Blog Interruption: To Kill A Mockingbird

I interrupt my blog scheduled for today for good reason. Yesterday, I saw the excellent Theatre Calgary production of To Kill a Mockingbird. The play, based on the book by Harper Lee, recounts a seminal year in the childhood of Jean Louise (Scout) Finch in the backdrop of a rape trial of a Black man in the deep American South of the 1930s. Scout's father, Atticus Finch, is the lawyer, representing the accused.

The case has already been decided by the townspeople many years before the trial even starts; the victim is a White woman. The audience knows this and knows the inevitable will happen; an innocent man will be convicted and put to death because of the colour of his skin. We know this and yet we hope. As Jean Louise, her brother Jem, and her friend, Dill, hope, so we too hope. But like a train wreck waiting to happen, it happens and the shock of the inevitable is still crushing no matter how we try to cushion ourselves from it.

This play/book is an important reminder of the frailty of human kind and the impact which justice and injustice has on it. Indeed, one cannot help but feel, after reading the book or watching the play or movie, that equality and justice is the paramount goal for which we all strive, even if it takes us a long time to get there.

In order to get there, according to Atticus Finch, we must have empathy for others, live in another man's shoes so to speak, see the world through another woman's eyes; the disenfranchised, the vulnerable, and yes, even the prejudiced. Only then can we truly recognize each other and make steps, even baby steps, toward a free and just society.

Thank you Harper Lee for this reminder.

For more on literature, law, and miscarriages of justice see my October 18 blog on Julian Barnes, Sherlock Holmes, and A Miscarriage of Justice. For more on the backdrop to the case dramatized in To Kill A Mockingbird, read about the Scottsboro case here.  On the banning of this book in schools read the 2009 Toronto Star article here. Finally, read the book, go to the play, or watch the movie!

Tomorrow, I will reconnect with the Supreme Court of Canada and the case they should and, possibly, will take.

Julian Barnes, Sherlock Holmes, and A Miscarriage of Justice

Yesterday, the British writer, Julian Barnes, won the 2011 prestigious Man Booker Prize. I have read many of his books, some of which are particularly clever, such as The History of the World in 10 and A Half Chapters, with one chapter dedicated to a discussion of Theodore Gericault's 1819 painting of the aftermath of a shipwreck in The Raft of the Medusa.

Barnes also recently wrote a book simply entitled Arthur & George. This book fictionalizes the real-life relationship between Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, the creator of Sherlock Holmes, and a unassuming solicitor named George Edalji. This semi-fictional account juxtaposes the lives of these two men in the backdrop of one of England's infamous cases of injustice. Edalji, of Indian ethnicity, was wrongly accused and convicted of mutilating cattle and sending poisonous letters in support of the crime. He was sentenced to seven years of hard labour and disbarred until Conan Doyle "took up his case" in a purely Holmesian manner, and managed to clear Edalji's name and restore his law society membership.

This case reminds us that one miscarriage of justice is one too many. In Canada, where such miscarriages have been revealed, not by celebrity writers, but by hard-working individuals, committed lawyers, and dedicated associations, we must be watchful and protective of justice and the repercussions of injustice. 

On September 15, 2011, the Canadian Federal/Provincial/Territorial (FPT) Heads of Prosecutions Committee on the Prevention of Miscarriages of Justice released an update to their 2005 Report. The original Report is large in scope and contains many recommendations. It tackles a broad range of issues, including systemic injustices caused by Crown/Police tunnel vision. This update, entitled The Path to Justice: Preventing Wrongful Convictions, reviews prosecutorial practices and makes further recommendations. Interestingly, the update starts with a quote from another British writer of justice, Charles Dickens, in his book The Mystery of Edwin Drood:

Circumstances may accumulate so strongly even against an innocent man, that directed, sharpened, and pointed, they may slay him.

Barnes, Conan Doyle, and Dickens reminds us, in a literary and engaging way, of the importance of justice in our legal system. It is up to us, however, to translate these works into reality.This requires, as stated in the FPT Update, "continued vigilance."