the cartoonist Berkeley Breathed exchanged letters with author Harper Lee?
Berkeley received 4 letters over a 14 year
period from 1994 to 2008, according to
a February 2016 article in the New York
Times.
Did you know......Harper Lee became a fan
of Opus, the endearing penguin in
Berkeley's comic strip Bloom Country. (Who
wouldn't fall in love with this penguin!)
Berkeley Breathed originally wrote to Harper
Lee in 1972 as a high school freshman,
sharing that the rural backdrop for his
Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoon, Bloom
County, was inspired by the setting of
Maycomb in To Kill a Mockingbird.
In later correspondence, Harper Lee wrote:
"Althought I get more like Mrs. Gummidge
every day (referring to the lonely widow
in Charles Dicken's David Copperfield)...Opus
never fails to delight me."
When Harper Lee was in her early 80s, contending with diminished eyesight &
hearing & recovering from a stroke she wrote against Opus's planned retirement.
Bekeley Breathed's reaction: "How ironic is that here, she is desperately upset
that I'm letting my character die for her when millions around the world,for generations,have
been upset that she let her characters end.." (Until the publication of "Go Set a Watchman."
Come join the discussion on May 4 for To Kill a Mockingbird - published in 1960, winner of the
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The film version was released in 1962 & you have the opportunity to
watch the film & join in the discussion on May 11th.
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