There are some books that almost EVERY American teenager reads while going through the school system, and although they're not as sexy or talked about than popular movies, it'd still be hard to find someone who hasn't heard of the classic Harper Lee novel "To Kill a Mockingbird." The American classic novel has become so popular that it's been translated into various languages for distribution in various countries, including into Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. While Korean and Chinese translate the title literally, "to kill a mockingbird," Japanese inverts it to "Alabama Tale," which isn't wrong and does give the setting of the book, but why? For marketing purposes? For some reason I couldn't recall why the book was called "To Kill a Mockingbird," but upon re-reading the book again recently it became crystal clear, and showed I didn't really read books very well back in high school, or at least didn't have a good understanding of the significance of books.
Asian languages will, by the way, translate American book and movie titles into weird titles, and they can often be pretty interesting.
Why I read books back in high school, I was more interested in a good plot, good dialogue between characters, and character development.......I got immersed into the lives of the characters. (this is still pretty much my appeal for reading any fiction book). I didn't see the many allegories, metaphors, social commentary, and historical background so present in classic books like To Kill a Mockingbird. Heck, for me to the takeaway from Hamlet was "Prince's father dies, prince goes kind of crazy, prince avenges his father, but goes kind of crazy and everyone dies at the end." That's why I liked the Redwall series as a kid, it was what kept me going reading a book instead of just turning to Sparknotes or a plot summary like some of my classmates did.
I just recently read a manga version of To Kill a Mockingbird, and it was a really enjoyable 2 hours to go through the whole book and rehash a lot of memories of reading. The adventures of Jeb and Scout, the dignity of Atticus, the unjust racial atmosphere in Alabama in the early 1900's, the empathetic feeling of having nothing to do in the summer, the public spectacle of a court trial, all came flooding back to me like I was back in 2002 again, when I first read the book. I hate to say it for book purists out there, but I think the manga animated version would improve any classic book and put the words into pictures and make the reader keep flipping the pages. I think of all the classic literature books of 200 to 300 pages and sometimes more and wonder how kids or adults nowadays can get through them......you have to be a really dedicated scholar or bibliophile (lover of books) to traverse through them all, nowadays with all the media and distractions that we have around us.
And yes, I finally was able to understand what mockingbird had to do with the book. I'm not sure if people know that a mockingbird just flies around not harming anyone and sings for society? And that it's a sin to kill a mockingbird? When I go to a zoo or somewhere where there's animals I don't necessarily look for a mockingbird. But I guess that's the genius of the metaphor or the mockingbird itself: we don't pay attention to it, and it doesn't seek attention, but it provides a great service for society nonetheless.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
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