Biography
In cinema there is a term "actor of one role" - so called performers whose fame is limited to one role. As an example - Makolai Kalkin from "One House" and "One House - 2". In the literature there is no such term, but you can spend a parallel - the fame of some writers is based on one work ("flying over the cuckoo's nest" Ken Kizi) or one hero (Sherlock Holmes Arthur Conan Doyle). Among such "writers of one book" can be attributed to the American harley Harper.Childhood and youth
The future writer was born on April 26, 1926. It happened in Monrovail, the small town of Alabama. Nell Harper Lee (this sounds the full name of the writer) - the youngest of the four children Amaha Kolmann and Cunningham Finch Lee.
According to the memoirs of the older sister Nell Alice, with which the writer was in close relations until the death of death, Harper grew up the Top Top Top, and delivered problems to parents, as well as senior brothers and sisters. Then the girl became friends with a neighbor and a classmate, who later became a writer with the world glory - Capote.
In 1931, the event that the whole country was spoken is the case of the guys from Scottsboro. According to this case, nine black guys from the town of Scottsboro (Alabama) raped two white girls. Even before the trial, the angry residents of the city almost confused these guys. People did not even stop the result of a medical conclusion, according to which the girls were not raped.
As a result, the jury, consisting only of whites, during the four hearings announced the verdict in the form of the most terrible punishment in the state - the death penalty. Little Harper remembered this case thanks to his father, who at that time he worked as a lawyer and was interested in this business. Later, the writer uses his memories when writing a debut book.
After graduating from school in 1944, Harper enters the female college, located in Huntingdon. I studied in college, the girl submits documents to the University of Alabama to study jurisprudence over the next four years. This profession was chosen by the father of the girl who was at that time an influential civil servant.
In 1945, on the program for the exchange of students, for a year, the University falls into Oxford University, but without passing the course of study, the girl throws a university and moves to a permanent place of residence in New York, where he plans to become a writer.
The first works of Harper writes back at the University of Alabama, in the hostel room of the student fraternity "Hee omega". These works are small stories and essays, on which the girl fills his hand. By the way, in the same period - from 1945 to 1949 - Harper Lee works as an editor of a local humorous journal.
To live on something and pay for a removable apartment, the young girl is arranged to work first in Eastern Airlines, and after "British Overseas Airways Corporation". In both airlines, the girl works a ticket for ticket sales. This is happening until the end of the 1950s.
Literature
After Harper manages to publish several stories, it hires his first literary agent in the fall of 1956. At the end of the same year, her old friends Michael and Joy Brown give the most important gift in the life of the writer - paid annual vacation.
"You will have exactly a year to write everything you wanted," they write in a postcard.During this vacation, the girl has time to write a series of stories connected by one hero. These stories, she decides to attribute to the publishing house "Lippincott, Williams and Vilkyins". The editor-in-chief of Tei Holofoff flatly responds to the work of the girl, but strongly recommends that all these stories in one novel.
As a result, in the summer of 1960, the "kill the casting" goes to the light - a book that won the popularity and love of readers of the whole globe. Even critics recognized that the novel is good. For the book of the best-selling book, the thirty-year-old writer receives a Pulitzer Prize in the nomination "The Best Artwork of the Year".
In 1962, the screening of the novel, shot by the director Robert Malligan ("Grand Immunion", "Up the Stairs leading down", "At the same time next year," "man on the moon"). The film is nominated for Oscar and gets it. Also gets another kinonagrada - "Golden Globe". During the filming, Harper managed to jerk with all the actors and the film crew, but she had the most strong relationship with Gregory Pec, to whom she presented the father's watches as a reward for a well-executed role.
After the success of the novel, the writer, along with his childhood friend, Truman Hood goes to Holkomb (Kansas) to collect material for the article about the killed farmer and his family. In 1966, on the basis of these materials, the hood publishes one of the most popular its works - "Cooling Murder", which received the Award of Edgar Alan by in the nomination "Best Detective", as well as several screen incarnations. Harper switches to another material.
Throughout the life of Lee wrote essays and stories, but sometimes it was taken for large forms. The most famous attempt to write a new novel is considered a dropped draft about the serial killer from her native state. The work did not like the writer, and she decided to get rid of him, as he acted with two other works, which are practically known.
In 1966, President Lindon Johnson appoints it to the National Art Council. In 1983, Harper publishes the Essa "Roman and Adventure", with which Alabama History and Heritage Festival. At the same time, whether decides to return to the native city of Monrovill. In 1999, the US Library Journal calls the novel "Kill the casting" the best American novel of the century.
In 2005, in Los Angeles, Harper receives the Award of the City Public Library for achieving in the literature. Next year, Lee receives an honorary degree of the University of Notredam. In the same year, the writer gives one of its rare interviews in the form of an open letter of the leading Ophera Winfrey.
"Now, after 75 years, living in a secured society, in which each second has a laptop, a mobile phone, apad and emptiness in their heads, I still prefer books," writes Harper Lee.In 2007, the writer receives from the hands of the current President George Bush, the highest civilian award of the country - the presidential medal of freedom. Three months later, tolerates stroke. Because of this, Harper has to move to the nursing home to be under the closer attention to his employees.
In 2014, Elis dies - the older sister of the writer. Harper flows into depression. The situation is slightly changing when an unpublished Roman Harper "Go, put the Storam", which was also founded on the stories brought by the writer to the publishing house in 1957, was found in the Safe Alice. Formally, the work is a continuation of "kill the crossbar", but in fact it was written earlier. Harper herself was sure that this manuscript was lost.
New Literary Agent writer Andrew Nureberg and an old familiar Tonya Carter, Lie's lawyer, helped the book to get to the publisher. The writer itself did not comment on the appearance of "Go, put the guard" on the shelves of bookstores. There is a theory that this novel is a hoax and, in truth, not written. The novel "Kill the casting" came to the curriculum for schoolchildren of many countries (including Russia), and quotes from the work went to the people.
Personal life
For almost 90 years of life, the writer never married. Other children also did not.
There were rumors about her intrigues with the writer Truman Hood and actor Gregory Pes, but both men unanimously argued that only warm friendly feelings are associated with Harper.
Death
The writer died in 2016 on the night from 18 to February 19. It happened in a dream - it is easy and painless.Bibliography
- 1960 - "Kill the crossbar"
- 1961 - "Love in other words"
- 1961 - "Christmas for me"
- 1965 - "When children learn America"
- 1983 - "Roman and Adventure"
- 2006 - Open Letter Opera Winfrey
- 2015 - "Go, put the guard"