Posted on 02/19/2016 7:51:13 AM PST by Borges
Nelle Harper Lee, who won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1961 for her book, "To Kill a Mockingbird," has died at the age of 89, multiple sources in her hometown of Monroeville confirmed Friday morning.
Lee was born April 28, 1926, in Monroeville, the youngest of four children of lawyer Amasa Coleman Lee and Frances Cunningham Finch Lee.
As a child, Lee attended elementary school and high school just a few blocks from her house on Alabama Avenue. In a March 1964 interview, she offered this capsule view of her childhood: "I was born in a little town called Monroeville, Alabama, on April 28, 1926. I went to school in the local grammar school, went to high school there, and then went to the University of Alabama. That's about it, as far as education goes."
She moved to New York in 1949, where she worked as an airlines reservations clerk while pursuing a writing career. Eight years later, Lee submitted her manuscript for "To Kill a Mockingbird" to J.B. Lippincott & Co., which asked her to rewrite it.
On July 11, 1960, Lee's novel was published by Lippincott with critical and commercial success. The author won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction the following year.
The film adaptation of the novel, with Mary Badham as Scout, opened on Christmas Day of 1962 and was an instant hit.
Harper Lee suffered a stroke in 2007, recovered and resumed her life in the hometown where she spent many of her 89 years. A guardedly private individual, Lee was respected and protected by residents of the town that displays Mockingbird-themed murals and each year stages theatrical productions of "To Kill a Mockingbird."
Lee returned to Monroeville for good once her sister Alice became ill and needed help. She'd eat breakfast each morning at the same fast-food place, and could later be seen picking up Alice from the law firm founded by their father.
Services for Lee have not been announced.
God Bless ‘em. The “hero” in history’s casting of characters- what the world would be like without them.
One of my bucket list items is to visit the Clutter graves and lay a flower on them. Such mild people to meet such a violent end.
Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Most people now have a really warped idea of the South during the 50s.
My Father served on a jury in DeFuniak Springs in the 50s. It was a trial of a Black man accused of carrying a concealed weapon which was a knife.
During the trial in which he had no lawyer, he denonstrated how he used the knife to open cans with. He was a hobo.
Now the knife was technically a concealed weapon but totally understandable. Daddy and most of the jurors were what would be called racists today.
Despite that they had no desire to see an innocent man go to jail and they found him not guilty.
My neighbor, two doors away, grew up in the same town and, although my neighbor is twenty-eight years younger than Harper Lee, her mother was a childhood friend of Harper’s and Truman Capote’s and has old photographs to prove it.
Capote is too sympathetic to the killers, in my opinion, but he was writing less of a crime novel than a peek into their minds.
Propaganda movie utilizing all the stereotypes that I was ignorant of as a kid
And the novel? Same?
One of the greatest powers the human brain has is the power of rationalization. Pretty much everybody has beliefs that don’t exactly gel on deeper analysis, but taken individually make perfectly good sense. Defense lawyers don’t want to see people unjustly prosecutes, heck most defense lawyers don’t even want to see people justly prosecuted, their job is to get that innocent verdict. Just because they have an “issue” with the person’s demographic group away from the courtroom doesn’t change what they believe about their job, and the proper disposition of the unjustly accused.
Never read it
Just saw the movie several times and like I said
Got teary eyed first time
And winning the Pulitzer with your first book propels you into the pantheon of writing legends.
Well I think it predated the stereotypes.
Stephen King also writes mostly trash. He is to literature what velvet Elvises are to painting.
It was 1960
Probably.
Moral absolutism:
Thou shalt not commit adultery
Moral relativism:
Jane’s husband is a cad who works long hours and drinks too much, comes home and yells at her. I’m a nice guy. It’s okay for me to “comfort her” in the afternoon, because ...
Moral absolutism:
Thou shalt not steal
Moral relativism:
Little orphan Billy is hungry. The wealthy (and plump) local baker has several loaves cooling on the windowsill. I’ll just take one and give it to little Billy.
They made us read this dreck during our attempted indoctrination into socialism in high school. Loathed it. Loathed “The Dollmaker”, “The Pearl”, and all those other crappy polemics. About the only thing I remember liking was a little ditty called Usher II which was in a book of short sci-fi stories in a box in the corner of the classroom. That and Harrison Bergeron, which I’m surprised they even let us get a glimpse of.
Blecch.
Anyway, that’s my grumpy 2 cents of the moment. Carry on...
I remember very little about 1960
My dad flew jets....the Meridian air wing
Our lake house at lake Bruin
He played semi pro baseball
Bubba the neighbor aged 7 punched me in the nose
My grandfather took me on a Southern airways Convair prop from Memphis to Jackson
Deer camp and skinned knees
Not much at 3
My mom had the book
She had Alan Watts too and Kerouac
She was boho
Well, I get you because I hated reading them too. I especially remember hating reading the Red Pony for the birthing scene when I was a pretty young girl.
Rest in peace.
Well, me and another student were invited to her house once............................
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