Why Harper Lee Kept Her Silence for 55 Years

Harper Lee has died only a few months after the publication of To Kill a Mockingbirds long-shelved prequel， Go Set a Watchman （2015）.1 This article， originally published in 2011， asks why Harper Lee was so burdened by her early success.

The professional lives of most novelists closely resemble2 each other. They write a novel； it is published； they embark on a round of publicity.3 They appear at literary festivals， where they garner a quarter of the audience of some television chef in the tent next door， and at signings in bookshops， with the aim of signing as much stock as possible.4

Through it all， the novelist attempts to remain amusing， affable5 and patient. Three years later， he will publish another novel， and the whole experience repeats itself. As Samuel Beckett wrote in Worstward Ho： “All of old. Nothing else ever. Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.”6

For some writers， however， the need to try again， to fail again， hardly arises7. The extraordinary career—or perhaps non-career—of Harper Lee bears witness to8 a quite different way of conducting a writing life. She wrote one novel， an immediate classic and perhaps the best-selling novel of the 20th century， To Kill a Mockingbird. Since its publication in 1960， Lee has published no other book. A second novel， entitled The Long Goodbye， apparently came to an abrupt end on the day her agent，9 JP Lippincott， expressed an interest in her first. “Her pen froze10，” he said.

Lee， who turned 85 in 2011， has not been entirely absent from the public record since， and her neighbours in Monroeville， Alabama， wouldnt agree that she is a recluse， either.11 Politely refusing to talk to journalists since 1964 is not the same thing as withdrawing from society.12 Since that has been her policy， her agreeing to co-operate with a new literary biographer，13 Marja Mills， who claims to tell the true story behind her years of silence， is important and surprising news. Will this biography tell the whole truth？ Can anyone ever really know why an author falls silent—even the author herself？

Lee came from one of the 20th centurys richest literary schools， the American South.14 Work by Faulkner， Tennessee Williams and Flannery OConnor examined the Souths flavour of intense， self-regarding decorum and passionately defended injustice and violence.15 It is sometimes regarded as extraordinary that Nelle Harper Lee came from the same small town as another great Southern writer， Truman Capote16—that， indeed， they were neighbours as children. Some have gone as far as to speculate wildly that To Kill a Mockingbird might actually have been a near-collaboration between the pair， as Capotes documentary study In Cold Blood seems to have been.17

The idea that a coincidence of implausible proportions would be needed to explain the emergence of two such gifted writers from a small place ignores how different their style is.18 It also ignores the way in which writers encourage， criticise， develop each other by proximity19. That is true not just of Lee and Capote， but of Lee and the whole Southern school of novelists. She could hardly have predicted that she would quickly come to be seen as the epitome and climax of the grand Southern tradition.20

To Kill a Mockingbird is a great novel and， unusually， was quickly made into a great film （Gregory Peck and his family subsequently became close friends with Lee）.21 But then， everything stopped for Lees writing. She spoke in an early 1960s interview， the last she ever gave， of wanting “to leave some record of small-town， middle-class Southern life”， apparently thinking of the novels she wanted to write in the future.

What stays in the memory of To Kill a Mockingbird are the grand coups—Scout unknowingly deflecting a lynching， or the great moment when the Reverend Sykes， after the verdict，22 says to Scout： “Miss Jean Louise， stand up： your fathers passing.” But the rich texture of the novel comes from its loving delineation of the relationships and tensions in a small town.23 That is the direction she would have gone in， and what we have lost in her subsequent silence.

The novelist of social texture， of the quiet relationships between people， is perhaps one peculiarly vulnerable to the impact of fame.24 We have plenty of witnesses to Jane Austens personal modesty， the way in which she would hide her writing at anyones approach.25 A novelist who had become a celebrity would find it almost impossible to pursue their task of listening，26 of modest disappearance into the background， of observation. Some writers manage to tough it out； others find the weight of expectation impossible to manage.27

The cynic28 would say that Harper Lee， with a novel which still sells millions every year， over half a century after its publication， hardly needed to go on writing anyway. Would she have wanted her career to work out like this？ But writing is not like hedge-fund trading29. The author who voluntarily retires from writing， after having made a pile， is a rare creature； it is the strangest of facts about Shakespeare that he stopped writing， apparently of his free will， at the height of his artistic powers after The Tempest， and retired to Stratford.30

Much more common is the writer who is effectively destroyed by a single huge success. The burden of fame and acclaim weighs down particularly on the creative faculties.31 Ian McEwan32 has spoken of feeling， when he embarks on promotion of his books， like “an employee of his own former self”.

The task of balancing the awareness of past success with the necessary task of producing new work is not one that every writer can achieve. And， perhaps， these single huge successes are much harder to deal with when they come early on in a writers career， before they have learnt to， in Kiplings words， “treat the two impostors” of triumph and disaster “just the same”.33 Its striking that out of the four novelists， for instance， who have won the Booker Prize in the last 40 years with a first novel， none has so far managed to write a successful follow-up.34

Lee has succeeded in protecting herself over the last half-century， and living a life which is of her choosing. In a rare statement recently， a letter to Oprah Winfreys magazine， she suggested how out-of-touch with modern life she has become： “In an abundant society where people have laptops， cellphones， iPods and minds like empty rooms， I still plod along with books.”35 That detachment36 is， clearly， necessary to her. It is the paradox of the novel that it could not have been written by someone in love with literary fame； that the fame it achieved and deserved killed off any prospect of a succeeding masterpiece.37

1. To Kill a Mockingbird：《殺死一只知更鳥》，哈珀·李發(fā)表于1960年的長(zhǎng)篇小說；long-shelved： 擱置已久的；prequel： 前傳，前篇；Go Set a Watchman：《設(shè)立守望者》。

2. resemble： 類似，像。

3. embark on sth.： 開始做某事；a round of： 一連串的；publicity： 宣傳。

4. 他們出現(xiàn)在文學(xué)節(jié)上，在那里他們招來的觀眾只有隔壁帳篷里電視大廚的四分之一多；他們出現(xiàn)在書店簽售會(huì)上，以此盡可能多地賣出存貨。garner： 獲得，收集；a quarter of： 四分之一的；chef： 廚師；stock： 存貨。

5. affable： 和藹可親的，友善的。

6. 正像塞繆爾·貝克特在《最糟糕，嗯》中寫道：“都是老套，從無新意，屢試屢敗。沒關(guān)系。再試，再敗。失敗中有進(jìn)步?！盨amuel Beckett： 塞繆爾·貝克特（1906—1989），愛爾蘭先鋒派小說家、劇作家及詩人，20世紀(jì)最具影響力的荒誕劇作家；Worstward Ho：《最糟糕，嗯》，又譯《每況愈下》，貝克特1983年散文集。

7. arise： 出現(xiàn)。

8. bear witness to： 證明。

9. abrupt： 突然的，唐突的；agent： 經(jīng)紀(jì)人。

10. froze： 凍結(jié)，freeze的過去式。

11. be absent from： 缺席；Monroeville： 門羅維爾，美國(guó)阿拉巴馬州一城市； recluse： 隱士，隱居者。

12. journalist： 新聞?dòng)浾撸粀ithdraw from： 退出，離開。

13. co-operate with： 與……合作；literary biographer： 文學(xué)傳記作家。

14. literary school： 文學(xué)派別；American South： 美國(guó)南方文學(xué)（Literature of the American South），指美國(guó)南北戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)后出現(xiàn)在南方的一種嚴(yán)肅而帶有悲劇性的文學(xué)流派。

15. ?？思{、田納西·威廉斯以及弗蘭納里·奧康納的作品，審視了美國(guó)南方恪守強(qiáng)烈的利己主義禮節(jié)以及為不公和暴力激情辯護(hù)的特征。Faulkner： ?？思{（1897—1962），美國(guó)作家，諾貝爾文學(xué)獎(jiǎng)得主，代表作為《喧囂和騷動(dòng)》；Tennessee Williams： 田納西·威廉斯（1911—1983），20世紀(jì)美國(guó)戲劇三大家之一，代表作為《欲望號(hào)街車》；Flannery OConnor： 弗蘭納里·奧康納（1925—1964），美國(guó)作家、散文家，常常以南方哥特風(fēng)格寫作；self-regarding： 利己主義的，自我維護(hù)的；decorum： 禮節(jié)；passionately： 強(qiáng)烈地，激昂地；injustice： 不公。

16. Truman Capote： 杜魯門·卡波特（1924—1984），美國(guó)小說家、編劇及劇作家，代表作品有《蒂凡尼的早餐》、《冷血》等。

17. 有人甚至妄加猜測(cè)，《殺死一只知更鳥》有可能就是兩人之間近似合作的作品，因?yàn)榭úㄌ氐募o(jì)實(shí)研究《冷血》看起來就是這樣的成果。go as far as to： 至于，甚至；speculate： 推測(cè)；wildly： 輕率地，胡亂地；near-collaboration： 近似合作；documentary： 紀(jì)實(shí)的。

18. coincidence： 巧合；implausible： 難以置信的，不像真實(shí)的；proportion： 比例；emergence： 出現(xiàn)。

19. proximity： 靠近，親近。

20. epitome： 典型，象征；climax： 高潮；grand： 著名的，杰出的。

21. Gregory Peck： 格里高利·派克（1916—2003），20世紀(jì)40年代到60年代美國(guó)著名電影明星，因出演《殺死一只知更鳥》而獲得1962年奧斯卡最佳男主角；subsequently： 后來。

22. grand coup： 大膽的行為，猛烈的一擊；unknowingly： 不知不覺地； deflect： 阻止（小說中主人公律師阿提克斯·芬奇的女兒斯科特阻止了當(dāng)?shù)匕兹藢?duì)黑人羅賓遜濫用私刑）； lynching： 私刑；reverend： 教士，牧師；verdict： 裁判，裁決。

23. texture： 本質(zhì)，結(jié)構(gòu)；delineation： 描述；tension： 張力，緊張。

24. peculiarly： 尤其地，特別地；vulnerable to： 易受……的侵害； fame： 名聲，名氣。

25. Jane Austen： 簡(jiǎn)·奧斯?。?775—1817），英國(guó)小說家，代表作有《傲慢與偏見》、《理智與情感》等；modesty： 謙虛，羞怯；at anyones approach： 一旦有任何人靠近。

26. celebrity： 名人；pursue： 繼續(xù)從事。

27. tough it out： 堅(jiān)持到底，挺過去； weight： 負(fù)擔(dān)，重荷。

28. cynic： 憤世嫉俗者。

29. hedge-fund trading： 對(duì)沖基金交易。

30. 在賺了大錢之后自愿封筆的作者是少見的異類；莎士比亞最奇怪之處就是他在自己藝術(shù)創(chuàng)作力的巔峰期—— 《暴風(fēng)雨》之后，自愿放棄寫作，退隱到斯特拉特福德老家去了。retire from： 退出；make a pile： 發(fā)財(cái)，賺錢；at the height： 在……的頂峰或鼎盛時(shí)期；artistic： 藝術(shù)的；The Tempest：《暴風(fēng)雨》；Stratford： 斯特拉特福德，英國(guó)東部的一個(gè)鎮(zhèn)，莎士比亞的故鄉(xiāng)。

31. acclaim： 稱贊；weigh down on： 在……上使負(fù)重?fù)?dān)；creative faculty： 創(chuàng)作能力。

32. Ian McEwan： 伊恩·麥克尤恩（1948— ），英國(guó)小說家及編劇，代表作品有《阿姆斯特丹》、《贖罪》等。

33. 然而，也許在作家事業(yè)的初期，那些早早來到的巨大成就更難處理，因?yàn)樗麄冞€沒有學(xué)會(huì)吉卜林所說的“要同等地對(duì)待‘成功和‘災(zāi)難這兩個(gè)騙子”。Kipling： 吉卜林（1865—1936），英國(guó)記者、詩人及小說家，1907年獲諾貝爾文學(xué)獎(jiǎng)，代表作品有《叢林之書》、《如果》等；impostor： 騙子；triumph： 成功。

34. striking： 驚人的，突出的；Booker Prize： 布克獎(jiǎng)，是當(dāng)今英語小說界最重要的獎(jiǎng)項(xiàng)，其獲獎(jiǎng)作品現(xiàn)在幾乎已經(jīng)成了最好看的英文小說的代名詞；follow-up： 后繼作品。

35. Oprah Winfrey： 奧普拉·溫弗瑞（1954— ），美國(guó)著名女脫口秀主持人；out-of-touch： 不接觸，不聯(lián)系；abundant： 富足的；plod along： 沉重緩慢地走。

36. detachment： 超然，分離。

37. 這本身就是一個(gè)悖論——小說不可能被一個(gè)熱衷于文學(xué)名望的人寫出來，而小說所帶來的和其應(yīng)得的名望抹殺了任何后繼杰作的可能性。paradox： 悖論，自相矛盾的事；kill off： 消滅；prospect： 可能性；succeeding： 隨后的，以后的；masterpiece： 杰作。