The Christmas Gift That Gave Us “To Kill a Mockingbird”

After she wrote “To Kill a Mockingbird” — a book that would go on to win the 1961 Pulitzer Prize — Harper Lee published very few stories. For decades when people asked about her next project she told them, “Some people only have one book in them.” Like her good friend Truman Capote she suffered many demons, drank excessively, and fell into long spells of depression. But in December 1961 she published an article in McCall’s titled “Christmas to Me” in which she told the story of two people that made her breakout novel possible.

Lee wrote that on Christmas morning in 1956 she awoke to a nudge from her roommate, Michael Brown. Outside, on their New York City street, the snow fell on Brownstone roofs. After she walked downstairs and joined Brown, his wife, and their two children, she watched everyone open their presents and awaited her turn. Her disappointment began to grow, however, as she wondered whether she would receive any gift at all.

Christmas was a difficult holiday for Lee, a self-described “displaced Southerner.” Her family lived more than a thousand miles away in Monroeville, Alabama. She wrote that she missed “the sound of hunting boots, the sudden open-door gusts of chilly air that cut through the aroma of pine needles and oyster dressing.”

1956 marked her 7th year away from home. When she wasn’t working her job as an airline reservation agent, she wrote fiction. She never expected to make a living from it though. The Brown’s changed that.

After the children opened their gifts Joy Brown told Lee, “We have not forgotten you. Look on the tree.”

A few branches up, a letter sat. It said, “You have one year off to write whatever you please. Merry Christmas.”

“What does this mean?” Lee asked.

“What it says,” they responded.

That year the Browns saved up enough money to provide Lee with a year of wages. They told her they didn’t care if she made a dollar from her writing. They wanted her to learn her craft. “Just permit us to believe in you. You must,” they said.

“It’s a fantastic gamble,” Lee said. “It’s such a great risk.”

The Browns exchanged looks, then Michael — a man that would go on to achieve great success as a Broadway writer — said, “No honey. It’s not a risk. It’s a sure thing.”