Harper Lee

Harper Lee (April 28, 1926 – February 19, 2016) was an American novelist best known for her Pulitzer Prize–winning work To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), a modern classic of American literature. Born Nelle Harper Lee in Monroeville, Alabama, she was the youngest of four children in a small-town lawyer’s family. Lee developed a passion for reading and storytelling at an early age, influenced by her father’s legal career and the complex social dynamics of the segregated South. She attended the University of Alabama, where she studied law but left before completing her degree to pursue writing in New York City.

Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird was published in 1960 to immediate acclaim, drawing on her childhood experiences and the racial injustices she observed in the South. The novel, set in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, tells the story of young Scout Finch, her brother Jem, and their father Atticus, a principled lawyer who defends a Black man falsely accused of raping a white woman. Its exploration of themes such as racial prejudice, moral integrity, and compassion resonated deeply with readers and continues to be a staple in schools and literary discussions worldwide.

The success of To Kill a Mockingbird brought Lee widespread recognition, including the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961. She became known for her reclusive nature, rarely granting interviews and publishing no new work for decades. Despite her public silence, the novel maintained a strong cultural impact, aided by the success of the 1962 film adaptation starring Gregory Peck, which won three Academy Awards.

In 2015, Lee surprised the literary world with the publication of Go Set a Watchman, a manuscript written before Mockingbird but set two decades later in the lives of its characters. The novel sparked controversy for its portrayal of an older Atticus Finch and raised questions about its release, but it nonetheless became a bestseller.

Harper Lee spent most of her life in her hometown of Monroeville, where she died on February 19, 2016, at the age of 89. Though she published only two novels, her work—especially To Kill a Mockingbird—has left a profound and enduring mark on American literature, celebrated for its empathy, moral vision, and unflinching examination of justice and humanity.