What is Harper Lee's given first name?

Harper Lee’s given first name was Nelle.

She was born Nelle Harper Lee on April 28, 1926, in Monroeville, Alabama. “Nelle” came from her grandmother’s name, Ellen, spelled backward. Although she was legally and personally associated with Nelle Harper Lee, she became known worldwide by the shortened professional name Harper Lee.

Her middle name, Harper, honored Dr. William W. Harper of Selma, Alabama, who had saved the life of Lee’s sister Louise. The author’s choice to publish under “Harper Lee” sometimes leads readers to assume that Harper was her first name, but it was actually her middle name.

Lee’s first novel, To Kill a Mockingbird, appeared in 1960 and drew on elements of her childhood in Monroeville. It won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961. She later published Go Set a Watchman in 2015, a work based on an earlier version of the Mockingbird manuscript. Her unusual first name is also a useful clue when distinguishing the author from her famous novel and its characters.