When I killed a mockingbird, I of course went and looked up what killing a mockingbird was supposed to mean in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD. I figured it was some deep voodoo curse or something. Some backwoods Alabama legend where you kill a mockingbird and your family is cursed and your children and your children’s children.
Turns out, no, it’s just Gregory Peck being an asshole. What he’s saying is: if you are going to kill a bird, do not kill the mockingbird in particular. Kill a blue jay instead, because the blue jay’s call is annoying. Whereas the mockingbird creates beautiful songs.
Which– it depends. The mockingbirds around here aren’t covering nightingales or some shit like that. What mockingbirds do is move into an area and sing the songs of competing birds to fake them out. So a sparrow flies by, considers nesting, and then hears the song of another sparrow and thinks: fuck it; I’ll move on. Continue reading