Let's start a review by throwing a wrench into my own 5-stars: there are some very valid criticisms of this book, particularly of Atticus, and especially of people of colour lacking the agency to affect change on their own, from a grassroots level. Paternalistic, benovolent racism is still racism and there is nothing nicer about it. I can't comment further on that, because I'm in no position to tell anyone what their own personal experience is. I think it's an important piece of the discussion to keep alive, because I don't think we've made as much progress as we'd like to think we have in the last 50 years.

One of the things I like about the book is that despite calling on us to try to see things from another perspective, to try to understand the other side, at the the end of the day, sometimes it takes a full-on smack-down of someone's baseless, unjustified nonsense. Learning to do this is in a kind, civilized way is difficult, if not impossible. I have little patience for those who call me intolerant because I call out someone's racist/classist bullshit. Am I intolerant of intolerance? Sure. Do I try to understand where the hate they harbour stems from? Yes. Does it it make it okay for them to hate? No. Are some people, at their core, awful people? Sometimes, yes. Should I hate them? Probably not, but sometimes, my compassion fails.

Atticus has been criticized for being too flat, too unrealistic for the time, and many have held their copy of Go Set A Watchman above their heads proclaiming "I TOLD YOU SO!". Here's the thing: Watchman isn't a sequel. Watchman is a first-draft. The finished book Lee published is the version of Atticus is. And what Atticus isn't what Atticus is - Atticus is what a six-to-nine-year-old girl thinks Atticus is.

That's the beauty of the writing of this book, and what ratchets it up to five stars for me. It's beautifully written (or at least, beautifully edited, depending on what articles you read about it). The writing is clean, simple and evocative. Using the voice of a child to poke in the depths of the profound adult questions is a wonderful way of providing social commentary without all the bluster. If Atticus had not been who he was in Mockingbird, Scout's ability to question the world around her would have been significantly compromised, and the underlying themes would have been grossly stunted.

We can love Atticus all we want, but for me, watching Scout (and Jem) shake the innocence of childhood, discover the unjust, arbitrary cultural systems, and poke holes in the thin fabric of society's rules...that it what makes this for me.

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Created Apr 05, 2024 at 2:18pm • Submit your own review...