Harper Lee

(1926 -          )

Background                                                                                                                                                 

          Nelle Harper Lee was born on April 28^th, 1926 in Monroeville, a very small town in Alabama .  She was the youngest of the four children of Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Finch Lee.  While growing up, Harper Lee was a tomboy who loved to read.  She also enjoyed all of her adventures with her childhood neighbor and friend, Truman Capote.  Truman Capote, who also grew up to be a famous author, has been both a great friend and inspiration throughout Harper Lee’s life.

Later in Life

In 1944, Harper Lee began her studies at Huntingdon College in Montgomery , Alabama .  Two years later, she moved on to the University of Alabama where she got a law degree and spent a year abroad at Oxford University in England.  After obtaining her degree in law, she worked as a reservation clerk for an airline during the 1950’s.  Eventually, Nelle Harper Lee gave up her job with the airline to focus on her writing.  She went on to write one of the greatest novels of all time, To Kill A Mockingbird.  One famous quote from this novel was spoken by Atticus Finch, a lawyer who defends a black man in an impossible trial. 

  “I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what.”

Books and Awards

When To Kill A Mockingbird was published, it sold over 500,000 copies and it was sold in ten languages.  It even won the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 for fiction.  In June of 1966, Harper Lee was honored yet again when President Johnson named her into the National Council of Arts.  These days, Harper Lee divides her time between New York and Monroeville, Alabama.  She keeps her life private and very rarely agrees to any interviews.                                                                                                            

Inspirations for To Kill A Mockingbird

Many of the situations and characters in To Kill A Mockingbird were influenced by Harper Lee’s own childhood.  Scout, the narrator of To Kill A Mockingbird, faces many situations as a young girl growing up in the South that were based on Harper Lee’s real life experiences.  Dill, Scout’s friend in the novel, was based on Harper Lee’s childhood friend, Truman capote.  But perhaps the most significant influence on Harper lee’s novel was an event that occurred when she was about five years old.  In April of 1951, in the town of Scottsboro, Alabama, very near where Harper Lee grew up, nine black men were tried after being accused of raping two white women.  All of the men except for a 12 year old boy were found guilty and sentenced to death by the all white jury, even after medical reports disproved those accusations.  After almost six years of trials these men were finally set free.  These events had a large effect on the young Harper Lee, and her novel written almost 26 years later was roughly based on them.

- by Atticus

Books Written By Harper Lee

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Book cover images are from http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/images/0446310786 

Photograph of Harper Lee is from http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/english_literature/prosemockingbird/0prose_mockingbird_contrev2.shtml