The 'How to Kill a Mockingbird' meme plays on the juxtaposition between Harper Lee’s serious Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and a literal, often absurd, interpretation of its title. Usually featuring a mock-up of the iconic book cover or a photo of an actual mockingbird, the meme subverts expectations by providing 'instructions' that have nothing to do with the story’s themes of racial injustice or moral growth. It gained significant traction in student and literary circles as a way to vent about high school reading lists, eventually evolving into a broader format for instructional parodies of famous book titles that highlight the irony of taking metaphorical language literally.