Have you ever been discriminated against for something you can't control? During the 1950s and most of the 1960s, the largest civil rights movement was the fight for African Americans to gain the same rights as whites. Famous American author Harper Lee once said: "You never truly understand a person until you see things from their point of view...until you step into their skin and we walk there. » During this period, due to practices of segregation and discrimination, African Americans were denied their basic civil rights. By depicting the personal impacts of prejudice, Lee's novel, To Kill A Mockingbird, educated Americans and helped increase diversity and the rights of all. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Harper Lee, the famous author of To Kill A Mockingbird, wrote this famous novel in 1960. The book featured a variety of characters of different races and ages. The novel came out as the civil rights movement was reaching its peak, and Lee put the story into perspective so young adults could get their hands on it as well. Magill Survey of American Literature vol. 4 states that in the book, many characters believed that black men only had a desire to be with white women. This became one of the issues of prejudice that occurred throughout the novel. This issue helps the reader see what is happening from both perspectives, the white one and the black one. “The novel traces the circumstances that led Atticus to take on the case of Tom Robinson, a black man falsely accused of raping a white woman.” “His only crime is being born black in a society that has certain preconceived ideas about black people.” Lee had written on this topic to show what life was like in the South and the many issues of racial injustice occurring there. Lee created such a dramatic impact with this novel. After schools across the country began incorporating the novel into their teachings, it helped teach readers about life in the South and the injustice that was meted out to African Americans. “She put racial prejudice in a perspective that allows us to see it as one aspect of a larger problem; as something that results from ghost contacts, fear and lack of knowledge. It continues, decades later, to appear on the curriculum of thousands of American schools. The book eventually became a popular movie and became known everywhere. The Magill Survey of American Literature Vol.4 states that the film of this novel won an Academy Award. According to Authors and Artists for Young Adults Vol. 13, the book won numerous awards such as the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1961, the Paperback Book of the Year Award, and the Best Seller Award in 1962. Years after the release of To Kill A Mockingbird, Lee decided to continue addressing the racial issues of the South by writing another book called Go Set A Watchman. This new book was not a sequel, but a new occurrence of racial events occurring in the 1950s. Blooms Literature states that the new book "features many of the same characters as To Kill A Mockingbird, but is set at a later date in the 1950s. Publishers Weekly says the novel helps show the growing civil rights movements. Keep in mind: this is just a sample. Get a personalized article from our expert writers now. Get a personalized essay For..