681 History of the Book - Final Project by Kelley Brenneman
Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird
The Book As…
Harper Lee's book To Kill a Mockingbird is a classic in American literature. It is a book often read in high school for an English class, and it is a beloved book by many. My own personal copy (saved from my high school English 10A class) is held together with tape and the spine is broken in numerous places because I have read it so many times. I often walk past the brand new copies on the shelves in bookstores and think "Oh I need a new copy." But somehow I never can seem to replace it. Lee considered her book "a simple love story," but in reailty it is so much more than that. By exploring this book in the context of book history and the book cycle explored in the class-the book as: artifact, author work, intellectual property, commodity, knowledge, print culture, cultural icon, and reader-one can see the effect this book has had.
The idea for this project came to me in a somewhat bizzare way. I was home recovering from surgery and was someone what restricted in the amount of time I could move. (You never realize how often throughout the day you use your abdominal muscles until you have surgery in that area.) I was scrolling through Facebook on my iPad and came across a story about To Kill a Mockingbird being banned is some school districts. While that is nothing new, it still struck me as sad. I'm sad everytime books get banned for whatever reason, but this book is very near and dear to my heart so it's even more heartbreaking when I read about schools banning To Kill a Mockingbird. I remember being a confused sophmore in high school wondering what life had in store for me, and I found comfort in the wisdom spelled out in this book. To this day I have the following quote hanging above my bed, and I look at it every night before I lie down and fall asleep:
I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting
the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when
you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anway
and see it through no matter what.
In regards to researching this project I used both primary and secondary sources, mostly secondary sources. Lee was a very private person and there is not a whole lot of primary sources about her, her life, or her book. She was known to reply with "Not just no, but hell no!" to interview requests. However there are many secondary sources. Various academic journals, books, magazine articles, video clips, and blog post were used during my research.
I hope you enjoy reading about this truely remarkable book, and remember "Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."
Source
Maslin, J. (2006 June 8). A Biography of Harper Lee, Author of 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/books/08masl.html..
Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird
The Book As…
Harper Lee's book To Kill a Mockingbird is a classic in American literature. It is a book often read in high school for an English class, and it is a beloved book by many. My own personal copy (saved from my high school English 10A class) is held together with tape and the spine is broken in numerous places because I have read it so many times. I often walk past the brand new copies on the shelves in bookstores and think "Oh I need a new copy." But somehow I never can seem to replace it. Lee considered her book "a simple love story," but in reailty it is so much more than that. By exploring this book in the context of book history and the book cycle explored in the class-the book as: artifact, author work, intellectual property, commodity, knowledge, print culture, cultural icon, and reader-one can see the effect this book has had.
The idea for this project came to me in a somewhat bizzare way. I was home recovering from surgery and was someone what restricted in the amount of time I could move. (You never realize how often throughout the day you use your abdominal muscles until you have surgery in that area.) I was scrolling through Facebook on my iPad and came across a story about To Kill a Mockingbird being banned is some school districts. While that is nothing new, it still struck me as sad. I'm sad everytime books get banned for whatever reason, but this book is very near and dear to my heart so it's even more heartbreaking when I read about schools banning To Kill a Mockingbird. I remember being a confused sophmore in high school wondering what life had in store for me, and I found comfort in the wisdom spelled out in this book. To this day I have the following quote hanging above my bed, and I look at it every night before I lie down and fall asleep:
I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting
the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when
you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anway
and see it through no matter what.
In regards to researching this project I used both primary and secondary sources, mostly secondary sources. Lee was a very private person and there is not a whole lot of primary sources about her, her life, or her book. She was known to reply with "Not just no, but hell no!" to interview requests. However there are many secondary sources. Various academic journals, books, magazine articles, video clips, and blog post were used during my research.
I hope you enjoy reading about this truely remarkable book, and remember "Shoot all the blue jays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."
Source
Maslin, J. (2006 June 8). A Biography of Harper Lee, Author of 'To Kill a Mockingbird.' The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/08/books/08masl.html..