Feb 9, 2015 4 min read

Legend has it that readers would wait at dockside in New York in the 1840s, eager to get their hands on the latest installment of Charles Dickens’ “The Old Curiosity Shop,” which was being carried in a British periodical called Master Humphrey’s Clock.

Of course, no one has to peer out into the harbor anymore to get the information or entertainment they crave.

Thanks to fiber optic cable and satellite technology, movies, music and all kinds of information and diversion, are available at a mouse click and ricochet around the globe in nanoseconds.

As the world has grown smaller and the ways we can be amused have expanded, however, it’s become increasingly rare that the publication of any kind of literary work generates the kind of excitement now reserved for the release of a blockbuster movie sequel, video game or shiny new gadget.

So, it was a little surprising, and more than a little heartening, that last week’s news about the publication of a second novel by the elusive Harper Lee was greeted with stop-press headlines, water-cooler conversation and, perhaps not surprisingly, fevered speculation about why the book is arriving now.

Lee is the author of “To Kill a Mockingbird,” one of the most beloved works of American fiction and surely one of the most widely read.

Published in 1960, it tells in flashbacks the story of a mischievous girl, Scout, growing up in the segregated South, and her father, Atticus Finch, a principled lawyer who takes on the case of an African-American farmhand accused of rape.

It won the Pulitzer Prize and almost immediately made its way to the screen.

The movie adaptation is almost as beloved – it earned Gregory Peck an Academy Award, and it has since been added to the Library of Congress’ National Film Registry, an honor accorded to movies of great historical or cultural importance.

Much to the frustration of Lee’s admirers, decades have passed without another novel. Only a 34-year-old at the time “To Kill a Mockingbird” arrived, Lee is said to have remarked to friends that writing one great novel was enough.

Perhaps she felt daunted by the prospect of trying to follow up such a garlanded debut. Nonetheless, “To Kill a Mockingbird” has proven to be more than sufficient to keep Lee comfortable. According to The New York Times, she usually earns about $2 million in royalties every year based on continued robust sales of the book.

Just when it appeared that we had heard the last from Lee, now 88 and ailing, it was announced that “Go Set a Watchman,” a sequel to “To Kill a Mockingbird,” would be landing in stores this summer.

It apparently contains material that Lee wrote in an original draft of “To Kill a Mockingbird” that depicts Scout as an adult and her father as an elderly man.

Lee’s editor reportedly convinced her to pare away this material when she was writing “To Kill a Mockingbird,” and it was believed to have been lost.

However, a copy of the manuscript surfaced last summer and, in an account that some say is hard to believe, Lee gave her blessing for it to see the light of day.

Lee has endured strokes in recent years, along with the recent death of a sister who was her lawyer and shield from the outside world, and acquaintances wonder if she has the capacity to make a reasoned decision about whether “Go Set a Watchman” should be published. A spokesman claimed the author was “extremely hurt” that questions were raised about her decision-making abilities.

Then, there are fans who wonder if “Go Set a Watchman” will inevitably be a disappointment, and it will tarnish the legacy of Lee and “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

That question will be resolved once the novel is available for everyone to peruse.

In the meantime, it lifts the spirits that a simple book should be the source of so much debate and anticipation.