Harper Lee pleaded with Berkeley Breathed not to 'murder' Opus the penguin

Harper Lee loved Opus the penguin
(Image credit: Facebook/BerkeleyBreathed)

Harper Lee never wrote another published novel after To Kill A Mockingbird, but she was evidently a prolific pen pal. One of her correspondents, from 1994 to 2008, was Berkeley Breathed, the cartoonist revealed after Lee's death on Friday. Breathed shared five of those letters with The New York Times, which published them late Sunday. Theirs was a mutual admiration society, with Breathed basing Bloom County on Maycomb, Alabama, the fictional setting of Mockingbird, and Lee growing to love Opus, the penguin who starred in Bloom County. Breathed made direct reference to Mockingbird in about a dozen Bloom County strips, The Times reports:

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Peter Weber, The Week US

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.