In an excerpt from her book, "Scout, Atticus, and Boo," that would lead to the documentary AMERICAN MASTERS Harper Lee: Hey Boo, director Mary Murphy details the the way that biographical elements worked their way into the creation and success of Harper Lee's literary classic "To Kill a Mockingbird."
Margaret Mitchell discusses the ways in which she conducted research to retain historical accuracy in her novel Gone With the Wind in this transcription of a radio interview from 1936 for WSB in Atlanta, Georgia.
Wally Lamb, author of the critically acclaimed She's Come Undone and I Know This Much Is True and former Director of Creative Writing at University of Connecticut, discusses Scout's universally sympathetic voice and the ways in which To Kill a Mockingbird and all literature can act as an agent of change. Harper Lee: Hey Boo airs Monday April 2nd at 10 p.m. (check local listings).
Mark Childress, author of Crazy in Alabama, describes how Harper Lee's protagonist Scout Finch, the narrator of To Kill a Mockingbird, was a radical voice of change in the segregated south of his childhood. Harper Lee: Hey Boo airs Monday April 2nd at 10 p.m. (check local listings).
Allan Gurganus, author of Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All and The Practical Heart, discusses the ways that Harper Lee's novel To Kill a Mockingbird influenced him as an adolescent. The novelist's ability to distill national issues into a local, familiar setting, he says, made him excited about literature. Harper Lee: Hey Boo airs Monday April 2nd at 10 p.m. (check local listings).
Novelist Richard Russo describes how he reluctantly read To Kill a Mockingbird as a student in Catholic school. Russo explains how the relationships described in the book influenced him as a writer and provided inspiration for his own characters in his Pulitzer prize-winning novel, Empire Falls. Harper Lee: Hey Boo airs Monday April 2nd at 10 p.m. (check local listings).
James McBride, author of the memoir The Color of Water, discusses how Harper Lee used the voice of her protagonists in To Kill a Mockingbird to bravely provide an accessible and radical point of view about racism in 1960. He describes and how today's authors can expand upon Lee's views. HarperLee: Hey Boo airs Monday April 2nd at 10 p.m. (check local listings).
