Harper Lee
Harper Lee (born April 28th, 1928) is a Pulitzer prize winning American novelist, known for her major work To Kill a Mockingbird, which was first published in 1960. Lee is a native of Monroeville, Alabama, and much of her fiction is considered autobiographical in nature. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007 by President George W. Bush[1].
Biography
Her father was a local lawyer in small-town Alabama, who for some time served on the state legislature. The daughter studied Law at the University of Alabama in the late 1940s, but did not graduate. She was employed as a reservation clerk until 1959, when her first novel was published.
To Kill A Mockingbird
The novel is partly autobiographical. It deals with racial prejudice and class in the American south in the early 1930s. The book is set around a framework of historical events, with references to President Roosevelt and Hitler. In the Depression-era small southern town, a racially charged trial takes place against the the mystery of Boo Radley, and the moral force of defense lawyer Atticus Finch. Scout, the narrator, is five when the story begins, eight when it ends. But Lee endows her with streetsmarts and simple honesty in such doses that the main impact of the story is overwhelming authenticity.