To Kill a Mockingbird is simply my all-time favorite novel. I first heard about it in 1960, shortly after it was published. I was ten years old. The adults in my life cussed and discussed it so much, and so often, that I thought I was going to die in anticipation of reading it. The adults were too, too slow readers and it was grossly unfair, I thought, that I, a fast reader even then, had to wait on a bunch of molasses waders. But after I got my hands on TKaM, I learned it was very hard to relinquish it to the next reader. My mother, bless her, enabled me by buying our own family a copy. That was nearly fifty years ago and hundreds of readings later (in the early years, I would read it every other week, but after about ten years the rereadings tapered down to once or twice a year), I have great chunks of TKaM memorized. I feel that TKaM is so much a part of me that if -- hard to imagine -- I had never read it...well, I wouldn't be me!

That's all I will say, for now. I have a tendency to be too enthusiastic when discussing To Kill a Mockingbird.

Unlike many American readers, I did not get TKaM as an assignment in school, although from what I understand it is now on the curriculum of some schools in Iceland.

I did not, in fact, hear of it until I was an adult, which is a pity, because I would have loved it as a teenager. As it is I like it very much, and I know I will re-read it at some point. It is a very effective coming-of-age story, and I think the Boo Radley mystery on the one and and the trial on the other balance it nicely so that we see how Scout is growing up from her reactions to the trial and its outcome while still being capable of the childish wonder and fearlessness that causes her to connect with Boo Radley.

I remembered that I loved TKaM, but I didn't remember a lot of details other than the horrific trial and its outcome. I was surprised to be so charmed by the series of vignettes of southern life a few decades ago. Although I am from the north, well do I remember a time when children were taught manners, manners, manners - proper behavior was everything. I know many RPers were probably raised that way. I remember vividly the maxim "Children are seen and not heard" - hard as it was, no interrupting of adults was allowed. (I wish this could come back in at least a modified form.) I also keenly felt Atticus's difficulties in living by his own principles, raising children without a mother. In this reading, he lept off the pages to me.

I am interested in how the novel is perceived by those from countries other than the U.S. Netla has already weighed in - I wonder if there is any equivalent to this way of life and the beliefs expressed in the novel in other places? Those of us from the industrial north might view the novel as though it is in fact from other country!

I read this in high school and when my DD was assigned it this year, I wanted to read it again. Rosefolly's suggestion to discuss it was the push I needed to do so.

All I remembered from my first reading was that I liked the book, I remembered the ham costume, I had a few snippets of the movie stuck in my head, and I could recall one line from trial about making dandy shoes from old tires (insert image of my DD rolling her eyes at me here). Re-reading was a singular pleasure and I simply couldn't put the book down.

Reading it as an adult, I was struck by Scout's voice and the fact that Harper Lee never, ever, slipped up in writing Scout. Few authors can channel a child's POV and Lee did it perfectly. I think Rosefolly figured out part of Lee's magic: Children assume a certain rightness (though not necessarily goodness) in way the world works. -- exactly! And I would argue most adults forget this. Lee did not.

I was in awe of Atticus and his remarkably firm moral compass. Profound is an apt word to describe him. All in all, I found the book charming, amusing in places, utterly heart-breaking in others. It was a perfect book, IMHO.

As to why Harper Lee never wrote another book -- perhaps she only had the one story to tell, and having told it perfectly, had no desire to write more. I know almost nothing about her, and can only guess at this.

I'm so glad I re-read this, it was brilliant and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

Reading it as an adult, I was struck by Scout's voice and the fact that Harper Lee never, ever, slipped up in writing Scout. Few authors can channel a child's POV and Lee did it perfectly.Sheri, the narrative point of view is especially interesting, to me, because although it's obvious that there's the six-, seven-, eight-, and nine-year-old Scout's point of view, there's also the grown-up Scout who is equally obviously telling the story with the benefit of hindsight. Sometimes there is a blend of the two points of view -- the child's and the grown-up's. As an adolescent reader this didn't bother me one whit, and truthfully until it was pointed out to me I never even considered it (and was certainly never distracted by it, even now). Yet some critics apparently found (find) fault with Lee's switching and blending viewpoints. I found this in Mockingbird, the biography of Harper Lee by Charles J. Shields:
W.J. Stuckey in The Pulitzer Prize Novels: A Critical Backward Look, attributed Lee's "rhetorical trick" to a failure to solve "the technical problems raised by her story and whenever she gets into difficulties with one point of view, she switches to the other.
Shields continues that Lee rewrote her novel three times, the original being in third person, then changed to first person, and finally rewrote it to blend the child Scout and the adult Jean Louise "Janus-like, looking forward and back at the same time. She later called this a 'hopeless period' of writing the novel over and over."

Personally, I think this "trick" is what gives power to the narrative. Can you imagine the story being told entirely in third person? Or entirely in childish first person? I think the critics are being too picky.

Frieda, I loved it just the way it was. Somehow even the "older" voice still recalled the story through the eyes of a child. I had no problem with it, and honestly, barely noticed it. A third person narration would have been wooden, I think.

Yes, I agree, and it is the blending of the voices that gives the novel such power and originality. Critics do have to find something to be critical about.

The one and only thing I had a bit of doubt about was Scout's assertion that she did not miss her mother. A mother's love is something that doesn't have to be experienced to be missed. At some point in her life, the adult Scout would feel her mother's absence. But this is of course my opinion and not worth a jot, just something that struck me when I read the book.

I read this book in school, though whether it was assigned or recommended I can't remember now. I suspect it was recommended. I loved it then, and love re-reading it.
I grew up in the north east of the US, but lived in the South (Tennessee) during the 1990s. After my first summer, I truly understood the opening of the book as Scout talks about wilting on the summer days. Without air conditioning, each day would seem a full 24 hours long, especially to a child.
I finished the book very fast, and want to review a couple of things before posting more comments.

The one and only thing I had a bit of doubt about was Scout's assertion that she did not miss her mother.Siobhan, it's a particularly poignant aspect of TKaM that the children are motherless -- Jem and Scout because their mother died, and Dill because his mother farmed him out to relatives whenever she could. Harper Lee evidently felt conflicted about mothers in general. Her own mother, Frances Lee, evidently suffered from some sort of "nervous disorder," perhaps depression or Alzheimer's. This made her emotionally distant and nonresponsive; other times she was a flibbertigibbet and an endless gossip. Truman Capote skewered her in a short story he wrote when he was ten years old, calling her "Old Mrs. Busybody." Nelle Harper Lee, being the youngest of four children, was possibly given the least mothering by Mrs. Lee. Nelle and other family members seemed to have been somewhat ashamed of Mrs. Lee. Charles J. Shields in the biography of Harper Lee I mentioned above speculates that
When it came time to write To Kill a Mockingbird, Nelle wiped the slate clean of the conflict between herself and her mother. Since she couldn't be her mother's daughter, so to speak, in the novel, the fictional Finch family has no mother. Or, rather, it did have, but "Our mother died when I was two," says Scout, "so I never felt her absence."
Perhaps the absence of a mother also makes the story better, after all it is one of the most admirable aspects of Atticus's character: the rearing of his children without their mother.

I also admired Atticus a great deal, partly because I could identify him with my grandfather. My grandmother died when my mother was 10. She had one sister who was 12 and two younger sisters plus a five-year-old brother. My grandfather raised them by himself, and they all thought he hung the moon.

I read TKAM when it first came out and loved it but somehow didn't reread it until last year. Maybe it was because I thought I remembered it quite well, but, of course, I didn't and thoroughly enjoyed it again.

I agree that it is a perfect book. Critics must criticize, I suppose, but I don't see any validity in what Frieda quoted above. I think Ms. Lee got it just right. Scout is wonderful, and Calpurnia was a wonderful mother substitute.

Thank you for that, frieda, it greatly clarifies the idea in my mind. Now I see why Lee makes a point of Scout not missing her mother.

Even today it is a bit unusual for a single man to raise children on his own - everyone seems to take for granted he will remarry ASAP to provide the children with a stepmother. I have a friend who lost his wife to cancer, leaving him with three girls under the age of ten, and he was constantly bombarded with "advice" to find the girls a new mother...grrrr. Lee creates a character so good and yet so human - really an achievement.

A side note for us readers: Years ago, when I was in my twenties, a friend and I were discussing a Halloween party she had attended. I asked about the costumes and she told me that her favorite was the person who came as Boo Radley. I was excited and wanted to know about the costume. I remember her saying: "That's what I like about you. None of my other friends would have any idea who Boo Radley was." That memory has stuck with me for some reason.

This was my second reading for the book. I didn't read it in high school, but I read for my book group a few years ago. What struck me this time was how much I didn't remember from the first reading. In my mind, growing up in the 60s, this book was all about the racial issues. In reality, this was a coming-of-age story. I didn't really see that the first time. (Dense, I know.)
I actually enjoyed watching how Jem matured over the course of the story.

I couldn't help comparing this to "The Help," which I also reread recently for my book group. Although "The Help" isn't near the quality of TKaMB, I did enjoy it, and saw some similarities. One in particular that struck me was that in both stories, the white kids went to church with the black housekeeper.

I'll have more to add later.

In my mind, growing up in the 60s, this book was all about the racial issues. In reality, this was a coming-of-age story. I didn't really see that the first time.Vicki, I think the racial issues are still the most commonly perceived feature of TKaM -- too often to the exclusion of practically everything else HL wrote into her story. It is, I think, a particular myopia, perhaps generational -- or at least age connected -- that some readers apparently can never correct in their minds unless they reread TKaM at least once or maybe several times. I don't think a reader is dense for not picking up on the coming-of-age theme on a first reading: it all depends upon what the reader is attuned to at the time.

I think it's interesting how readers have changed since my early experiences reading TKaM. I've told this story before but here it is again: I wanted to give a book report on TKaM, circa 1961/62, but my teacher nixed my choice because she deemed TKaM a "trashy" book -- her thinking apparently being the subject matter was inappropriate for the pre-teen that I was at the time. I begged my teacher to allow it, and even got my mother to write a note saying she approved of my reading it. No dice. TKaM was off limits.

Even when I was in high school and college TKaM was not a commonly assigned book, but then in the 1970s it seemed to me that it leapt onto school reading lists. Why? What had happened? It dawned on me that the teachers had changed -- they were more likely to have read TKaM themselves while young and impressionable. But unfortunately the more TKaM was assigned, the less impressed the newer readers seemed to be. At goodreads the reviews of TKaM are overwhelmingly favorable, but boy! the negative ones are doozies. I've noticed that a lot of these are young readers who had to read TKaM.

Frieda, I think it's that had to read it aspect that puts younger readers off. I also wonder if they have the ability to really take in what they are reading. I know they don't have the life experience or historical knowledge that aids in truly understanding books set in certain times and places, and I wonder how much insight their teachers offer (or, if offered, how much of it is heard or understood).

Sarah Canary -

So now I'm curious. What was the Boo Radley costume like?

Lemonhead - That's been a realllly long time ago. But I'm guessing it was just pasty makeup and white hair. Maybe some non-descript clothes. Didn't Boo have a sort of "never-seen-the-sun" look about him?

I have a question. Frieda - since you have read this so many times, maybe you can answer.

SPOILERS

Did Boo actually kill Ewell or was it an accident, as the sheriff so eloquently persuaded Atticus. :) If it was in fact Boo, even if it happened accidentally, do you think he was dangerous? I kept thinking back to the scissors incident.

SC, I think everything indicates that Boo killed Ewell. Such as:

1) the knife between Ewell's ribs was a kitchen knife. Mr. Heck Tate explained that Ewell probably found the knife in the dump and honed it down; but

2) Sheriff Tate was using a switchblade knife to demonstrate to Atticus what had happened. Atticus suddenly asked Tate where he had gotten the knife, and the sheriff said he had taken it off a drunk earlier that night. (I interpret this: the sheriff was lying and he had probably picked it up alongside Ewell's body or somewhere under the big oak tree and it was likely Ewell's knife. The kitchen knife came from someone else and Boo was the only one who could've brought it.)

3) Sheriff Tate told Atticus under no uncertain terms that the decision was his (Tate's) alone. His decision was that Bob Ewell fell on his own knife, and if Atticus disputed it he would call Atticus a liar to his face. Tate goes on to say:
"Mr. Finch, taking the one man who's done you and this town a great service an' draggin' him with his shy ways into the limelight--to me, that's a sin. It's a sin and I'm not about to have it on my head. If it was any other man it'd be different. But not this man, Mr. Finch."

"I may not be much, Mr. Finch, but I'm still sheriff of Maycomb County and Bob Ewell fell on his knife. Good night, sir."

The logical inference I get from Tate's pronouncement is he was going to protect Boo Radley, although he knew Boo had killed Ewell.

Now, whether Boo was dangerous... I don't think he was to Jem, Scout, Dill or to most people. He did stab his father in his thigh with the scissors, but I suspect plenty of pent-up provocation. What was it Calpurnia said of old Mr. Radley when he finally died and his body was carried from his house: There goes the meanest man ever God blew breath into.

Rosefolly, yes, I also thought that Mayella was a victim of incest. It seemed implicit. I think, in the film version, some of the body language indicated this, as well. I saw Mayella as desperate to escape from her world, nightmarish in so many ways.

As for Boo, I thought Lee wanted readers to see him as almost child-like in his innocence, despite the murder he committed to save the children. Many years ago, when I first read this, our professor stated that Boo Radley was meant to be a "christ figure." Any takes on this?

As to why the novel suddenly jumped on to so many school reading lists by the 1970's. What had happened? What, indeed. America had just undergone the turbulence of the Civil Rights Movement! I might add that others,such as the work of Langston Hughes, also jumped in popularity at that time.

I also think it is implied that Bob Ewell imposed incestuous relations on Mayella. Whether she was moved to force herself onto Tom Robinson because of incest-generated promiscuity, I don't know if I can draw that inference. I rather suspect it was because she was so hellishly lonely. Tom was the only person who had ever been nice to her for no reason (except that, as he said, he felt "sorry" for her). And he was a man and Mayella perhaps had developed fantasy ideas about him. She was eighteen or nineteen years old and pathetically ignorant, but her fantasies might have been normal enough if she had not acted on them. This is just my gut feeling because I too have always felt sorry for Mayella, in spite of what she did.

Woodnymph, I don't see Boo Radley as a "christ figure." I'm not sure what the parallels could be between Boo and Christ. Please tell us what your professor thought, if s/he elucidated. I have to admit that I usually took any ex cathedra-like statements from my professors with a great deal of skepticism. I never formally studied TKaM and it's probably a good thing because I probably would have got myself in the prof's doghouse. ;-)

Woodnymph, no doubt about the Civil Rights Movement. But I was thinking more about the lag time. TKaM appeared just about half way between the salvos of Brown v. the Board of Education (1964) and the Civil Rights Act of 1964. I graduated from high school in 1968 and got my first university degree in 1972. In all my school years between 1960 and 1972, I never ran into TKaM as any assignment. And believe me I would have noticed and been jubilant if I had. (Instead I got five assignments of Nineteen Eighty-Four.) Of course people had been reading TKaM all along, but it wasn't yet a regular curriculum item. I left for Europe in the summer of 1972 and when I returned to the U.S. in the late '70s, the assignments of TKaM had bloomed. I still think that the main difference was the people teaching -- the old guard of teachers had passed (was passing) from the scene and the newer teachers had the interest and willingness to promote the racial (as well as the feminist, antiwar, etc.) aspects of more recent culture in literary assignments.

Quotes that will not soon fade from memory:

"Hey, Boo."
and
"Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passin'."

Correction of my typo above: Make it Brown v. the Board of Education (1954)

Oh-oh, and I wanted to ask: What do you all think of the Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose episode? This is a curiously neglected part of the story in my opinion, yet to me it has always seemed pivotal in Jem's coming of age. I still cannot read it without crying.

Does Mrs. Dubose even appear in the film adaptation? I can't recall. I know the Reader's Digest condensed version omitted it entirely -- a travesty. I'm not a fan of condensations and abridgements, but I'm not going to begrudge their usefulness for some readers.

"Mr. Finch, taking the one man who's done you and this town a great service an' draggin' him with his shy ways into the limelight--to me, that's a sin. It's a sin and I'm not about to have it on my head. If it was any other man it'd be different. But not this man, Mr. Finch."

I think the quote above is the quote in the book that draws the line of connection between Boo and the mockingbird. Here is the quote about why it is a sin to kill a mockingbird:

"Remember itÂs a sin to kill a mockingbird." That was the only time I ever heard Atticus say it was a sin to do something, and I asked Miss Maudie about it.
"Your fatherÂs right," she said. "Mockingbirds donÂt do one thing but make music for us to enjoy . . . but sing their hearts out for us. ThatÂs why itÂs a sin to kill a mockingbird."

In addition, mockingbirds don't have a voice of their own - the song that they sing repeats what other birds sing.(which is very fascinating to hear,IMHO) Boo didn't have a voice of his own, either, at least as far as the adults in his family were concerned. They kept him under lock and key after a run in with the law, and an incident when he attacked his father with a pair of scissors. His own family spoke of him as being dangerous and not fit to be in public, and maybe he was. Perhaps the only people who acknowledged Boo's 'voice' were Jem and Scout, who had received kindness and small gifts from him.

friedag, I first read TKAM in high school English class in 1975, so that fits your timeline. I had a youngish teacher (around 30) who was very enthused about parts of the book, mainly about the racial inequalities. He homed in and spent most of the time concentrating on that. I do not remember discussing the Mrs Dubose part at all. I completely forgot about it in fact until I re-read it a decade later. That time I was struck, as you were, at how pivotal it was for Jem.

I know what you mean about crying. It is a sad but very profound lesson. Atticus said to Jem, "son, I told you that if you hadn't lost your head I'd have made you go read to her. I wanted you to see something about her - I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do. Mrs Dubose won, all ninety-eight pounds of her. According to her views, she died beholden to nothing and nobody. She was the bravest person I ever knew." It is a long quote but I think it is one of the most important in the whole book.

Lydia, thanks for your response. The usual silence about the Mrs. Dubose episode has always puzzled me. I don't know if readers generally don't find it compelling or it is relatively unmemorable coming on the heels of the indelible image of Atticus shooting the mad dog. But I'm with you about that quote. It is Atticus's warning to Jem and foreshadows that the first baby steps of standing up to the status quo cannot be expected to succeed but are nonetheless necessary.It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what.It epitomizes Atticus's involvement, don't you think? I think it is one of the most powerful messages in all of TKaM.I am interested in how the novel is perceived by those from countries other than the U.S. Netla has already weighed in - I wonder if there is any equivalent to this way of life and the beliefs expressed in the novel in other places? Those of us from the industrial north might view the novel as though it is in fact from other country!Siobhan, I'm sure you would prefer to hear directly from readers outside the U.S., but your question interested me so I asked two of my non-U.S. friends about what they think. I thought I would share their responses.

The first friend was born, bred, and still lives in Yorkshire. She says that she half-expected TKaM to be completely foreign to her. Instead she found that, although many of the characteristics make the place and people of TKaM unique to the American South, there were just as many instances in which she could identify. She feels that Maycomb could almost be any small town in England, with similar eccentrics, prejudices, and pathos. She sees the theme as universal to the human condition.

My second friend is Argentinian. She says what enchanted her so much was the children's day-to-day lives: how they were left to their own devices and how safe their world seemed until, of course, things were no longer safe for them.

I think I have profoundly thoughtful friends!

An experience of mine: I tried to read Ne tirez pas sur l'oiseau moqueur, but I finally gave up because Jem and Scout speaking French just seemed too incongruous to me. It makes me wonder how many English translations come out sounding absurd to the speakers of the language the story was originally written in.

LOL! Jem and Scout's and the other characters' dialect seems so much an intrinsic part of the way the story is told. How can translators convey that charm? I imagine that a lot could be lost in translation.

friedag, maybe people are not very interested in Mrs Dubose because she is a hateful old woman. She weaned herself with Jem's help from morphine addiction, but she did it only for her own benefit and triumph. Unlike Atticus who thought her the bravest person he had ever known, most people will not find much to admire in her and will dismiss her part of the story because of it.

My sister in law is a Filipina American. TKAM is the first American book she read after coming to the United States. It is her all-time favorite book too. Like your Argentinian friend, friedag, and the way you decribed it, rosefolly, she says it is the kids' point of view that makes the story accessible to mature adolescents and believable to adults, yet there is no pandering to either age group.

I cannot help but contrast this to other books with similar themes whose writers DO pander.

You are right lydia, that is exactly how I felt about Mrs. Dubose. I guess my moral compass is very different from Atticus (not necessarily a good thing). When I read that, I thought, "What is the point of suffering? Take the morphine now, when it is needed!" I would have felt differently with a different character in different circumstances, i.e. a young parent overcoming addiction to care for their family. Also, I don't find that strength of character in one area excuses other faults. But I accept the story as indicative of the attitudes that would have been prevalent at that time and place.

The comments from those from other countries really brings home the timeless and universal themes of the book, don't they?

Siobhan, you are a genius. You have put into words what I felt about Mrs. Dubose but couldn't quite put my finger on it. But since I was told by Atticus, my hero, to admire Mrs. D, I tried to, but just couldn't quite make it.

So much is said about 'To Kill a Mockingbird' decades after its first publication. (This just confirms its greatness!) Shmoop had some helpful comments on this book that helped me read it with an interesting approach. Scout, Atticus Finch, and all the other characters become real life people for the readers. This is a book you go back to again and again. In the midst of the chaos, the book gives you solace that there are good people in the world who have the integrity to stand up for what they believe in. There are people who are honest, and righteous, and compassionate. And as long as there are people like Atticus finch, nothing can shake the world from its axis!

Here is a link that might be useful: To Kill a Mockingbird

FYI,a new book is forthcoming next month: "Scout, Atticus, and Boo: A Celebration of 50 years of To Kill a Mockingbird" by Mary McDonagh Murphy. In the review I read, Opra tried to get Harper Lee to come on her program but Lee refused, saying if you know Scout, you know all you need to know about me, because I am Scout.

Very interesting, woodnymph. I'm reading an unauthorized biography of Lee called "Mockingbird." It's not a thrilling read, exactly, but I'm enjoying learning more about her and her life before TKAMB. I'll watch for this new title.

There was a nice article in the book section of our newspaper yesterday about the 50th anniversary of TKAM. People in Ms. Lee's small home town were interviewed and reported her to be reclusive but sometimes seen about town with her sister who has never married. They all said she doesn't like attention but does allow the townspeople to put on a play of TKAM annually with themselves playing the parts--strictly amateurs, no professionals allowed. The article also quoted Ms. Lee as saying she had attempted another novel two or three times but found that she had said all she had to say in the one.

Hi i though i would leave u guys to a link to the book

Here is a link that might be useful: To Kill A Mockingbird pdf

goodbye harper lee. thank you for the good years :( i want to share with you this lovely design in the honour of this amazing woman..

https://teespring.com/its-a-sin-to-kill-a-mockingbir