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Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

bbc.com

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Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#41

Post by seanalltogether »

wmeredith wrote: post #3

I'd be interested to hear more about the creative dynamic between this new book and To Kill a Mocking Bird. It says she put this new one aside 60 years ago to write TKaMB, but it features the characters later in their lives. I wonder if she was sketching out backstory to flesh out the characters and that was more compelling, so she pivoted and wrote To Kill a Mocking Bird instead?

I'm also curious to know if this second book pulls as heavily from her life experiences as mockingbird did. Mockingbird is such a poignant book because of how well it captures a certain period in american history. If the second one does as well, it could be just as important of a novel.

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#42

Post by shiven »

savanaly wrote: post #22
mrkipling wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...why?

I get it. To take the joke even farther, you might imagine a headline from The Onion along the lines of "God working on sequel to The Bible". Not funny when I state it all dryly of course, but hopefully you can see the joke now?

Wait a minute, I thought the Quran was that sequel. Wasn't it?

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#43

Post by dragonwriter »

shiven wrote: post #42
savanaly wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get it. To take the joke even farther, you might imagine a headline from The Onion along the lines of "God working on sequel to The Bible". Not funny when I state it all dryly of course, but hopefully you can see the joke now?

Wait a minute, I thought the Quran was that sequel. Wasn't it?

Perhaps; authorship is disputed, and some claim the Book of Mormon is the sequel from the original author.

(Of course, its worth noting that that the problem goes back further than that and that "the Bible" is itself a combination of the Hebrew Scriptures and a -- of disputed provenance, like the others -- sequel to that work.)

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#44

Post by pervycreeper »

wpietri wrote: post #21
puranjay wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because it is a timeless tale about the goodness of people, of faith and charity and humanity. Those are everlasting values. My girlfriend reads the book at least once a year. She says it keeps her grounded and optimistic. I started doing the exercise last year and I have to say, she is right.

True. But also because it's a sensitive and nuanced examination of the fucked-uppedness of US culture with regards to race. I certainly hope that isn't everlasting, but the book remains depressingly relevant.

That's an unfortunately narrow misreading. There are much more universal themes than that in the book.

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#46

Post by themodelplumber »

mw44118 wrote: post #45

To Kill a Mockingbird perpetuates the idea that women make false rape accusations. We shouldn't celebrate such a hurtful topic.

You're getting downvoted, but I think it's not because your claim lacks merit; rather the book perpetuates many ideas, of which that may be one. I'm sure fans of the book don't wish to perpetuate falsehoods surrounding a topic like rape, but they may naturally take a different perspective on what is being celebrated by sharing this news.

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#47

Post by lotharbot »

mw44118 wrote: post #45

To Kill a Mockingbird perpetuates the idea that women make false rape accusations. We shouldn't celebrate such a hurtful topic.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law ?

Actually, To Kill a Mockingbird perpetuates the idea that racist drunken white dads in the deep south in that era made false accusations and beat their daughters when their daughters hit on black men. Which is something that, you know, actually happened sometimes.

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#48

Post by SoftwareMaven »

venomsnake wrote: post #27
puranjay wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In between, he probably put out 200 odd books. The man wrote like his life depended on it. As far as gaps go, I'm still hoping GRRM won't break any records

Judging by Leviathan Wakes and the others from the expanse we are safe in the unfortunate case of "a jordan". It is written by his assistant and a friend of him. They are also the people that are his "hit by a bus" insurance. And I think that he will progress faster nowadays with the show. Not that I have high hopes for the series after book four and five.

I'm trying to understand why you brought Leviathan Wakes into this. One of the authors of The Expanse is GMMR's assistant, as I understand it, but I'm not clear how either GMMR would affect The Expanse or how The Expanse would affect Game of Thrones.

I ask as a fan of The Expanse who has not jumped into GoT, and who wouldn't like to see The Expanse side-tracked because of it. Is there some piece of this relationship I'm not seeing, or is Ty Franck more involved in GoT writing than I would have expected?

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#49

Post by unreal37 »

spike021 wrote: post #29
nathanb wrote: post #26

Embarrassingly, I first misread this as Harper Lee working on a sequel to the Hunger Games finale Mockingjay, and I was so confused.... I was forced to read To Kill a Mockingbird for school. I started reading it with a bad attitude. After I finished it, I immediately turned back to the first page and reread it, not with a school mindset but with a "this is amazing literature that I need in my life" mindset. If she wa…

Apparently she was writing this novel first and incorporated flashbacks, which were so descriptive that someone (might've been her editor) strongly suggested she separate them into their own novel. I think it'll be great.

Yes, this "sequel" was apparently the original book she wrote before her book editor told her to focus on when Scout was a child (the flashbacks). And they just found the manuscript hidden in a box a few months ago apparently.

Re: Harper Lee to publish Mockingbird 'sequel'

#50

Post by unreal37 »

TwiztidK wrote: post #19

A writer working on a biography of Harper Lee came to my high school 6 or 7 years ago to give a presentation about her. He told us that she had written another book but didn't want to publish it due to the pressure she felt from the success of To Kill a Mockingbird, so she planned on having it published after she died. This is probably the book he was talking about. I can't remember exactly who the writer was, but he…

Apparently, they only just found this manuscript hidden in a box "in the fall of 2014", so it was probably not the new book that person was talking about. In fact, this was the original book before "To Kill a Mockingbird" was written.
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