This is about an hour and 20 minutes. Lets see if this mic is hot. It is. Good evening. Right on cue. I am jake reese with alabama booksmith and on behalf of our dedicated staff of awesome booksellers and this entire crew at the magnificent alabama theater and the geniuses at Penguin Press who have published the book the literary world has anticipated for half a century. It is my privilege and pleasure to welcome you to a mockingbird tribute. We also say a big hi yall to the viewers on cspan. The theater audience has enjoyed watching and hearing catherine check in with them on the big screen tell personal harper lee stories before the start of the main event. Each attendee has received a signed First Edition of the mockingbird next door with their ticket. Many of you wanted extra copies for friends and for gifts. They are available at alabama booksmith. Com. The folks sitting here will also soak up the ambience from this early 20th Century Movie palace that has been lovingly restored t
This might take the rest of the evening. What things did you find inspired harper lee . She had such an appreciation for how hard people work. Especially as someone who knew the depression and captured it in such an iconic way in to kill a mockingbird was always impressed. Whatever somebodys bat round, whatever their Family History with people who had the perseverance to work hard, a lot of times for not very much pay provides for families. It was i think there were values from their father that they both talked about the ec and not vote, the ec and the way they live in now as the ones that was the most striking in my conversations with them. Their appreciation of how hard it was what a lot of families not only the depression, but at the time i was living in monroeville and the fact for the people who found a way if they had the opportunity to provide for his family and to persevere over time. I think an appreciation that although like a lot of families in the depression, they certainl
It was refreshing. And everything wonderful perception that so many of us think of her as mysterious but you made her seem as normal as Blueberry Pie and many aspects. Getting a sense of them in that town where they grew up, one of the great pleasures for me is there was a story for of them, on a drive to every property we drove by, the story of a family that lived there and a feud that had started three generations earlier and the way it had been patched over and all the stories that lurked in that landscape and i also would just try to get a sense of what it was like for them growing up their end being the one listening to those stories they had and alice, their mothers sister who sounded like quite a character. Whenever there was an and dallas story didnt take long before i heard most of those that time or two. It was welcome hearing about them more and they grew up as a lot of people of their generation did here, hearing stories that were not just information but it was the pleasur
Question i have regards accountability. You were saying before someone in the private sector has a certain job description. They are hired to do a job. They dont do the job come under fire. If youre in the government and you dont do the job you move to another division. Plus i learned in college there are games played with the budget. So youve got a certain amount of budget and youve only used 70 of that, you better figure out how to spend 30 next week. Exact way. Youre voting on a bill that will cost 200 million. You need to see the feasibility of the money youre spending and how it will affect your constituents. That people need to see the exact same thing. Pure accountability. Let it be posted for a month before you can vote, online for every citizen. Thats one example of accountability or let me give you second one i think hold people accountable. They are not accountable because there in washington and you were here. I wouldnt care about gfi 3000 miles away. Its human nature. I do
I had the idea that maybe i could just find an apartment over someones garage. I really didnt need very much, didnt want very much. But in a small town like that, an apartment, that kind of a rental was actually harder to come by than a house, for example, to rent. And a good friend of theirs had suggested that i look at the house two doors down from theirs where by that time i had spent a lot of time with both of them as something that i could rent for a time in monroeville. And i did say to both nell harper and to alice, i wonder if that wouldnt be too close for comfort . I dont want to even inquire about that if that might be the case. But they encouraged me to look at it. It was far more house than one person needed. But as somebody who lived in Downtown Chicago, the rent that they proposed charming this was charging, this was a house that they had hoped to sell but in a difficult market were willing to rent, they were going to charge me the outlandish sum of 650 a month. [laughter