Bibliography

- www.wikipedia.org

- www.gradesaver.com

- To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee

Comparaisons

We noticed some similarities between Harper Lee's life and the book.  First of all, when Harper Lee was a child, she was a tomboy and she loved to read.  That is similar to Scout in the book, because she doesn't like to wear dresses and she loves reading with Atticus.  Another similarity that we noticed between the life of Harper Lee and the book is that Harper's father was a lawyer.  In the book, Atticus is also a lawyer.  One final comparaison that we noticed was the one between Harper Lee's good friend Truman Capote, and the character Dill in the book.  Truman and Harper were best friends, but they didn't get to see each other that much.  Just like how Scout, Jem, and Dill were good friends but they only got to see Dill during the summer.

Senior Years

Harper Lee's close friend had an interview in 2011 with the Daily Telegraph, where he said that Lee is in an assisted-living facility.  He also said that she is in a wheelchair, she is partially blind and deaf, and she is starting to suffer from memory loss.  Lee's friend mentioned that she confessed to him why she never wrote again.

After To Kill A Mockingbird

After the publication of her bestseller, Harper Lee hadn't published any more of her writing except for a few short essays.  She had started writing a second novel called The Long Goodbye, but never finished.  Later, in the 1980s, she started another novel about an Alabama serial murderer, but she wasn't satisfied with it so she also put that one aside.

When the Academy Award-winning screenplay of To Kill A Mockingbird came out in 1962, Harper Lee said: "I think it is one of the best translations of a book to film ever made".  Gregory Peck, who plays Atticus Finch in the movie, became a friend of Harper Lee's.  She remained close to his family, and Gregory Peck's grandson was even named Harper, after Harper Lee.

Harper Lee distributed her time between her sister's home in Monroeville and an apartment in New York.  She has turned down making speeches, but has accepted honorary degrees.  She arrived in Philadelphia in March 2005, her first time being there since 1960 when she signed with publisher Lippincott.  There, she received an ATTY Award from the Spector Gadon & Rosen Foundation.  After that, she went to Los Angeles, where she accepted the Los Angeles Public Library Literary Award.

In May 2006, Harper Lee accepted an honorary degree given to her by the University of Notre Dame.  The graduating seniors there were given copies of To Kill A Mockingbird before their ceremony, which they held up when Lee received her degree.

Harper Lee wrote a letter to Oprah Winfrey on May 7th, 2006, about her love of books when she was a child.  She also said: "Now, 75 years later in an abundant society where people have laptops, cell phones, iPods and minds like empty rooms, I still plod along with books."

To Kill A Mockingbird

The immediate bestseller To Kill A Mockingbird was published on July 11th, 1960.  In 1961, the book won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.  To this day, To Kill A Mockingbird is still a bestseller, with over 30 million copies in print.  It was also voted "Best Novel of the Century" in a survey by the Library Journal in 1999.

Later Years

Harper Lee developed an interest in English literature during high school, where she attended Monroe County High School.  She graduated in 1944, then attended Huntingdon College in Montgomery for her post secondary education.  Harper Lee was very different from the rest of the students-she showed no interest in fashion, makeup, or dating.  She was mainly interested in her writing, as well as the rest of her studies.  She was a member of the literary honor society.

Harper Lee was very individual, and was known for being a loner when she transferred to the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa.  She attempted at somewhat of a social life here when she joined a sorority.  She was also a part of the school's newspaper, as well as its humor magazine, the Rammer Jammer.  Later, she became the editor for this magazine.

Lee left the magazine when she was accepted into the law school at her university.  After her first year, she expressed to her family that law wasn't her true calling, and writing was.  It was then that she went to Oxford University in England during the summer.  When she returned to study law in the fall, she quickly dropped out and moved to New York City, to follow her dream of becoming a writer.

Harper Lee was 23 years old when she arrived in New York City, where she worked as a ticket agent for Eastern Airlines, as well as the British Overseas Air Corp.  Later, she met up with her old friend Truman Capote, who at that time, was a literary rising star.  By this time, Lee had written multiple long stories and decided to find an agent.  A month later, in December of 1956, a gift was given to her.  This gift included a year's wages, as well as a note saying she could have a year off from her job to write whatever she wished.  Sure enough, she quit her job, and after a year had passed, a first draft of To Kill A Mockingbird was completed with the help of J.B. Lippincott and Co. editor Tay Hohoff.

Childhood

  Nelle Harper Lee was born on April 28th, 1926, in Monroeville, Alabama.  She was the youngest of four children, belonging to Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Cunningham Finch Lee.  Her father was a lawyer who served in the Alabama State Legislature, from 1926 to 1938.  Harper Lee was a tomboy and loved reading as a child, and Truman Capote was her best friend from school, as well as her neighbour.