Linking Literature

Linking Literature is a book of student-written oral histories that explore thematic connections between historical literary texts and our contemporary society. Using Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird as an entry point, students record and craft oral histories that capture people’s very real experiences around themes of justice, empathy and innocence. This collection of 32 oral histories is the result of a two-month long process during which students tackled the sometimes daunting challenges that come with interviewing, transcribing, edited and drafting. They also came to discover that often there is little difference between fiction and reality. Subjects range from the unknown to the famous, and include Holocaust survivors, local political figures and renowned journalist Bill Moyers.