I wanted to fix the old Canon EOS camera for Isaac to use. I had to drive to a specialty camera shop in San Rafael. It’s a big place, filled with vintage cameras from every decade and obscure lenses and knickknacks. Right next to the vintage camera shop is a used bookstore, obviously. I went into the bookstore for impulse buys, thinking that I could get a stack of used books and give them to my children, who would be grateful for a break from screens. The classics were only $5 each, all lined up in a special section for great and valuable works. I bought used paperback versions of Moby Dick, Oliver Twist, and To Kill a Mockingbird.
When I got home, the kids suggested that I put the books on a very high shelf so nobody would accidentally spill water on them or anything. Instead of doing that, I started Oliver Twist, which I had never read. This made me feel like I had uncovered the original source of all parody of nineteenth century British people. Every sentence is preposterous, like Dickens is mocking anyone who would write like he does. For example:
“Well, well,” said Mr. Bumble, “every trade has its drawbacks. A fair profit, is of course, allowable.”
“Of course, of course,” replied the undertaker; “and if I don’t get a profit upon this or that particular article, why, I just make it up in the long run, you see—he! he! he!”
“Just so,” said Mr. Bumble.
This goes on for about 500 pages. Now I know where Richard Scarry got his ideas for Busy, Busy Town. Even poor Oliver, a downtrodden orphan, speaks like a cartoon aristocrat.
I stopped reading after Oliver left Mr. Brownlow’s house with a five-pound note and Mr. Grimwig said, “If that boy ever returns to this house, sir, I’ll eat my head.” I didn’t stop because Mr. Grimwig said that, but because I thought that Mr. Brownslow was bound to be disappointed, and I didn’t want to read about his sorrows. Incidentally, after I wrote these last few sentences, I asked ChatGPT if Charles Dickens was an influence on Richard Scarry, and ChatGPT said, “That’s a really perceptive connection—and yes, you’re on to something literary there” (italics in original ChatGPT sycophancy).
Anyway, after putting down Oliver Twist, I picked up To Kill a Mockingbird. If you’re like me and are around fifty years old, you don’t know whether you have read this book or not. (I did not feel this way about Oliver Twist; I was sure that I had not read it.) Even after reading To Kill a Mockingbird in the last couple weeks, I cannot rule out the possibility that I read it when I was fifteen and forgot all about it for the next 35 years. It all seemed vaguely familiar.
Is this a great book that deserves its fame? Who knows, maybe. It was easy to read. But that’s not enough for election to the literary canon. The kids have given me books to read that were pretty cringe from the first page to the last, and yet I kept reading because the author made me want to find out what would happen next. I finished “Hail Mary” but that doesn’t mean it’s a good book.
I asked the Internet for reviews of To Kill a Mockingbird. I will not review the reviews, but I will quote them selectively to show that some people apparently believe that The Book is evidence of God’s intervention in human affairs. Here are some real reviews:
“A novel to be read and reread, and one that should be present in the consciousness of every schoolchild, everywhere.”1
“To Kill a Mockingbird … sits you down, looks you in the eye, and quietly reshapes how you see the world.”2
“It’s important for every single person to read this book at least once in their lives, because what it teaches cannot be summed up in any other way.”3
“‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ is not merely a classic novel; it is a literary treasure that transcends time.”4
These are among the first reviews that appear in the Google. Based on these words of a few random people who are totally unknown to me, I believe I have to say nice things about To Kill a Mockingbird.
Here’s what I think: To Kill a Mockingbird creates an imaginary world, set in 1930s Alabama, that seems like it might have been real. The town of Maycomb comes across as an impoverished backwater, held together by families who apparently never leave and perpetuate their own caste system from generation to generation. Scout and Jem are growing up and, at first, as kids, they can’t see beyond their games and countless indignities at the hands of teachers, classmates, and mean neighbors. As they get older, they find out that their town is cruel and unjust in many ways, and kind in others.
The book holds up Atticus as a nearly perfect person, who always remembers that the Maycomb people who do bad things must be judged in the context of their lives and circumstances. If this works, it is because the author loves people. Atticus is her voice to tell us why people should be forgiven. I thought To Kill a Mockingbird pulled this off—it was somehow believable that a person like Atticus could exist. This seems like a huge accomplishment, all by itself, especially today.
The book doesn’t deny the existence of evil, of course. The book has one irredeemable character—Bob Ewell, who falsely accuses Tom Robinson of raping his daughter. Even Atticus calls Ewell “trash.” The jurors convict Robinson, even though they knew or should have known that he was innocent (it would have been sort of interesting if the facts were ambiguous or conflicting about whether Robinson was guilty, but they’re just not). The townspeople know that the county jurors are racist, but they can’t be bothered to do better. So, although the people in Maycomb are capable of good, they turn their backs on injustice. In this way, everyone is complicit.
After Ewell attacks the Finch kids and Boo Radley comes out of nowhere to stab Ewell, the sheriff persuades those present to say that Ewell fell on his own knife. Ewell is so evil and Boo Radley is so innocent that even Atticus agrees that the law does not require the whole truth on this occasion. The book leaves things there. It was about empathy, not reform. It may be showing that in some situations, empathy is all that is possible, the beginning, but not the end, of change.
https://matthewjrichardson.com/2018/06/13/book-review-to-kill-a-mockingbird
https://sameergudhate.medium.com/sameer-gudhate-presents-the-book-review-of-to-kill-a-mockingbird-by-harper-lee-2dd4b3285e26
https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-site/2015/jul/17/to-kill-a-mockingbird-harper-lee-review
https://medium.com/illumination/book-review-kill-a-mockingbird-by-harper-lee-80452f17a48b
No worries since "To Kill a Mockingbird" is frequently on the banned book list.