In the Spring of 1957, an American publisher received the first novel from 31-year-old Harper Lee. “The spark of the true writer flashed in every line," her editor said, but nevertheless declared it not fit for publication – “more a series of anecdotes than a fully conceived novel". Lee and her editor completely reworked the manuscript and three years later, one of the great classics of the 20th Century, “To Kill A Mockingbird”, was published.
For me, and for many others, it is in the top rank of
favourite novels, and Atticus Finch is one of the great literary heroes. So,
when the reclusive Harper Lee published “Go Set A Watchman” in 2015, a supposed
sequel, it created a stir. Atticus Finch of all people had turned racist; the
saint had turned sinner and I determined never to read it. But horror of
horrors, last year it was chosen for our book group and I had to bite the
bullet. What a revelation – I loved it and read it twice!
GSAW is not a sequel but the original manuscript from 1957. It
was written when the US Supreme Court had ruled that education in every state
must be de-segregated and the National Association for the Advancement of
Coloured People was growing in power and influence. The southern states felt
under threat and the deep tensions that emerged form the background to the
novel.
We are 20 years on from TKAM and “Colour-blind” Jean Louise Finch
returns to her hometown to find her New York values are not only at odds with
Maycomb but tragically at odds with her much-revered Father and also her would-be
husband. The flashbacks to childhood where black and white lived alongside each
other in a separated harmony and where six-year-old Scout had no understanding
of the currents building in the black community contrast sharply with the
present where the currents are running strong, and the demand for equal rights is
not only tearing the community apart but also tearing Jean Louise from those
she holds dear.
At a church service she hears this text from Isaiah:
“For thus hath the Lord said unto me, Go, set a watchman,
let him declare what he seeth.” (Is 21:6)
“Fallen, fallen is Babylon; And all the images of her
gods are shattered on the ground.”
Isaiah saw the coming destruction of Babylon and liberation
of the Jews from captivity, and Jean Louise sees the coming liberation
of African-Americans from subservience to full citizenship, but her
contemporaries are oblivious. In a social gathering, young
women she grew up with talk openly of doing away with the Negro race. She reflects on how the great words of the Gettysburg Address have become a grotesque parody:
“Conceived in mistrust
and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created evil.”
“I hope the world
will little note nor long remember what you are saying here.”
She thinks, “I should like to
take your head apart, put a fact in it, and watch it go its way through the
runnels of your brain until it comes out of your mouth. We were both born here,
we went to the same schools, we were taught the same things. I wonder what you
saw and heard.”
At a key point in the novel she confronts Atticus and her
language is visceral:
“Atticus, I’m throwing it at you and I’m gonna grind it in:
you better go warn your younger friends that if they want to preserve Our Way
of Life, it begins at home. It doesn’t begin with the schools or the churches
or any place but home. Tell’ em that, and use your blind, immoral, misguided,
nigger - lovin’ daughter as your example. Go in front of me with a bell and
say, ‘Unclean!”
She wants no more to do with Maycomb and no more to do with
Atticus. But her uncle halts her flight.
He says, she has revered her father too much and turned him into a God -
“And all the images of her gods are shattered on the ground.”
A famous passage from TKAM is:
“You never really understand a person until you consider
things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk
around in it.”
Her uncle makes Jean Louise realise that her conscience, her
Watchman as he calls it, is not the same as her father’s and she needs a new
relationship with him, adult to adult.
GSAW is an uncompromising call for justice seen through the
eyes of an adult, but it was transformed into TKAM narrated by a child. Was this
because Harper Lee could not reconcile the Old Testament voice of the prophet
calling for justice and righteousness with the New Testament message of mercy
and forgiveness? TKAM removed the conflict between Atticus and Jean Louise, the
cry of the prophet was silenced, and Atticus was able to stand Christ-like, for
mercy and forgiveness.
If you have never read either, then do read TKAM. But I
found GSAW far more powerful in the themes it explores; more realistic and less
idealistic than TKAM.
