Books: Go Set a Watchman

I’ve always enjoyed posting about books I am reading, though in the past I’ve done it in an all in one post. This year, I want to write about each book after I finish, which leads us to Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee.

First of all, there is a lot of controversy about this book because it may have been published without Harper Lee’s permission, at least permission while she is in her right mind. I suspect that she permitted this work while having less than a sound mind, though who can say, really? However, I imagine that this work would have been published and read upon her death anyhow, so perhaps, she did give it permission to be published while she was living.

Second of all, I LOVED To Kill a Mockingbird. Sadly, I just read it for the first time just two years ago. It may be my all time favorite book. The writing is solid and good with well developed characters and details. The story is excellent. It is about Scout (also known as Jean Louise), Jem (her brother), Atticus (her dad), Calpurnia (her black maid), and Dill (her childhood friend). There are other characters in the story, but these are the main ones. Atticus is a lawyer, who tries a case representing a black boy who has supposedly raped a white girl. Scout is a rambunctious, little girl who often sneaks into the courtroom and around town to see for herself what is really happening, so the story is told from her point of view. Atticus is definitely the hero figure of the book.

Go Set a Watchman was written first, given to publishers, and then they suggested Harper Lee write a story about what happened to Jean Louise (Scout) in her childhood, which is how To Kill a Mockingbird came to be. The two works are intrinsically tied together, but TKAM went on to win a Pulitzer prize and was given much more time and care in the story crafting and editing. The story articulated racism in the 1930’s, and one man’s fight to do what was right. Go Set a Watchman was not as well crafted, though it is a beautiful story.

In Go Set a Watchman, Jean Louise is 26 years old and has moved to New York. The story starts as she comes home to Maycomb, Alabama, for a two week visit to see Atticus and her potential boyfriend, Henry (Hank). I found the opening of the book super hard to read. I often had to reread the pages to make sure I was understanding what was happening, and after a while, I began to understand Harper Lee’s raw style of writing. I like to know where a story is headed, and once I picked up how to read the story, I began to engage in it more, whereas at first, I was not sure I wanted to finish it. The crux of the story happens again while Jean Louise (Scout) is once again hiding in the balcony of the courtroom eavesdropping – this time on a Maycomb County Citizens’ Council meeting instead of a trial as in TKAM. The story, though speculating on racism and racial division from many sides and viewpoints, is not really about racism however.

It could change your thoughts on the beauty and adoration of the fight against racism in TKAM. Many people will not love this story because it will perhaps change how you view Atticus and what you loved about him. I, however, read this book still seeing Atticus as the hero, because he and Uncle Jack were still teaching Jean Louise something. I was able to read this story and love it, at least in part, because I could remove myself from the idealist view-point of Scout and look for the underlying message of the book. What does this book want to teach me? I probably loved this book because I am from a small town in Alabama that is much like Maycomb. I’ve known how women gossip and prattle on, and I’ve seen the division racism causes. Like Scout, I am an idealist. Like Scout, I’ve had to face the harsh reality and painful truth that people I love are not who I thought they were when I was a child. I definitely felt I understood Harper Lee more after reading.

This story asks us if we will continue to love people when we find out that they are not who we thought they were, and it shows us that when we do not, we are just as much racist as they are. It shows us that often we stick to our own kind, if not in color, then at least in thought and ideal. It is the kind of story that shows us why children grow up and do not remain close to their parents – because they were not the same kind to begin with. This is a coming of age story – the kind where you realize you are your own person and are still loved though you think quite differently.

There are a lot of hard truths about the characters in this book. They are true to being from Alabama, and I was born 20+ years after this was written, but even I could see how it came to be. If I had to guess Harper Lee’s thoughts on racism, I’d say she was an idealist just like Scout, and that TKAM, not Go Set a Watchman, is her perceived reality about the way the world should be. Go Set a Watchman is a book about Lee’s wrestling with the truths of her family and who they are. Even though she wrote this novel first with the intent to publish, my opinion is that she probably did not want to publish this book while her family members (ie, her dad and sister) whom could be hurt by the story were still living, assuming she may not live to see the day she could publish it without hurting either one of them.

*****

I’ve changed my website design, so email subscribers will see a change in the emails coming soon. For now, feel free to click over and take a peek.