In the early 1960s, shortly alter publication of To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee accompanied her
childhood friend Truman Capote — the basis for the Dill Harris character — to Holcomb, Kansas, and
served as a research assistant for Capote's 1966 novel, In Cold Blood.
Lee also published three articles in the '60s: "Love — In Other Words" in Vogue (1961), "Christmas
to Me" in McCall's (1961), and "When Children Discover America" in McCall's (1965). President
Lyndon Johnson named Lee to the National Council of Arts in 1966. She has received several
honorary doctorates, including one from the University of Alabama and another from Spring Hill
College in Mobile, Alabama. She attended both ceremonies, but spoke at neither and gave no
interviews.
In 1998, the Harper Lee Award for a Distinguished Alabama Writer was unveiled by the executive
committee of the Alabama Writers' Forum. This award recognizes an accomplished writer who was
born in the state or who lived in Alabama during his or her formative years.
Never married, Lee continues to divide her time between New York and Monroeville, where she
lives with her sister Alice. Known for her wit and charm, Lee has granted only a handful of
interviews since To Kill a Mockingbird's publication. Her family and friends remain protective
of her privacy.
Many wonder why a writer of such talent would choose to write only one novel. When Lee's
cousin, Richard Williams, posed that question to the author, her answer was "When you have a hit
like that, you can't go anywhere but down."