is that this book was written before To Kill a Mockingbird, and released unaltered from the original condition. The first chapter alone brings up a big difference in that Atticus managed to get a "not guilty" verdict for Tom Robinson. Can this really be considered a sequel when it was written as a draft before the original was published and contradicts the original in such major ways?

I don't think so, but that doesn't mean I consider the book either unworthy of release or unworthy of people's time. Rather, I see Go Set a Watchman in much the same way as I see George Lucas's release of the original Star Wars draft where Han Solo was an alien and C3PO was a sleazy used-car salesman type, although hopefully better in quality.

In fact, I don't even think the word "sequel" is appropriate in these circumstances. Rather, I think GSAW should be referred to as a "variation" on TKAM. Much like how John Coltrane's variations of "My Favorite Things" are both connected and independent of each other. Go Set a Watchman is valuable for that alone, regardless of weather or not the book lives up to the hype or causes people to think about matters outside their comfort zone.

 

[Watcher]

I think it's more interesting for it's historical context than it is for it's value as a book. Making a sequel to TKAM is really hard to do since the book said all it needed to on prejudice and racism in the time it was made. Continuing the story from there just feels unnecessary. It's like making a sequel to something like Blade Runner, it doesn't need one.

 

[*Asterisk*]

I think it's more interesting for it's historical context than it is for it's value as a book. Making a sequel to TKAM is really hard to do since the book said all it needed to on prejudice and racism in the time it was made. Continuing the story from there just feels unnecessary. It's like making a sequel to something like Blade Runner, it doesn't need one.

Again, I don't really think this counts as a true sequel. It was drafted before TKAM , it is not in continuity with TKAM, it isn't being released for money or ego, and was published as it was found without editing to match up with TKAM. Hence why I consider it a "variation" rather than a sequel.

It kind of reminds me of an unauthorized variation that was done on Peanuts. It's a play called Dog Sees God: Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead. It's also not in continuity with and not at the quality level of Peanuts, but it's still a very interesting read. And it has a similar vibe to what the early reviews say GSAW contains.

 

[XYZpdq]

Hence why I consider it a "variation" rather than a sequel

Sorta like Shock Treatment

I think there's a thread about this somewhere around here. I forget, it might have been about the drama around it instead.

If I was really into To Kill A Mockingbird this would probably be really cool. Like, I dunno. A collection of random stages they made for Metal Gear Solid that they threw out, something like that I guess.

 

[NobleGreyHorse]

What bothers me about the book is not what was spoilered in the OP -- I find that more realistic than the Gregory Peck version of Atticus as a noble, flawless hero (for brevity, the film version cuts the whole situation with Scout being ordered to read to Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose, who is withdrawing from an opiate patent medicine she had become addicted to; afterward, Atticus explains he had made Scout keep Mrs. Dubose company during her withdrawal so she would understand that courage was more than just some man with a gun).

It's that it's a first draft. Even some of the original drafts of my own poems, I guess maybe especially those, make me cringe super-hard when I pick them up to revise them. I'll tell my previous self, "Oh my god, no no no, not THAT," or "Did you realize you've [done a particular writey thing] to every single line in this poem? Did you mean to do that? Were we on crack?" And Harper Lee is now 89 years old, living in a glorified nursing home, with -- reportedly, and I don't know the source or accuracy on this -- some cognitive problems. So why are they releasing a first, and therefore inevitably flawed, draft right now? Are they trying to cash in on the racial unrest of which Dylann Roof is merely a small part? Is it that her sister Alice just died, and Alice hated the original book? Basically, I hate to see an iconic author potentially being taken advantage of, and possibly not really understanding how or why. Hell, have a powerlevel.

Spoiler: A poem I wrote at age 4

Nature is green.
Nature is wild.
Yes, Nature can be
Just like a child!

My grandmother literally had that laminated. She kept it on her refrigerator until the moment we had to move her into a nursing home, and like the Jerkhief defeated by Chris-Mary-Sue in Sonichu, my soul hurt every time I walked past the damn thing. So this might well feel a million times worse -- and it's also raising questions of authorship: e.g. did Truman Capote really take over and write Mockingbird for her when her original editor asked for a novel about young Scout?

 

[XYZpdq]

Are they trying to cash in on the racial unrest of which Dylann Roof is merely a small part?

iirc publication of this has been on and off for a while, but I might be wrong and getting it mixed up with somebody else

 

[Silver]

I was talking to Mom about it and she said "I love Scout. I identify with Scout." and I was like ... What?

 

[*Asterisk*]

So this might well feel a million times worse -- and it's also raising questions of authorship: e.g. did Truman Capote really take over and write Mockingbird for her when her original editor asked for a novel about young Scout?

This story has less validity than the "Shakespeare was a pen name" theory.* It's been proven wrong for quite some time, and do you have any idea the effort it'd take to cover something like this up for so long?

The Million Little Pieces guy couldn't keep his cover, and somehow Harper Lee's been able to keep things under wraps for over half a century when she wrote one of the most popular novels of the century and countless frauds of lesser fame and acclaim get caught every single time?

How about this? Harper Lee wrote TKAM. No conspiracies, no coverups, no nonsense, no half century of silence; just a lady and a book.

*Which is bullshit for many, many reasons, but I digress.

 

[AnOminous]

This story has less validity than the "Shakespeare was a pen name" theory.* It's been proven wrong for quite some time, and do you have any idea the effort it'd take to cover something like this up for so long?

The Million Little Pieces guy couldn't keep his cover, and somehow Harper Lee's been able to keep things under wraps for over half a century when she wrote one of the most popular novels of the century and countless frauds of lesser fame and acclaim get caught every single time?

The Million Little Pieces guy was a dumbass, though. I think In Cold Blood and To Kill a Mockingbird could have been written by the same author. Or it could just be that Harper Lee and Truman Capote's influence on each other was that intense. I have always had the theory that Harper Lee may well have written a lot of In Cold Blood. After all, she was certainly with Capote at the time, and it would be very unlikely for her not to have any influence at all over the final text.

I also don't think that interview really proves the idea wrong. Truman Capote is easily intelligent enough to have set up evidence like that if he felt like it. The only part of that I find convincing is that he would be too much of an egomaniac not to take credit for something he had any hand in, and that makes a bit of sense.

 

[Holdek]

The only part of that I find convincing is that he would be too much of an egomaniac not to take credit for something he had any hand in, and that makes a bit of sense.

I think he quietly encouraged those rumors, or at least didn't disabuse them, because he was jelly that Lee was getting all that praise for her first book.

 

[sugoi-chan]

It's that it's a first draft. Even some of the original drafts of my own poems, I guess maybe especially those, make me cringe super-hard when I pick them up to revise them. I'll tell my previous self, "Oh my god, no no no, not THAT," or "Did you realize you've [done a particular writey thing] to every single line in this poem? Did you mean to do that? Were we on crack?" And Harper Lee is now 89 years old, living in a glorified nursing home, with -- reportedly, and I don't know the source or accuracy on this -- some cognitive problems. So why are they releasing a first, and therefore inevitably flawed, draft right now? Are they trying to cash in on the racial unrest of which Dylann Roof is merely a small part? Is it that her sister Alice just died, and Alice hated the original book? Basically, I hate to see an iconic author potentially being taken advantage of, and possibly not really understanding how or why. Hell, have a powerlevel.

This is what I heard too. Lee didn't release the story in the many many years she's had available to do it and it's now coming out? After the sister (and caretaker) died and her estate has been left to lawyers?

And supposedly, according to that same lawyer, there's a third book in that same safe deposit box where the original was found: http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/13/living/feat-harper-lee-mockingbird-watchman-third-novel/

Given that it's not a sequel to the original book, but rather more of a first draft or early incarnation of what would become Mockingbird...I don't think I'm going to read it. The original meant a lot to me.

 

[Holdek]

According to the person who made the PBS documentary on Lee, who recently visited her to make an update to it, Lee is aware of what is happening and expected the manuscript to be published at some point anyway. The State of Alabama investigated an anonymous elder abuse complaint alleging that she was unable to consent to it being published, and concluded that indeed she wanted it to be.

So, for better or for worse, it is what it is.

 

[NobleGreyHorse]

Just to clarify, when I said "It's raising questions," I didn't mean "I totes believe the Capote conspiracy theory, guise." I meant literally, "People across the interwebs are wondering about whether Lee really wrote this." I don't have any doubt that she did. Complex Atticus just may be best Atticus, because people who have acted for abolition or civil rights, from Lincoln to LBJ, have more or less quietly held racist beliefs: Harriet Beecher Stowe, too. The woman Uncle Tom meets when they are both owned by Simon Legree is classic "Tragic Mulatto" stereotype from head to toe, just to name one example. And even Gregory Peck's Atticus, delivering his closing remarks in defense of Tom Robinson, points out that Mayella chose to kiss a young, healthy man, "not an old uncle." Cringe.

(Trivia for people who liked the movie: Brock Peters, who played Tom Robinson, did a lot of voice acting as Darth Vader in audiobooks, video games, and IIRC the NPR radio plays of the original Star Wars trilogy.)

I'll be interested to see how the flashbacks work, whether they're clunky or whether they do what they're supposed to. Scenes like that are difficult to write and integrate (no pun intended) into the flow of a book.

 

[The Knife]

OH THANK GOD SOMEONE MADE A THREAD

Spoiler: Now is my chance to sperg!

Having read the book, I'd say there are some weird, weird aspects to it that bring into question the validity of its origins. Not to be too glib, but it honestly does feel like it was written well after TKAM: there are some characterization issues that simply do not make sense unless the reader has previously read TKAM, such as the whole Atticus thing. And it's not a minor deal, considering that the entire conceit of the book is that Scout (and by proxy the reader) has to have a sense of Atticus as a role model and decent man before learning that he's really a racist and always has been. There's literally no emotional heft to the novel if you don't have that piece of information. It falls flat on its face without it. This is echoed in a scene where Scout goes to meet a now-retired Calpurnia, her old nurse and her family's cook, and is shocked that Calpurnia now treats her like a white lady, as opposed to the sincere loving relationship they shared when Scout was a child. Except...without TKAM, we only have Scout's word (and a few piddling flashbacks) to that relationship ever existing. Either Scout is a deeply delusional woman who imagined nobility and affection where there was literally no evidence for it, or this book did a superbly shitty job of setting up its flashback sections.

More than that, it's very much a first draft. The pacing is all over (I had to read someone else's review before I even figured out that the story takes place over three days); there are wholly superfluous sections just take up space, such as a section where Scout breaks aside to explain the internal politics of the local Methodist church. It's not a bad book--it's highly readable; I finished it in like, a day--but the quality is very uneven.

Frankly, the only reason for it to even exist is to either shed some light on the creation of TKAM, or to expand and conclude that story, and it doesn't really do either.

 

[bradsternum]

I'm interested in reading the book purely from a wannabe writer perspective. It was written before TKAM, @The Knife, and her agent helped Harper Lee strip it for parts, and reassemble it into the book we know and love. I'm in the camp of people who believe that Harper Lee did not want this book to see the light of day. It's all too suspicious; this bitch who controls Harper Lee's estate waits for Alice Lee to die, and then "discovers" the book in a safety deposit box? Come on. It's a little too perfect, isn't it? Harper Lee's statements all come through this woman - the public hasn't seen her in years.

Now, according to interviews from around the time Lee released TKAM, she was writing a book - don't remember if it was a sequel or something different, but I don't think she got very far into it. The success of TKAM was too intimidating for her. But hey, if your legacy is one of the greatest English books of the 20th Century, maybe it's ok to rest on your laurels.

Edit: As for the old question about Capote - Honestly, I think he spread that rumor. He was bitter that Lee won the Pulitzer before he did. He was a spoiled old queen - not to say that he wasn't brilliant, too.

 

[AnimuGinger]

So, I bought it Thursday, had it read by Friday night. I was underwhelmed.

 

[Mrs Paul]

Call me a wuss, call me overly sentimental, but TKAM has always been one of my favorite books, and Gregory Peck is one of my favorite actors. It's not just the view of Atticus as a racist -- I could see him as a quasi-segregationist, as in, "I have no problem with the Negros, but they have their place, and we have ours". But an outright Klan supporter? Just...no.

I do want to know though -- does it mention Boo Radley, or say what happened to him?

 

[AnimuGinger]

I do want to know though -- does it mention Boo Radley, or say what happened to him?

I don't think he was ever mentioned. Since this is a sorta-sequel-sorta-retconeverything book, I think his story may have just fallen away.

 

[XYZpdq]

Boo probably didn't exist as a concept at the time this was written.

 

[Whiskey Foxtrot]

Because a couple of posters have already mentioned it and I feel like it should be elaborated on, here are a few links for anyone who's interested that explain the controversy and potentially shady business surrounding Go Set a Watchman and Harper Lee's questionable consent to its publication:

- Paste Magazine
- The Washington Post
- The Atlantic
- Vanity Fair (information on Lee's history of legal disputes and being taken advantage of)

The Cliffs Notes version is that the manuscript of GSAW (essentially the first draft of To Kill a Mockingbird) was squirrelled away in a lockbox for dozens of years before Tonja Carter, Harper Lee's lawyer, coincidentally "discovered" it three months after the death of Alice Lee, Harper's older sister, who was also a lawyer and had handled her younger sibling's financial and legal affairs up to that point.

Since then, there have been claims that Lee is neither physically nor mentally competent, and that Carter is manipulating her and isolating her from others. All of Lee's (supposed) statements to the press are only delivered by Carter, some friends and acquaintances of Lee's have said that Carter has denied them access to her, and her conduct has definitely been shifty (lying, refusing to answer questions, etc.).

I think everyone should be fully informed about the circumstances surrounding GSAW, even if they don't necessarily believe all of the claims being made. I haven't read GSAW yet, but when I do, I think I'll probably buy a second-hand copy to be on the safe side. I love TKAM, and I just hate the thought that I might be putting money in the pockets of someone who has no qualms taking advantage of a talented author and vulnerable old lady, you know?