Nelle Harper Lee, better known by her pen name Harper Lee, (1926–2006) was an American novelist widely known for To Kill a Mockingbird, published in 1960. Immediately successful, it won the 1961 Pulitzer Prize and has become a classic of modern American literature. Though Lee had only published this single book, in 2007 she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom for her contribution to literature. Additionally, Lee received numerous honorary degrees, though she declined to speak on those occasions. She was also known for assisting her close friend Truman Capote in his research for the book In Cold Blood. Capote was the basis for the character Dill in To Kill a Mockingbird.
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Folks don’t like to have somebody around knowing more than they do. It aggravates ’em. You’re not gonna change any of them by talking right, they’ve got to want to learn themselves, and when they don’t want to learn there’s nothing you can do but keep your mouth shut or talk their language.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Example
I’m no idealist to believe firmly in the integrity of our courts and in the jury system — that is no ideal to me, it is a living, working reality. Gentlemen, a court is no better than each man of you sitting before me on this jury. A court is only as sound as its jury, and a jury is only as sound as the men who make it up.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Justice
It was times like these when I thought my father, who hated guns and had never been to any wars, was the bravest man who ever lived.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Courage
When a child asks you something, answer him, for goodness’ sake. But don’t make a production of it. Children are children, but they can spot an evasion quicker than adults, and evasion simply muddles ’em.
—Harper Lee
As you grow older, you’ll see white men cheat black men every day of your life, but let me tell you something and don’t you forget it — whenever a white man does that to a black man, no matter who he is, how rich he is, or how fine a family he comes from, that white man is trash.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Race, Racism
I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It’s when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Courage, Bravery
Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Books, Reading
do much of my creative thinking while golfing. If people know you’re..
—Harper Lee
Topics: Golf
Before I can live with other folks I’ve got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn’t abide by majority rule is a person’s conscience.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Conscience, Integrity, Honesty
I think there’s just one kind of folks. Folks.
—Harper Lee
Topics: Prejudice
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