2. To Kill a Mockingbird Introductory Notes

3. Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird is largely autobiographical. Born in Monroeville, Alabama on April 28, 1926.

4. Harper Lee

5. Family & Childhood Father –Francis Finch Lee - a lawyer – The pattern for Atticus Finch, the attorney whose quiet heroism and integrity are central to the novel. Harper Lee grew up in the Great Depression of the 1930’s. This is the same time period as TKAM.

6. Pause & Reflect 1. Write about a few of the things you know about American life during the Great Depression – and in the South during the same time period.

7. Education Harper Lee attended Law School at the University of Alabama. She left in 1950 without finishing. She spent one year as an exchange student at Oxford University in Great Britain.

8. Writing Experience She wrote in her free time, then eventually quit her job to write full time. She submitted her first manuscript of To Kill a Mockingbird in 1957 and was rejected. She revised for 30 months, was accepted and published in 1960.

9. TKAM Awards In 1961, To Kill a Mockingbird won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction. –the Literary Award from the Alabama Library Association –Brotherhood Award of the National conference of Christians and Jews.

10. Pause & Reflect 2. Write 1-2 things that impress you about Harper Lee.

11. TKAM Setting Maycomb County, Alabama is the imaginary district in southern Alabama where To Kill a Mockingbird is set. Maycomb, the setting of TKAM, is modeled on Harper Lee’s home town, Monroeville The story begins in the summer of 1933 and ends on Halloween night, 1935.

12. Background of U.S. The country is in the grips of the Great Depression.  Maycomb operates under segregation and the Jim Crow laws common in the South during this time period.

13. Themes in TKAM Racism Class/Social Prejudice Differences/Tolerance Injustice Loss of Innocence / Growing Up

14. Pause & Reflect 3. Based on the themes and setting background presented, what expectations or predictions do you have about the novel?