By Caitlin MacDougall, Intern

You never forget your first read of your favorite novel—at least I don’t.  In the wake of your first reading, you remember how the book became a part of you, how it shaped and defined that one period in your life, and the painful separation anxiety you felt when you realized you were on the last chapter.  It’s about as good as falling in love.

Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird was that first love for many, but I never got the chance to read it.  I remember showing my mother my reading list in junior high and her puzzled look when she realized Lee’s one and only masterpiece, a coming-of-age prerequisite, did not make the cut.  “What kind of middle school doesn’t have To Kill A Mockingbird as required reading?” she asked.  I felt excluded from this literary secret that everyone seemed to relish, but I made it my personal responsibility to read the book on my own.

Years went by and as I checked the American classics off my unofficial reading list (F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Baldwin, Flannery O’Connor, J.D. Salinger), To Kill A Mockingbird lingered as the itch that had not been scratched.  Walking around Politics and Prose recently, I noticed a re-print of the novel in honor of its 50th anniversary (I’ll let the baby-boomers take a moment to let that settle in).  As a recent college graduate experiencing my first taste of funemployment, I knew that this summer was my chance to finally fulfill the experience I had missed out on when I was thirteen.

I read the entire book during a weekend with my family in Lake George.  Instead of sailing, hiking, or biking, I spent hours sitting on a hammock on the porch, engrossed in the story.  What I love most about Lee’s writing is her mastery of place.  The passage in which Scout first describes the town of Macomb is unforgettable:

“Macomb was an old town, but it was a tired old town when I first knew it. In rainy weather the streets turned to red slop; grass grew on the sidewalks, the courthouse sagged in the square. Somehow, it was hotter then: a black dog suffered on a summer’s day; bony mules hitched to Hoover carts flicked flies in the sweltering shade of the live oak on the square. Men’s stiff collars wilted by nine in the morning. Ladies bathed before noon, after their three-o’clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frostings of sweat and sweet talcum.” (5)

How beautiful.  The description completely sets the tone for the entire novel.  As we follow Scout, Jem, and Dill through the seasons, through their neighbors’ yards and the through heartwrenching trial of Tom Robinson, we are reminded of the heat and listlessness in that first passage about Macomb in the summertime—a description of stagnancy that was sure to be torn apart as the town’s racial epithets are challenged and the characters are drained of their innocence.

Lee’s masterpiece is a testament to the importance of setting certainly, but it is also a reminder to re-read the books that inspire you.  Ask yourself: why is this story so important to me?  What makes it magnificent?  You can read as many How-To books about writing or getting published as you want, but the best lessons are those hidden in the sleeves of that dusty hardcover you love so much.