Now, but when I began writing this book I underestimated the unending geyser of Harriet the Spy’s nanny during a scene when the 11-year-old heroine isįriendless and suffering – for being an uncompromising truth teller. Q: How was the book's title chosen, and what does itĪ: The title comes directly from the book advice from High on the list of women whose lives intrigued me, and about whom I wanted to Once I began writing biographies, Louise Fitzhugh was I remember reading it through several times, stunnedĪt how lucky I was-after all this time, and the many ways our rendezvous might I was hired to write an adaptation of Harriet the Spy for the Minneapolis Harriet and Louise until working as a playwright in Minneapolis 20 years later. Reading kids’ books anymore and missed the wave.

When the book was published in 1964, I really wasn’t Lots of the same cultural references around New York City in the ‘50s and ‘60s. I was born in theīronx, and although Harriet lived in an elite quarter of Manhattan, we still shared Is to say in 1963 when Harriet was 11 years old, so was I. Q: Why did you decide to write this biography ofĪuthor Louise Fitzhugh, creator of the classic children's novel Harriet the Spy ?Ī: I am exactly the same age as Harriet the Spy. She teaches in the Creative Writing Department at the University of Redlands. Leslie Brody is the author of the new book Sometimes You Have to Lie: The Life and Times of Louise Fitzhugh, Renegade Author of Harriet the Spy.

Louise fitzhugh biography