harper lee biography worksheet answers

To Kill a Mockingbird

by Harper Lee

To kill a mockingbird study guide.

Harper Lee wrote To Kill a Mockingbird during a very tense time racially in her home state of Alabama. The South was still segregated, forcing blacks to use separate facilities apart from those used by whites, in almost every aspect of society. The Civil Rights Movement began to pick up steam when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955. Following her bold defiance, Marin Luther King, Jr., became the leader of the movement, and the issue began to gain serious national attention. Clearly, a prime subject of To Kill a Mockingbird, namely the injustice of racism and inequality in the American South, was highly relevant at the time of its publication.

Interestingly, Harper Lee decided to set the novel in the Depression era of the 1930s. The main character, Scout, is based on Lee's own childhood, and Dill is most likely based on her childhood friend and neighbor, Truman Capote. By placing her novel in the 1930s, Lee provided her readers with a historical background for current events of the time, and in doing so she exposed the deeply rooted history of the civil rights struggle in the South.

In addition to a biting analysis of race relations, To Kill A Mockingbird is also a story about Scout's maturation. Coming-of-age stories are also known as members of the genre Bildungsroman , which tends to depict main characters who take large steps in personal growth due to life lessons or specific trauma. In Lee's novel, Scout Finch works to come to terms with the facts of her society, including social inequality, racial inequality, and the expectation that she act as a "proper Southern lady." Scout is a tomboy who resents efforts to alter her behavior in order to make her more socially accepted. In the 1930s, gender inequality also reigned, and women were not given equal rights. Women in the South were expected to be delicate and dainty, concepts that Scout abhors; and women were not allowed to serve on juries in Maycomb, according to the novel. Scout loves adventure and can punch as well as any boy in her class. She finds it hard to fit into the mold of a Southern lady. Miss Maudie is a strong role model for her in that Miss Maudie also defies some of their society's expectations and maintains her individuality as a Southern woman. But Scout eventually succumbs--in her own way--to social pressure.

The novel's characters are forced to examine the world (or at least the town) in which they live. Through observing their society and interacting with people such as Tom Robinson and Boo Radley , they come to understand more about true bravery, cowardice, and humanity.

To Kill a Mockingbird Questions and Answers

The Question and Answer section for To Kill a Mockingbird is a great resource to ask questions, find answers, and discuss the novel.

Where can I find the literary devices used in each chapter a book?

To find literary devices used in each chapter of "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, you can refer to literary analysis guides, study aids, or academic resources that offer chapter-by-chapter breakdowns. Here are a few places where you might...

From the text:

We eased in beside Miss Maudie, who looked around. “Where were you all, didn’t you hear the commotion?” “What happened?” asked Jem. “Mr. Radley shot at a Negro in his collard patch.” “Oh. Did he hit him?

What was "round the back steps" when Calpurnia came in on Monday morning?

Gifts for Atticus and the family....... food given in appreciation for his help and fine counsel.

The kitchen table was loaded with enough food to bury the family: hunks of salt pork, tomatoes, beans, even scuppernongs. Atticus grinned when he...

Study Guide for To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird is a book written by Harper Lee. The To Kill a Mockingbird study guide contains a biography of Harper Lee, literature essays, quiz questions, major themes, characters, and a full summary and analysis.

• About To Kill a Mockingbird
• To Kill a Mockingbird Summary
• To Kill a Mockingbird Video
• Character List

Essays for To Kill a Mockingbird

To Kill a Mockingbird essays are academic essays for citation. These papers were written primarily by students and provide critical analysis of To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.

• The Impact of Class Structure
• Justice in To Kill a Mockingbird
• The Journey Motif in Works of American Literature
• Prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird and Goin' Someplace Special
• Character Analysis in To Kill A Mockingbird

Lesson Plan for To Kill a Mockingbird

• About the Author
• Study Objectives
• Introduction to To Kill a Mockingbird
• Relationship to Other Books
• Bringing in Technology
• Notes to the Teacher

Wikipedia Entries for To Kill a Mockingbird

• Introduction
• Biographical background and publication
• Plot summary
• Autobiographical elements

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Harper Lee Biography Reading Comprehension Passage Printable Worksheet PDF

Subject: English

Age range: 10 - 16

Resource type: Worksheet/Activity

Last updated

21 March 2024

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Summary of passage

Harper Lee, the famous American author of “To Kill a Mockingbird,” was born in April 1926 in Monroeville, Alabama. As a child, she loved reading and writing and had a vivid imagination. Her father’s work as a lawyer inspired her to write her famous book. Harper attended a local school and later went to college to study law but decided to pursue a career in writing instead. In 1960, she published “To Kill a Mockingbird,” which became a huge success and addressed important themes like racism and injustice. The book taught lessons about compassion and understanding and is still widely read today. Harper Lee lived a private life after her book’s success but continued to write. She passed away in February 2016 at the age of 89, leaving behind a lasting legacy as one of the greatest American authors.

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• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Literature Notes
• Harper Lee Biography
• To Kill a Mockingbird at a Glance
• Book Summary
• Character List
• Summary and Analysis
• Part 1: Chapter 1
• Part 1: Chapters 2-3
• Part 1: Chapters 4-5
• Part 1: Chapters 6-7
• Part 1: Chapters 8-9
• Part 1: Chapters 10-11
• Part 2: Chapters 12-13
• Part 2: Chapters 14-16
• Part 2: Chapters 17-20
• Part 2: Chapters 21-23
• Part 2: Chapters 24-26
• Part 2: Chapters 27-28
• Part 2: Chapters 29-31
• Character Analysis
• Scout (Jean Louise) Finch
• Atticus Finch
• Dill Harris
• Boo Radley and Tom Robinson
• Aunt Alexandra and Miss Maudie Atkinson
• Bob and Mayella Ewell
• Character Map
• About To Kill a Mockingbird
• Critical Essays
• Racial Relations in the Southern United States
• Comparing To Kill a Mockingbird to Its Movie Version
• Famous Quotes from To Kill a Mockingbird
• Film Versions of To Kill a Mockingbird
• Full Glossary for To Kill a Mockingbird
• Essay Questions
• Practice Projects
• Cite this Literature Note

The youngest daughter of Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Cunningham Finch Lee, Nelle Harper Lee was born in Monroeville, Alabama (a small town in Monroe County between Montgomery and Mobile) on April 28, 1926. Lee was raised with two sisters, Alice and Louise, and a brother, Edwin Coleman Lee. Both her sisters are still living, but her brother died of a sudden cerebral hemorrhage in 1951.

Amasa Lee grew up in Florida and came to Monroe County in the early 1900s. He worked as a bookkeeper until 1915, when he passed the bar and began practicing law. Mr. Lee also served on the Alabama State Legislature from 1926 to 1938, and as editor of  The Monroe Journal  from 1929 to 1947.

Frances Finch was from a Virginia family who settled in Monroe County, Alabama, and founded the town of Finchburg. Miss Finch met Mr. Lee while he was working at the Flat Creek Mill Company in Finchburg; they married in 1912. The couple lived briefly in Florida, returning to live in Monroe County in 1913.

By all accounts, Harper Lee is friendly and gregarious with those she knows, but has always been an extremely private person, disclosing little about her life to the public. Consequently, most of the information available about Lee's childhood comes from friends and is largely anecdotal. Because the character of Scout is somewhat autobiographical, readers gain their best access to Lee's childhood — or at least the flavor of her childhood — within the pages of To Kill a Mockingbird .

In 1944, at the age of 18, Harper Lee enrolled in Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Alabama. From 1945 to 1949 she studied law at the University of Alabama. She transferred to Oxford University in England as an exchange student for a year, but six months before completing her studies, Lee decided to go to New York to be a writer.

While pursuing the career that would ultimately produce To Kill a Mockingbird , Lee worked briefly in the early 1950s as a reservations clerk for Eastern Airlines and BOAC (British Overseas Airways Corp.) in New York City. In 1957, she submitted a manuscript to the J. B. Lippincott Company, who felt that her attempt at a novel was actually more of a series of strung-together short stories. The publisher recommended a rewrite, so Lee spent the next two-and-a-half years working on the manuscript. Her efforts paid off, and To Kill a Mockingbird , her first and only novel, was published in 1960.

Many aspects of To Kill a Mockingbird are autobiographical. Monroeville served as the model for Maycomb, and Lee was dubbed "Queen of the Tomboys" by at least one friend; Lee gave all three of her mother's names to various characters in the novel. There is at least anecdotal evidence that Boo Radley was based on an actual neighbor. Finally, Lee has stated that Atticus Finch was based largely on her own father.

To Kill a Mockingbird was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1961, and was made into a major motion picture starring Gregory Peck in 1962. Lee was so impressed with Peck's portrayal of Atticus Finch that she gave him her father's pocket watch at the end of the movie's filming.

In the early 1960s, shortly after publication of To Kill a Mockingbird , Harper Lee accompanied her childhood friend Truman Capote — the basis for the Dill Harris character — to Holcomb, Kansas, and served as a research assistant for Capote's 1966 novel, In Cold Blood .

Lee also published three articles in the '60s: "Love — In Other Words" in Vogue (1961), "Christmas to Me" in McCall's (1961), and "When Children Discover America" in McCall's (1965) . President Lyndon Johnson named Lee to the National Council of Arts in 1966. She has received several honorary doctorates, including one from the University of Alabama and another from Spring Hill College in Mobile, Alabama. She attended both ceremonies, but spoke at neither and gave no interviews.

In 1998, the Harper Lee Award for a Distinguished Alabama Writer was unveiled by the executive committee of the Alabama Writers' Forum. This award recognizes an accomplished writer who was born in the state or who lived in Alabama during his or her formative years.

Never married, Lee continued to divide her time between New York and Monroeville, where she lived with her sister Alice. Known for her wit and charm, Lee granted only a handful of interviews since To Kill a Mockingbird' s publication. Her family and friends remained protective of her privacy.

Lee died in 2016 at the age of 89.

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To Kill A Mockingbird Facts & Worksheets

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Table of Contents

To Kill A Mockingbird is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book and one of the classics of modern American literature. It has been a phenomenal success since it was published. The book follows the life of Scout Finch, who shows us how 1930s Alabama dealt with the Southern justice system and social class.

See the fact file below for more information on the To Kill A Mockingbird or alternatively, you can download our 22-page To Kill A Mockingbird worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

Harper lee biography.

• Nelle Harper Lee was born on April 28, 1926, in Monroeville, Alabama.
• To Kill a Mockingbird was her only published book until Go Set A Watchman was released in 2015.
• She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007.
• She lived a very private life and did not attend any public engagements.
• The character Dill was based on her childhood friend, the novelist Truman Capote.
• She based her book on her childhood life living in Alabama and admitted that Scout was her.
• Harper Lee died at the age of 89 on February 19, 2016.

THE CHARACTERS

• Atticus Finch – father of Jem and Scout, a widower, and lawyer. A man respected by the people of Maycomb even though he does not abide the community’s racial prejudice. His neighbors scorn him for defending and proving the innocence of a black man wrongly accused of rape. He stands his ground but does not take it against his neighbors.
• Jean Louise Finch or Scout Finch – Atticus’ daughter and Jem’s sister. She is six years old when the story starts, and is our eyes in this novel, both as an adult and a kid. She shows us how the people of Maycomb treat each other as racism and unequal treatment unfold before her eyes.
• Jeremy Atticus Finch – He is 10 years old when the story starts, and is the son of Atticus and brother of Scout, his constant playmate along with their neighbor, Dill. He idolizes his father and wants to follow his footsteps. We see him as a child at the start of the book, who only cares about dares and games, but he becomes mature as he discovers the cruelty and unfairness of the world.
• Arthur Radley or Boo Radley – A man Jem, Scout, and Dill are thoroughly curious about. They always wonder what he looks like and what might make him finally go outside. Boo leaves things in the tree knot for Jem and Scout without them knowing it is him until Jem figures it out. Legends say he eats cats and raccoons and hurt his father with scissors, like it was a natural thing to do.
• Tom Robinson – The African-American accused of rape by a white girl. Atticus is chosen to defend him, and proves that he couldn’t have hurt Mayella due to his injured arm.
• Calpurnia – A black female cook for the Finch household who acts as mother to Scout and Jem. She knows how to read and write, a rarity at the time.
• Ms. Stephanie – We see through her how the community of Maycomb thinks. She never filters what she wants to say, disregards the accuracy of her statements, and thinks highly of her race.
• Robert Ewell – A drunkard and violent father of Mayella Ewell and her seven siblings. It is hinted that he is responsible for what Tom Robinson is accused of.
• Mayella Ewell – The white girl who Tom Robinson is alleged to have raped. She is the eldest of seven siblings and responsible for taking care of them.
• To Kill A Mockingbird is narrated through the eyes of a six-year-old girl, Jean Louise Finch, or Scout as everybody calls her.
• The novel is set in a fictitious town, Maycomb, Alabama, where the Finch family is living during the Great Depression .
• Scout, her brother Jem, and their friend Dill, who visits during the summer, find themselves captivated by a mysterious personality near the Finch abode.
• This character is Boo Radley, who is claimed to be a dangerous man who eats cats. The children, despite these stories, are curious and try to get his attention and make him come out of the house.
• While the children are busy with their adventures at Radley’s house, Atticus Finch, Jem and Scout’s father, a lawyer, is appointed to defend a black man wrongly accused of raping a white girl.
• Tom Robinson, with an injured left hand, fights for his innocence in a trial where his fate has been decided even before the trial starts.
• Atticus stands to question Mayella Ewell and proves that Tom Robinson couldn’t have raped or hurt Mayella, but she stands by her statement.
• Atticus tries his best to defend and protect Tom Robinson. He heavily implies that Robert Ewell was responsible for the crime they are accusing Tom of.
• Before the judgment day, Atticus stands guard on Tom Robinson’s cell to stop a planned mob lynching the latter.
• The mob does not succeed as Scout unknowingly appeals to the conscience of Mr. Cunningham and the crowd.
• Tom Robinson, as expected, is convicted. He tries to escape prison, but is shot dead seventeen times by the guards.
• Robert Ewell attacks Atticus’ children in the woods when they are going home from participating in a school play.
• Boo Radley sees and accidentally kills Robert to protect the children.
• The sheriff and Atticus agree that Bob’s death was a drunken accident.
• Jem’s arm is badly broken at the elbow because of Bob Ewell’s attack.

THEMES IN TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

• Racism is the central theme of the book as the case of the African-American, Tom Robinson, is one of the two major plots.
• Tom Robinson is accused of the rape of a white girl. All the evidence suggests he is innocent, but due to the color of his skin, he is guilty even before the trial starts.
• Sadly, Tom Robinson is not the only character who experiences racism.
• Aunt Alexandra, Atticus’ sister, asks her brother to get rid of Calpurnia, hinting that a black woman shouldn’t raise Scout.
• Jem and Scout also have to endure discrimination when Calpurnia takes them to their church service. Atticus is being scorned because he chooses to defend and prove Tom Robinson’s innocence in court.
• Atticus says, “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… until you climb into his skin and walk around in it”.
• This is the best lesson the book imparts. Empathy is the core of the book.
• Empathy guides the actions of the protagonists. Atticus is the moral backbone of the story, never failing to put himself in other people’s shoes.
• He never fights back against Robert Ewell, no matter how the latter insults and provokes him.
• He tells Jem and Scout “Jem, see if you can stand in Bob Ewell’s shoes a minute. I destroyed his last shred of credibility at that trial, if he had any to begin with. The man had to have some kind of comeback, his kind always does”. Scout and Jem learn what this means through their observations and their father’s lectures.
• Scout is considered to be a tomboy. But despite her boyish tendencies, she is still expected to abide by the era’s expectation of the female gender.
• Calpurnia, who acts as her mother, dresses her as a girl and demands that she act like one, at least at formal gatherings.
• Aunt Alexandra has a very typical view of what a girl should be. She tells Scout once, “You shouldn’t be doing something that requires pants” when Scout complains that she can’t do anything in a dress.
• Women are also not allowed to be part of the jury. Atticus remarks, “I guess it’s to protect our frail ladies from sordid cases like Tom’s. Besides… I doubt if we’d ever get a complete case tried – the ladies be interrupting to ask questions”.
• Mayella also suffers due to the gender roles imposed by Maycomb society. She is left to take care of her siblings. It is implied by Tom that Mayella fell in love with him because he was kind to her. But being a white girl, she cannot do anything about it.
• The working theory of what happened with Tom and Mayella is that her father saw her kiss Tom. Disgusted, he hit Mayella and probably raped her, then tried to use Tom as a scapegoat and Mayella, being dependent on her father, agreed to this scheme.
• It is a sin to kill a Mockingbird because they are innocent.
• As Ms. Maudie and Atticus say, “Mockingbirds don’t do one thing but make music for us to enjoy, but sing their hearts out for us. That’s why it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.”
• Given this, it is fair to say that innocence dies in the book.
• The book starts where Jem and Scouts think everything in Maycomb is good and that all people get along nicely. They learn as the story progresses that it is the opposite. Some situations and motivations cause people to act unfairly to others.
• Boo Radley is another character who can be deemed as innocent in the book. He was not allowed to go out so that he would not endure the unfairness of the world.
• However, he is subject to prejudice, but he does not know the cruelty and unfairness of the rumors about him.
• His innocence is compromised when he saves Scout and Jem and accidentally kills Robert Ewell.
• Jem says “I think I’m beginning to understand why Boo Radley’s stayed shut up in the house all this time… it’s because he wants to stay inside.”
• Jem explains these by saying “There’s the ordinary kind like us and the neighbors, there’s the kind like the Cunninghams out in the woods, the kind like the Ewells down at the dump, and the Negroes”.
• He refers to his family as ordinary, even though his father is a lawyer, and his uncle is a doctor.
• The Cunninghams are poor white farmers who live decently, while the Ewells are the most impoverished white farmers whom the community also calls trash as they live in a run-down and dirty house where the children run wild.
• They have what Atticus calls “special white privileges” where they depend on various forms of public assistance and were allowed to hunt out of season so that the children would not get hungry.
• The community also allows children not to attend school.
• The fourth classification is the Negroes, who live separately from the whites and are considered as the lowest class in society regardless of their education, monetary status, and moral values.

To Kill A Mockingbird Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle which includes everything you need to know about the To Kill A Mockingbird across 22 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use To Kill A Mockingbird worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about the To Kill A Mockingbird which is a Pulitzer Prize-winning book and one of the classics of modern American literature. It has been a phenomenal success since it was published. The book follows the life of Scout Finch, who shows us how 1930s Alabama dealt with the Southern justice system and social class.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

• To Kill A Mockingbird Facts
• Harper Lee’s Life
• Mockingbird Characters
• Witnessing Injustice
• Who is the Mockingbird?
• Mockingbird at a Glance
• Mockingbird in Brief
• Best Movie Adaptation
• Who Said It?
• Left in the Knothole
• My Own Book Cover

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(1926-2016)

Who Was Harper Lee?

In July 2015, Lee published her second novel, Go Set a Watchman , which was written before To Kill a Mockingbird and portrays the later lives of the characters from her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.

Lee was born on April 28, 1926, in Monroeville, Alabama. The youngest of four children, she grew up as a tomboy in a small town.

Her father was a lawyer, a member of the Alabama state legislature and also owned part of the local newspaper. For most of Lee's life, her mother suffered from mental illness, rarely leaving the house. It is believed that she may have had bipolar disorder.

In high school, Lee developed an interest in English literature. After graduating in 1944, she attended the all-female Huntingdon College in Montgomery. Lee stood apart from the other students—she couldn't have cared less about fashion, makeup or dating. Instead, she focused on her studies and writing. Lee was a member of the literary honor society and the glee club.

Transferring to the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa, Lee was known for being a loner and an individualist. She did make a greater attempt at a social life there, joining a sorority for a while.

Pursuing her interest in writing, Lee contributed to the school's newspaper and its humor magazine, the Rammer Jammer , eventually becoming the publication's editor.

In her junior year, Lee was accepted into the university's law school, which allowed students to work on law degrees while still undergraduates. The demands of her law studies forced her to leave her post as Rammer Jammer editor.

After her first year in the program, Lee began expressing to her family that writing—not the law—was her true calling. She went to the University of Oxford in England that summer as an exchange student.

Returning to her law studies that fall, Lee dropped out after the first semester. She soon moved north to follow her dreams to become a writer.

Early Writing Career

In 1949, a 23-year-old Lee arrived in New York City . She struggled for several years, working as a ticket agent for Eastern Airlines and for the British Overseas Air Corp (BOAC).

While in the city, Lee befriended Broadway composer and lyricist Michael Martin Brown and his wife Joy. In 1956, the Browns gave Lee an impressive Christmas present—to support her for a year so that she could write full time. She quit her job and devoted herself to her craft.

The Browns also helped her find an agent, Maurice Crain. He, in turn, was able to get publisher J.B. Lippincott Company interested in her work. Working with editor Tay Hohoff, Lee worked on a manuscript set in a small Alabama town, which eventually became her novel To Kill a Mockingbird.

Friendship With Truman Capote

One of Lee’s closest childhood friends was another writer-to-be, Truman Capote (then known as Truman Persons). Tougher than many of the boys, Lee often stepped up to serve as Truman's childhood protector.

Truman, who shared few interests with boys his age, was picked on for being sensitive and for the fancy clothes he wore. While the two friends were very different, they both had difficult home lives. Truman was living with his mother's relatives in town after largely being abandoned by his own parents.

While in New York City in the 1950s, Lee was reunited with her old friend Capote, who was by then one of the literary rising stars of the time.

In 1956, Lee joined forces with Capote to assist him with an article he was writing for The New Yorker . Capote was writing about the impact of the murder of four members of the Clutter family on their small Kansas farming community.

The two traveled to Kansas to interview townspeople, friends and family of the deceased and the investigators working to solve the crime.

Serving as his research assistant, Lee helped with the interviews, eventually winning over some of the locals with her easygoing, unpretentious manner. Truman, with his flamboyant personality and style, had a hard time initially getting himself into his subjects' good graces.

During their time in Kansas, the Clutters' suspected killers, Richard Hickock and Perry Smith, were caught in Las Vegas and brought back for questioning. Lee and Capote got a chance to interview the suspects not long after their arraignment in January 1960.

Soon after, Lee and Capote returned to New York. She worked on the galleys for her forthcoming first novel while he started working on his article, which would evolve into the nonfiction masterpiece In Cold Blood .

The pair returned to Kansas for the murder trial. Lee gave Capote all of her notes on the crime, the victims, the killers, the local communities and much more.

Lee worked with Capote on and off on In Cold Blood . She had been invited by Smith and Hickock to witness their execution in 1965, but she declined. When Capote's book was finally published in 1966, a rift developed between the two collaborators for a time.

Capote dedicated the book to Lee and his longtime lover, Jack Dunphy, but failed to acknowledge her contributions to the work. While Lee was very angry and hurt by this betrayal, she remained friends with Capote for the rest of his life.

READ MORE: Harper Lee and Truman Capote Were Childhood Friends Until Jealously Tore Them Apart

DOWNLOAD BIOGRAPHY'S HARPER LEE FACT CARD

Lee published two books in her lifetime: To Kill a Mockingbird (1960) and Go Set a Watchman (2015). She also worked on and off with her friend Capote on his famed book, In Cold Blood (1966).

'To Kill a Mockingbird'

In July 1960, To Kill a Mockingbird was published and picked up by the Book-of-the-Month Club and the Literary Guild . A condensed version of the story appeared in Reader's Digest magazine. The following year, the novel won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize and several other literary awards. A classic of American literature, To Kill a Mockingbird has been translated into more than 40 languages with more than a million copies sold each year.

The work's central character, a young girl nicknamed Scout, was not unlike Lee in her youth. In one of the book's major plotlines, Scout and her brother Jem and their friend Dill explore their fascination with a mysterious and somewhat infamous neighborhood character named Boo Radley.

The work was more than a coming-of-age story: another part of the novel reflected racial prejudices in the South. Their attorney father, Atticus Finch, tries to help a Black man who has been charged with raping a white woman to get a fair trial and to prevent him from being lynched by angry white people in a small town.

'Go Set a Watchman'

Lee published her second novel, Go Set a Watchman, in July 2015. The story was essentially a first draft of To Kill a Mockingbird and followed the later lives of the novel’s characters.

Go Set a Watchman was submitted to a publisher in 1957. When the book wasn't accepted, Lee's editor asked her to revise the story and make her main character Scout a child. The author worked on the story for two years and it eventually became To Kill a Mockingbird.

Lee's Go Set a Watchman was thought to be lost until it was discovered by her lawyer Tonja Carter in a safe deposit box. In February 2015, it was announced that HarperCollins would publish the manuscript on July 14, 2015.

Go Set a Watchman features Mockingbird's Scout as a 26-year-old woman on her way back home to Maycomb, Alabama, from New York City. Scout's father Atticus, the upstanding moral conscience of To Kill a Mockingbird , is portrayed as a racist with bigoted views and ties to the Ku Klux Klan .

In Watchman, Atticus tells Scout: "Do you want Negroes by the carload in our schools and churches and theaters? Do you want them in our world?”

The controversial novel and shocking portrayal of a beloved character sparked debates among fans, and offered literary scholars and students fodder for analyzing the author's creative process. Lee's second novel also broke pre-sale records for HarperCollins.

With reports of 88-year-old Lee's faltering health, questions arose about whether the publication was the author's decision. Lee issued a statement through Carter: "I’m alive and kicking and happy as hell with the reactions to Watchman ."

But even that message didn't put an end to questions: In a 2011 letter, Lee's sister Alice had written that Lee would "sign anything put before her by any one in whom she has confidence." However, others who had met with Lee stated that she was behind the decision to publish. Alabama officials investigated and found no evidence that she was a victim of coercion.

'To Kill a Mockingbird' Movie

Playwright Horton Foote wrote a screenplay based on the book and used the same title for a 1962 To Kill a Mockingbird movie adaptation. Lee visited the set during filming and did a lot of interviews to support the project.

The movie version of To Kill a Mockingbird earning eight Academy Award nominations and won three awards, including best actor for Gregory Peck 's portrayal of Finch. The character is said to have been based on Lee's father.

Later Years

In the mid-1960s, Lee was reportedly working on another novel, but it was never published.

In 1966, Lee had an operation on her hand to repair the damage done by a bad burn. She also accepted a post on the National Council of the Arts at the request of President Lyndon B. Johnson . During the 1970s and '80s, Lee largely retreated from public life.

Lee spent some of her time on a nonfiction book project about an Alabama serial killer which had the working title The Reverend . This work, however, was never published.

Lee generally lived a quiet, private life, splitting her time between New York City and her hometown of Monroeville. In Monroeville, she lived with her older sister Alice Lee, a lawyer who the author called "Atticus in a skirt." Lee's sister was a close confidante who often took care of the author's legal and financial affairs.

Active in her church and community, Lee became famous for avoiding the spotlight of her celebrity. She would often use the wealth she had accumulated from her success to make anonymous philanthropic donations to various charitable causes.

In November 2007, President George W. Bush presented Lee with the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her "outstanding contribution to America's literary tradition" at a ceremony at the White House.

Her sister Alice once said about Lee, "Books are the things she cares about." With the assistance of a magnifying device—necessary due to her macular degeneration—Lee was able to keep reading despite her ailments.

Lawsuits and E-Publishing Deal

In May 2013, Lee filed a lawsuit in federal court against literary agent Samuel Pinkus. Lee charged that, in 2007, Pinkus "engaged in a scheme to dupe" her out of the copyright to To Kill a Mockingbird , later diverting royalties from the work. In September 2013, a settlement was reached in the lawsuit.

Later that year, Lee's legal team filed suit against the Monroe County Heritage Museum located in Monroeville for trying "to capitalize on the fame" of To Kill a Mockingbird and for selling unauthorized merchandise related to the novel. Lawyers for the author and the museum later filed a joint motion to end the suit, and the case was dismissed by a federal judge in February 2014.

That same year, Lee allowed her famous work to be released as an e-book. She signed a deal with HarperCollins for the company to release To Kill a Mockingbird as an e-book and digital audio editions.

In a release shared by the publisher, Lee explained: "I'm still old-fashioned. I love dusty old books and libraries. I am amazed and humbled that Mockingbird has survived this long. This is Mockingbird for a new generation."

Lee died on February 19, 2016, at the age of 89. Her nephew, Hank Connor, said the author died in her sleep.

In 2007, Lee suffered a stroke and struggled with various ongoing health issues, including hearing loss, limited vision and problems with her short-term memory. After the stroke, Lee moved into an assisted living facility in Monroeville.

Around the time of Lee’s death in 2016, it was announced that producer Scott Rudin had hired Aaron Sorkin to write a stage version of To Kill a Mockingbird . In March 2018, several months before the production's scheduled Broadway debut, Lee's estate filed a lawsuit on the grounds that Sorkin's adaptation significantly deviated from the original material.

A main point of contention was the play's portrayal of Finch, which reportedly showed him in early scenes as more in step with the oppressive racial feelings of the time, as opposed to the heroic crusader of the novel.

Rudin pushed back against the assertion that the characters were significantly altered, though he insisted he had leeway to adapt them to contemporary times. "I can’t and won’t present a play that feels like it was written in the year the book was written in terms of its racial politics: It wouldn’t be of interest," he said. "The world has changed since then."

The portrayal of Atticus Finch was reportedly softened from someone “who drinks alcohol, keeps a gun and curses mildly” to an “honest and decent person.” The play hit Broadway in December 2018.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: Harper Lee
• Birth Year: 1926
• Birth date: April 28, 1926
• Birth State: Alabama
• Birth City: Monroeville
• Birth Country: United States
• Gender: Female
• Best Known For: Harper Lee is best known for writing the Pulitzer Prize-winning bestseller 'To Kill a Mockingbird' and 'Go Set a Watchman,' which portrays the later years of the Finch family.
• Fiction and Poetry
• Astrological Sign: Taurus
• Oxford University
• Huntington College
• University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa
• Death Year: 2016
• Death date: February 19, 2016
• Death State: Alabama
• Death City: Monroeville
• Death Country: United States

We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right, contact us !

CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Harper Lee Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/authors-writers/harper-lee
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: March 31, 2021
• Original Published Date: April 2, 2014
• You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view—until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.
• Simply because we are licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try and win.
• I think there's just one kind of folks. Folks.
• People in their right minds never take pride in their talents.
• Any writer worth his salt writes to please himself ... it's a self-exploratory operation that is endless.
• Things are always better in the morning.
• The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience.
• Everybody's gotta learn, nobody's born knowing.
• I would advise to anyone who aspires to a writing career, that before developing his talent, he would be wise to develop a thick hide.

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Harper Lee and The 1930s Era Webquest

Welcome:  Harper Lee and The 1930s Era Webquest  Description:  This is an introductory activity prior to reading the novel "To Kill A Mockingbird" in which students will look for biographical details about Harper Lee and historical details about the 1930s era. Thanks to the provided links they will have to look for speficif information to answer specific questions.  Grade Level:  9-12  Curriculum:  English / Language Arts  Keywords:  Harper Lee Great Depression Mockingbird  Author(s):  Leesa Baltas

Before reading and studying "To kill A Mockingbird" you will learn biographical details about the author Harper Lee and her upbringing in the deep south of the United States, as well as historical information of the 1930s. By looking for specific information on different links provided, you will get more in depth knowledge about The Great Depression, Segregation, and Discrimination of that era. This will in turn help you to grasp the full scope and meaning of the events that occur in the novel.

You are about to start a journey in this webquest, where you will learn to find information about an author and historical events of the period of time referred to in the author's book. You will develop your sense of critical thinking by sorting through what you have found and deciding what is important and what is less essential to complete your assignment.

The things you learn through your findings will help you to read and better understand the novel we will study in-depth in class.

In order to do this webquest, the class will be divided into three groups of research with specific websites to visit and information to look for to answer a series of questions. Group 1 will work on the author's biographical background. Group 2 will research certain aspects of historical events and presidents of the time. Group 3 will look for information on an important event of the times. STEP 1: Find your group's worksheet here and answer the questions by visiting the website(s) provided: 

Harper Lee and the 1930's webquest

Group 1: Go to → en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harper_Lee  and find the following information:

date and place of birth:

Parents' names:

Population of her hometown:

Describe her childhood:

 1/Give examples of racism going on during her childhood:

 2/Who is Truman Capote and what's his tie to Harper Lee?

 3/How much formal education did Lee have?

 4/How did her upbringing and life influence her writing of To Kill a Mockingbird?

 5/Which of her family members' names did she use in the novel?

Group 2: Go to → http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Thursday  

                     http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl    

                      and answer these questions:

1/ What does the term « Black Thursday » refer to?

2/ What was the date?

3/ Explain how the country was led to the Great Depression:

 4/ What are « dust bowl » farmers?

5/ During the Depression, what did « dust bowl » farmers do, where did they go and why ?

ALSO  Go to --> www.enchantedlearning.com/history/uspres/list.shtml

6/ Who were the presidents during the 1930's ?

 Group 3: Go to → www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/FTrials/scottsboro/SB_acct.html

 1/ what were the Scottsboro boys known for?

 2/ Who were they?

 3/ What did they do and how did they get into so much trouble?

 4/ How did the defense attorneys show their lack of experience?

  5/Were they ever pardoned of their wrongful convictions?

  STEP 2: Information Gap activity: In class, you will need to ask the other groups questions, to get the answers to the other parts of the webquest you did not specifically work on, in order to have all the background information, on all aspects studied here, and complete the paper version of the webquest worksheet that will be handed out in class.   STEP 3: Writing Homework:  Consult the following websites and explain what life was like in the 1930s. Be sure to write down the weblinks to access these pages from home. https://www.createwebquest.com/node/40975   www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/snprelief.htm   www.alabamamoments.alabama.gov/sec48det.html www.fsd79.org/cms/lib/IL01001571/Centricity/Domain/262/Black%20in%201930s.pdf   STEP 4: Knowledge Quiz: Take the quiz on the evaluation page of this webquest.

Quiz for ALL students -->  Answer the following questions (2pts per question)

1/ Write a short biography about Harper Lee. Give essential facts, her date of birth, death, where she was born and grew up, bibliography, and influence of her childhood on her writing.

2/ Explain what her relationship was with Truman Capote.

3/ What and when was "Black Thursday"?

4/ During the Depression, what did « dust bowl » farmers do, where did they go and why ?

5/ Write a short paragraph explaining all you know about the Scottsboro Boys and how they are linked to Harper Lee's "To Kill A Mockingbird".

Congratulations! You have completed all of the steps to getting the necessary background knowledge to understanding Harper Lee's "To Kill A Mockingbird".

You are now ready to begin reading and enjoying this classic American novel set in the 1930s of The Deep South in Alabama.

Once we are through reading and studying the book, we will enjoy watching the film, with Gregory Peck, which has also become an America cinematographic classic.

Standards:  TESOL Technology Standards: 

TESOL Standard 1: English language learners communicate for social, intercultural, and instructional purposes within the school setting.

TESOL Goal 3: (Standard 3): “Language learners appropriately use and evaluate available technology-based tools for communication and collaboration.”

TESOL Goal 3: (Standard 4): "Language Learners use and evaluate available technology based research tools appropriately" by ...."collecting information from a variety of resources" ...."employ strategies to evaluate online information" ...."document source material appropriately".

Many thanks to: Createwebquest.com 

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harper_Lee    and find the following information:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Thursday  

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dust_Bowl    

www.enchantedlearning.com/history/uspres/list.shtml

www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/FTrials/scottsboro/SB_acct.html

www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/snprelief.htm   www.alabamamoments.alabama.gov/sec48det.html www.fsd79.org/cms/lib/IL01001571/Centricity/Domain/262/Black%20in%201930s.pdf

[img_assist|nid=41196|title=Leesa Baltas|desc=|link=none|align=left|width=100|height=63]

Hello, my name is Leesa Baltas and I created this webquest for my Master's in TESOL. This is a more elaborate version of a webquest I have already done in class, that students liked and learned a lot from. I have not yet implemented this version of it. If you should happen to try it out, let me know what worked and what needs changing. Enjoy!

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Harper Lee Biography

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Harper Lee Author Study Activity, Biography Worksheet Print and Digital

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Description

Students will be focused while researching Harper Lee with this Author Bio worksheet. Encourage your students to independently research this author while learning at their own pace.

Your students will love this self-directed activity while they research several sources (not included) to answer the questions. This will allow your students to retain the information. This will also allow for in-depth academic conversations as you review information found from the class.

Included in Download:

- Teacher Directions

- Author Bio worksheet (digital version included)

- 5 Writing Prompts (digital version included)

- Coloring Sheet with Quote

Use This Activity:

- Independent Research

- Partner Work

- Extended Learning Opportunity

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Harper Lee Biography

“Nelle” Harper Lee was born on April 28, 1926, the youngest of four children of Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Cunningham Finch Lee. She grew up in Monroeville, a small town in southwest Alabama. Her father was a lawyer who also served in the state legislature from 1926–1938. As a child, Lee was a tomboy and a precocious reader. After she attended public school in Monroeville she attended Huntingdon College, a private school for women in Montgomery for a year and then transferred to the University of Alabama. After graduation, Lee studied at Oxford University. She returned to the University of Alabama to study law but withdrew six months before graduation.

She moved to New York in 1949 and worked as a reservations clerk for Eastern Air Lines and British Overseas Airways. While in New York, she wrote several essays and short stories, but none were published. Her agent encouraged her to develop one short story into a novel. In order to complete it, Lee quit working and was supported by friends who believed in her work. In 1957, she submitted the manuscript to J. B. Lippincott Company. Although editors found the work too episodic, they saw promise in the book and encouraged Lee to rewrite it. In 1960, with the help of Lippincott editor Tay Hohoff, To Kill a Mockingbird was published.

To Kill a Mockingbird became an instant popular success. A year after the novel was published, 500,000 copies had been sold and it had been translated into 10 languages. Critical reviews of the novel were mixed. It was only after the success of the film adaptation in 1962 that many critics reconsidered To Kill a Mockingbird .

To Kill a Mockingbird was honored with many awards including the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1961 and was made into a film in 1962 starring Gregory Peck. The film was nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It actually was honored with three awards: Gregory Peck won the Best Actor Award, Horton Foote won the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar and a design team was awarded an Oscar for Best Art Direction/Set Decoration B/W. Lee worked as a consultant on the screenplay adaptation of the novel.

Author Truman Capote was Lee’s next-door neighbor from 1928 to 1933. In 1959 Lee and Capote traveled to Garden City, Kan., to research the Clutter family murders for his work, In Cold Blood (1965). Capote dedicated In Cold Blood to Lee and his partner Jack Dunphy. Lee was the inspiration for the character Idabel in Capote’s Other Voices, Other Rooms (1948). He in turn clearly influenced her character Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird .

Harper Lee divides her time between New York and her hometown of Monroeville, Ala., where her sister Alice Lee practices law. Though she has published no other work of fiction, this novel continues to have a strong impact on successive generations of readers.

Harper Lee had many childhood experiences that are similar to those of her young narrator in To Kill a Mockingbird , Scout Finch:

Harper Lee’s Childhood

• She grew up in the 1930s in a rural southern Alabama town.
• Her father, Amasa Lee, is an attorney who served in the state legislature in Alabama.
• Her older brother and young neighbor (Truman Capote) are playmates.
• Harper Lee is an avid reader as a child.
• She is 6 years old when the Scottsboro trials are widely covered in national, state and local newspapers.

Scout Finch’s Childhood

• Her father, Atticus Finch, is an attorney who served in the state legislature in Alabama.
• Her older brother (Jem) and young neighbor (Dill) are playmates.
• Scout reads before she enters school and reads the Mobile Register newspaper in first grade.
• She is 6 years old when the trial of Tom Robinson takes place.

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