Harper Lee: The Author And Her Times When To Kill a Mockingbird was first published in 1960, interviewers who met the author often felt as if they were coming face to face with a grownup version of Scout Finch, the six-year-old heroine of the novel. Although she was almost thirty-five years old, Harper Lee was a youthful looking woman with angular features and a casual, short-cropped hairstyle that marked her as a former tomboy. Appearances were not deceiving. A brief glance at the facts of Lee's life shows that reviewers were right to suspect that the portrait of Scout was to a large degree autobiographical. Harper Lee grew up