For many of us, the most recent memory of Nelle Harper Lee might be Catherine Keener's portrayal of the author, very endearing if somewhat insipid, in the Philip Seymour Hoffman tour de force, Capote. She plays the 'supporting role' to the charismatic Hoffman, for which Keener was nominated for an Oscar in the same category, leaving many of Lee's ardent fans a little miffed. There was also this unsavoury controversy at the time of To Kill A Mockingbird's publication in 1960 that the book was actually written by Lee's childhood friend Truman Capote. Lee did say the character of Dill, the friend of siblings Scout and Jem in her book, who visits Maycomb County in the summer, is based on Capote.
Like some other famous authors of Bildungsroman—for instance, J.D. Salinger (Catcher in the Rye) and our own Arundhati Roy (God of Small Things)—Lee too was a one-novel author. Or she will be till tomorrow. Her second book, Go Set A Watchman, is now all set to release on July 14th, which is actually the first book she wrote but couldn't convince any publisher to print it. Many who read the manuscript were more interested in the flashbacks in it, they wanted to know what exactly happened in the Finch household twenty years ago, what took place between the lawyer father Atticus Finch and his children Jean Louis Finch (Scout) and Jem. But Lee's fans have who have thirsted for 55 years to know what happened to the Finches later, Go Set A Watchman, which follows one of those classic publishing stories where an author's original MS is discovered in an old chest of drawers by the family lawyer, should be a treat.
Will it be as good as Mockingbird? The first chapter is on the Guardian's website, and if that is any indication, it has Lee's trademark narrative style. Scout, called by her proper name Jean Louis here, who was six in Mockingbird is twenty-something now, is making her fifth annual trip to Maycomb, by train this time, to meet her father who is 72 and arthritic now. Right away you are curious about how the father-daughter relationship panned out, did the strong-headed young girl turn out too much on the other extreme of the generation gap, did she mess up her life in her teen-years, does Atticus still live by his high ideals? The train ride is described in true Lee style, with tangential short family episodes thrown in, with casual humour and sharp insights.
"Bus service (to Maycomb) was erratic and seemed to go nowhere, but the Federal Government had forced a highway or two through the swamps, thus giving the citizens an opportunity for free egress. But few people took advantage of the roads, and why should they? If you did not want much, there was plenty."
By the end of the first chapter you also find out Jem is dead. What happened? And who is this Hank, Jem's friend who is now Atticus' heir apparent in the legal business, who is kissing and proposing marriage to Jean? With a book like Mockingbird which we have all grown up with, which has helped us form our world view on many things, which we re-read or read along with our children now, we all have some idea of how we wanted our favourite characters to turn out in later life. And since this book has the added complexity of not being a sequel in the true sense but actually written first, there is this extra fear that most of the characters would have turned out all wrong. The first chapter only gives a glimpse of what is to come, but my feeling is Go Set A Watchman will turn out like a college reunion after many years, where some friends turn out exactly how you thought they would, and others completely jolt you.