[Clemenza]

Good book, awful movie. Considering the fact that the book brought up the issue of (attempted) interracial seduction (on the part of the white trash girl who accused the black guy of rape), in 1960. I still found Scout to be annoying in both the book and the movie.

An even better book from that era exploring the issue of race relations in the south is "A Cry of Absence" by Madison Jones.

[SquirrelKing]

I'm fond of Intruder in the Dust too.

I appreciate your opinion about Book, movie & etc. but respectfully disagree.

[Diana in Wisconsin]

"An even better book from that era exploring the issue of race relations in the south is "A Cry of Absence" by Madison Jones."

Thanks for the recommendation. :) Have you read, "On The Ocassion of My Last Afternoon" by Kaye Gibbons? I enjoyed that one. It's the story of a Southern family at the end of the Civil War, as a dying woman looks back over her life.

[Steely Tom]

Good book, awful movie. Considering the fact that the book brought up the issue of (attempted) interracial seduction (on the part of the white trash girl who accused the black guy of rape), in 1960. I still found Scout to be annoying in both the book and the movie.

I believe the seduction is brought out in court by Atticus in his interrogation of Tom Robinson. It is a he said/she said situation. His testimony is so convincing that Mayella Ewell, the plaintiff and accuser, is forced to do an amazing act on the stand, in which she tells the jury that they are not really men if they cannot bring themselves to protect the honor of a white woman from a black man (she also calls them one of the most hateful two-word expressions ever invented). Her acting is unforgettable.

I always thought the movie was mighty good. I read the book as a fourth-grader (it was the very first "grown up" book I ever read). So faithful was the book to the movie that, for years, I thought the movie covered the whole book. When I revisited the movie as an adult, I was surprised to discover a number of parts of the book (Mrs. Dubose, and the rabid dog scene, for example) were not in the movie; so vivid were the images created by the book in my mind's eye when I read it.

I also always thought the girl who played Scout was very beautiful, and would have liked to see what she looked like when she got older.

Also, Boo Radley character is played by Robert Duvall. I believe it is his debut appearance in a movie.

I lived in the south as a child, during the years 1960 through 1962 (Dinwiddie County, Virginia). There was a house immediately next to my school that was occupied by a reclusive family; the children made up all kinds of stories about them. The experience of living in the south gave the book incredible resonance for me when I read it, two years later, after having moved back up north.

(steely)