Literature Guides
Key Facts about To Kill a Mockingbird
When the novel To Kill a Mockingbird was out, it became an immediate success, which greatly surprised its author. However, the reviews varied. Some reviewers liked the author’s style, called her a skilled writer and found the book nationally significant; other found the book childish, melodramatic, or even immoral. Some noted than a six-year-old protagonist cannot think and speak as an adult, which she does in the book, and that she draws too complicated conclusions for a young child leading an isolated life.
One year after the novel was published, it was translated into 10 languages, and subsequently into more than 40 languages. It is now studied in most American schools and considered to be one of the classical books of the 20th century.
