Harper Lee Promises A New Novel—Or Does She?

Smells Like Denmark

02.04.15 - The Daily Beast

Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast

Malcolm Jones - The Daily Beast - 02.04.15

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More than half a century after she published her only novel, the author of 'To Kill a Mockingbird' has announced that she'll publish a new book this summer. But is it really new—and is it is really her idea?

Now that we’ve heard that a new Harper Lee novel is coming next summer, the old saw about being careful what you wish for is probably running through the minds of a lot of her fans.
For decades after the publication of To Kill a Mockingbird in 1960, the question that occupied most readers’ minds was, when will she write another novel? As the years passed, the question became, will she write another novel? And then, as Lee moved into her 80s, the question changed again: why didn’t she ever write another novel?

Now, out of nowhere comes the news that indeed there will be at least one more book from Lee. Go Set a Watchman is a sequel to To Kill a Mockingbird, taking up the story of Scout and Atticus some 20 years after the time of the first book. Scout returns to Maycomb, Alabama from her home in New York City to settle unfinished business with her family and her town.

According to her publisher, the Watchman manuscript was written before Mockingbird. Lee’s editor at the time was especially taken with the flashbacks in the earlier version and asked her to fashion a novel out of Scout’s memories of childhood. “I was a first-time writer,” she said in a recent statement, “so I did as I was told.” Her revisions became To Kill a Mockingbird.
So, not to put too fine a point on it, Go Set a Watchman, never published, is the first draft of the book that’s sold more than 40 million copies.

Sadly, this latest Harper Lee news raises more questions than it answers. First, why now? A statement released over Lee’s signature would have us believe that the earlier version has just come to light, attached to a typescript of Mockingbird. “After much thought and hesitation I shared it with a handful of people I trust and was pleased to hear that they considered it worthy of publication,” Lee says in the statement. “I am humbled and amazed that this will now be published after all these years.”
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