Every now and then I flip through my reading journal to look back at old quotes, characters, and overall thoughts from and about books I have had the pleasure of experiencing. Today was one of those days, and the first page I opened to were my thoughts while reading Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee. This is somewhat of a sequel to her well known classic To Kill A Mockingbird (TKAM) and follows adult Scout Finch as she returns home to Maycomb, Alabama. For anyone who loves TKAM as much as I do, and identified with Scout as much as I did, I would highly recommend this book.

I don’t want to give away much from the book, but wanted to address a feeling that stirred inside me the entire time I read this book. I had learned before I read this novel that is was written prior to TKAM. After reading it I wondered “would my feelings have changed about Atticus Finch if I would have read this one first?” Whichever one was read first I feel like would change the way you view Atticus. Either as a man who finally realized the error in his thinking. Or as a man who had fallen from grace. As someone who read TKAM first, it was tough to read some of the dialogues between Scout and her father years later. Did Harper Lee wait to release this one to give us the Scout Finch experience? Did she make us all fall in love with Atticus in TKAM only to have us experience him again when we are also older and wiser to the world?

The point in which I no longer knew exactly how I felt about Atticus, but reaffirmed how I felt about Scout, is when he makes an argument about civilized society and who should and shouldn’t be included. He asks Scout if she wants “them” in their world, referring to the black people of their town, but “they” always have been there. But “they” have always been there, however not on their own terms. Rather on the terms of those that look nothing like them. Now that tide has shifted, and it seems everyone gets a bit uncomfortable when people are in their own spaces on their own terms.

I try not to get too political in my posts, but it’s a thought many of us should dwell on with what we see in the world around us, specifically where I live in the United States. To give a person their freedom does not take yours away. To give someone something they need, does not mean you will have less.

One thing everyone will hopefully all have are human adventures from the comfort of wherever you decide to open a book. Happy reading!

• Literature