"Go Set a Watchman"

In 1957, Harper Lee sent her novel “Go Set a Watchman”   ("Watchman") to the J.B. Lippincott publishing company and they bought it. The novel centered on Jean Louise's visit to her home town and her discovery of racism not only in the town, but in the heart of her father, Atticus, as well.  The work sought to imitate the factors inherent with the civil rights movement that began in the mid 1950s. 
Lee worked with Tay Hohoff, an editor at JB Lippincott who told Lee the manuscript needed to be revised.  There was a close collaboration between Hohoff and Lee from which a new novel, entitled “Atticus Finch”, was born, and would be renamed "To Kill a Mockingbird.”

Jean Louise, in the new novel,"To Kill a Mockingbird,” is an eight-year-old girl, Scout, not a twenty-six-year old woman living in New York City as is the case in "Watchman." Scout narrates the story herself, looking back in recollection an unidentified number of years after the events of the novel took place. Lee keeps an adult perspective while at the same time telling Scout's story in the voice of the child.

Atticus Finch was recast as a “White Savior” and as a flawless character, who Scout reveres.  “To Kill a Mockingbird” was set in the 1930s while “Go Set a Watchman” was set contemporaneously with its writing, i.e., 1957. In the 1930s the doctrine of "separate but equal" was the law for public schools so the schools were segregated.  The central issue in "Go Set a Watchmen" is the Brown v The Board of Education (Brown) case decided by the Supreme Court in 1954. By making the changes described the novel loses what could have been a meaningful narrative dealing with the social issue of race discrimination. Instead another "White Savior" narrative was created, which was hardly what was needed on the cusp of the civil rights movement in 1960.
"Go Set a Watchmen" was ultimately published in 2015 at which time it was essentially an anachronism, but one with historical significance.  The New York Times book review of "Go Set a Watchmen" in July 2015 at its conclusion states "Perhaps even more promising, though, was the novel Lee first envisioned, the story of Jean Louise’s adult conflicts between love and fairness, decency and loyalty. Fully realized, that novel might have become a modern masterpiece."
The NYT review doesn't explain what they mean by "modern masterpiece." For me the issue is one of social and cultural relevance and the story could have been and should have been set at the time of "Brown." This time setting could have been used while, nonetheless, making the change to the puerile narrative voice of (Jean Louise / Scout). The symbol of a "Watchmen" suggests vigilance and a readiness to defend oneself. Thurgood Marshall argued the Brown case before the Supreme Court---he was the Watchman. The “mockingbird” symbol implies innocence; it also suggests the powerlessness of the victim, ergo enter the "White Savior" Atticus.
Recently the TV show "60 Minutes" featured Jeff Daniels and the cast of the Broadway play "To Kill a Mockingbird" which is having an exuberantly successful run on Broadway.  Daniels emphasized the changes they have made in characterization so the performance will seem more relevant.  The changes consist of presenting Tom Robinson and Calpurnia as real persons, not caricatures, and presenting Atticus as less saintly.
Considering the change to the Jim Crow 1930s, the change of the narrator to a little girl and the change of Atticus from flawed to saintly it seems gullible of people to assess cultural and social significance to "Mockingbird." In 1957 the Civil Rights movement had begun and the Tay Hohoff-Harper Lee collaborators chose for Harper Lee to write a Fable set in the Jim Crow era, albeit a Fable of alluring literary appeal for readers. Possibly, I am being too hard Tay Hohoff since nearly sixty years later we still love "White Savior" narratives and we still carry Kipling's "The White Man's Burden" as our continuing obligation although we patronizingly characterize it as something else, something relevant.