Harper Lee

Harper Lee (1926-2016) was an American novelist of Southern Gothic fiction. She is best known for her classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird , which won the Pulitzer Prize. Harper used the observations she made living in the Deep South in the 1930s as the basis of the novel. Harper (who goes by her given name of Nelle) was born in Monroeville, Alabama and was the daughter of a former newspaper editor/lawyer. Nelle was a tomboy who enjoyed reading and was a close friend of Truman Capote. After living life frugally, she was gifted a year’s wages in order to pursue her dream of writing.