While the West is withering under the effects of an earth-killing drought, we are swimming in the wet. Rain and more rain. Humidity that is forcing creation to add gills to humans. God bless, but it has been wet! And this is July. Picture me shaking my head slowly, wiping sweat from the back of my neck, and running my third shower of the day. If I'm going to get wet, I want it to be of my own choosing.
I fully intend to sound like a wet, woolly, icky blanket. Maybe the weather has made me cranky, but I will not, cannot read Go Set a Watchman, the "newly discovered" precursor to To Kill a Mockingbird. The NYT review revealed that Atticus, in this early version, is a racist bigot. I cannot imagine why any author would allow a revered and venerated character to be morally assassinated in another book. And now we know why Lee's elder sister, Alice, kept the manuscript locked up. Only after she passed on did it get "discovered" by her successor guardian, a shady deal if ever I heard one. Harper Lee doesn't need the money. So why did she allow this to happen, now that Alice is gone?
We'll probably never know the reason. Lee has stated that Alice is Atticus Finch. Maybe she wanted the world to know, finally, that her father, the purported foundation for Atticus, wasn't, in no uncertain terms. Graduate degrees will be given on an analysis of the two books and what happened between their writing. I really don't care.
I refuse to destroy a good and noble book that has influenced generations to seek justice and protect those who need it most. Atticus Finch will stay as he has been lo these many years, at least in my imagination.
No comments:
Post a Comment