Skip to main content

News Tip: New Harper Lee novel represents ‘fascinating possibility,’ says Duke professor

A second novel by the author of “To Kill a Mockingbird” represents a chance to revisit characters from a classic of Southern literature. 

Harper Lee will publish her second novel this summer, more than 50 years after her classic “To Kill a Mockingbird.” The new book features some of the same characters, in later years.

James W. ApplewhiteProfessor emeritus of English, Duke Universityjwa@duke.edu

Applewhite, a professor emeritus of English at Duke and a member of the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame, is a poet and essayist who has published many critical essays on Southern literature.  

Quote:  “’To Kill a Mockingbird’ participates in a tragic view of the past that pervaded Southern culture for a long time. It represents a state of mind that the South had embedded in its cultural DNA for a long time following the Civil war, a state of mind that involves inability to escape the past.”

“That obsession with replaying the past tended to prevent an imagination of a positive future. It locked people of the Deep South in a battle against accepting the outcome of the Civil War and against accepting the humanity of African-Americans.”

“The new novel represents a fascinating possibility for revisiting one of the classics of Southern literature. One wonders if Scout, as an adult, will see the actions that took place in any way differently.”