Skip to main content

Up Next

Why We Keep Retelling the Classics

Why We Keep Retelling the Classics

Season 2 Episode 26
12:30
The Women of Jane Austen

The Women of Jane Austen

Season 2 Episode 27
18:33
Episode 5: The Calling

The Calling

Season 4 Episode 5
53:05
When Whales Could Walk

When Whales Could Walk

Season 51 Episode 1
53:31
Back to Show
It's Lit!

The Life behind To Kill a Mockingbird

Season 2 Episode 23

For decades it has been widely read in high schools and middle schools as a key anti-racist text. But how did this novel, with its Southern Gothic and Bildungsroman elements become a book that in 2006 the British said “every adult should read before they die” ahead of the Bible. To Kill a Mockingbird was written by Harper Lee and was loosely based on Lee’s real-life experiences.

Support Provided By
Season
Toni Morrison’s Opus About Confronting a Terrible Past
9:41
To understand Beloved, we must first look at the author: Nobel Prize Winner Toni Morrison.
Why Magical Realism is a Global Phenomenon
10:03
We explore the roots, tenets of the genre, and its rise in Latin American Literature.
Why Edgar Allan Poe Isn't Just a Sad Boy
11:03
His legacy is more complicated than school books may have lead us to believe.
Inside the Absurdist Mind of Kurt Vonnegut
15:11
We explore the life and work of Kurt Vonnegut.
The Women of Jane Austen
18:33
The women in her work reveal to us her growth, her politics and ambition.
Why We Keep Retelling the Classics
12:30
Sometimes a story is just so dang good, it bears repeating.
What We Don’t Know About The Father of Sci-Fi
17:12
There's more to H.G. Wells than we know or think.
Why Do People Think Huck Finn Is Racist?
13:34
It is considered one of the great American novels and one of the most frequently banned.
Don’t Know Much About BEOWULF? Nobody Does!
12:56
We take a look at this Epic Poem and follow its long, winding journey.
The Female Writers Who Dominated Amatory Fiction
11:52
Amatory fiction was a genre of fiction was created by…women.
Octavia Butler, The Grand Dame of Science Fiction
14:34
She is one of the most prolific and important Black authors in the genre.
Jane Eyre: Why We Keep Reading It
17:08
After 175 years after its publication, here's why we're still dissecting Jane Eyre.
Active loading indicator