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    Harper Lee, whose 1961 novel To Kill a Mockingbird on the racial troubles of the American deep south, has died at the age of 89.

    Until last year, Lee had been something of a one-book literary legend. To kill a Mockingbird sold more than 40 million copies around the world and earned her a Pulitzer prize, remaining a towering presence in American literature. Another novel, Go Set A Watchman, was controversially published in July 2015 as a “sequel” to Mockingbird, though it was later confirmed to be Mockingbird's first draft.

    But from the moment Mockingbird was published to almost instant success, the author consistently avoided public attention. Lee had lived for several years in a nursing home near the house in which she had grown up in Monroeville, Alabama—the setting for Maycomb of her famous book. Her neighbor for 40 years, Sue Sellers, said, “She was such a private person. All she wanted was privacy, but she didn't get much. There was always somebody following her around.”

    James Naughtie, BBC Books Editor, commented on the novels of Harper Lee: “I think she stands, particularly among American readers, as someone who shone a light into a very dark place. She was writing at a time when people were beginning to lift the lid on everything in the South which they'd chosen not to understand. That all changed in the 1960s. So I think her status for writing that book in its extraordinarily direct way will remain.

    My husband and I had been married nearly twenty-two years when I acquired Stevens-Johnson syndrome,a disorder where my immune system responded to a virus by producing painful blisters（水疱）.Although my long-term evaluation was good,I,who had been so fiercely independent,rapidly became absolutely helpless.

    My husband,Scott,stepped up to the plate,taking care of kids and cooking dinners.He also became my personal caretaker,applying the medicine to all of my blisters because my hands couldn't do the job.Needless to say,I had negative emotions,bouncing from embarrassment to shame caused by total reliance on someone other than myself.

    At one point when I had mentally and physically hit bottoms I remember thinking that Scott must somehow love me more than I could ever love him.With my illness he had become the stronger one,and I the weaker one.And this disturbed me.

    I recovered from my illness,but I couldn't seem to recover from the thought that I loved my husband less than he loved me.This seeming distinction in our love continued to annoy me for the year following my illness.

    Then recently Scott and I went on a long bike ride.He's an experienced cyclist;I'm quite the green hand.At one point with a strong headwind and sharp pain building in my tired legs,I really thought I couldn't go any further. Seeing me struggle,Scott pulled in front of me and yelled over his shoulder,"Stay close behind me."As I fell into the draft of his six-foot-three-inch frame and followed his steps,I discovered that my legs quit burning and I was able to catch my breath.My husband was pulling me along again.At this very moment I woke up to what I now believe: during these and other tough times,love has the opportunity to become stronger when one partner learns to lean on the other.

    I pray my husband will always be strong and healthy.But if he should ever become the struggling one,whether on a bike ride or with an illness,I trust I'll be ready to call out to him: Stay close behind me—my turn to pull you along.

    It was one of those terribly hot days in Baltimore. Needless to say, it was too hot to do anything outside. But it was also scorching in our apartment. This was 1962, and I would not live in a place with an air conditioner for another ten years. So my brother and I decided to leave the apartment to find someplace indoors. He suggested we could see a movie. It was a brilliant plan.

    Movie theaters were one of the few places you could sit all day and—most important —sit in air conditioning. In those days, you could buy one ticket and sit through two movies. Then, the theater would show the same two movies again. If you wanted to, you could sit through them twice. Most people did not do that, but the manager at our theater. Mr. Bellow did not mind if you did.

    That particular day, my brother and I sat through both movies twice, trying to escape the heat. We bought three bags of popcorn and three sodas each. Then, we sat and watched The Music Man followed by The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance. We'd already seen the second movie once before. It had been at the theater since January, because Mr. Bellow loved anything with John Wayne in it.

    We left the theater around 8, just before the evening shows began. But we returned the next day and saw the same two movies again, twice more. And we did it the next day too. Finally, on the fourth day, the heat wave broke.

    Still, to this day I can sing half the songs in The Music Man and recite half of John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart's dialogue from The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance! Those memories are some of the few I have of the heat wave of 1962. They're really memories of the screen, not memories of my life.

    Why not consider spending the holiday at Harvard if you are a high school student who will have a holiday in this coming summer?

    About the program

    This is a five-week program^ from July 16 to August 17, 2018, which is designed to help high school students to pave the way for a successful college experience. We have 200-plus courses, such as film, philosophy, creative writing, and computer science. Besides, we offer you two types of credit courses—4-credil course and 8-credit course. You can earn college credit here. Whether you choose to sign up for one or two courses, you will still have some flexibility (灵活性) to schedule your days'.

    Tuition and Fees

    Application fee (the application period opens in December): $50

    Tuition: $3,300 for 4-credit course;

    $6,600 for 8-credit course

    Housing (room and board) fee: $5, 700

    Health insurance fee: $200

    Financial Aid(援助)

    Financial aid is a scholarship award. It is available to Secondary School Program students with excellent academic records who give evidence of financial need. It does not have to be paid back. Awards cover only a part of the program cost. Families should expect to contribute to the remaining part. Award amounts are determined by many sides, including family finances, availability of fund (基金), and whether students are resident. ... Local students may be eligible (有资格的) for additional funding towards room and board.

    Loud cheers and applause broke out at NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab on Monday, November 25, 2018, as the unmanned lander, called Insight, touched down on Mars, after nearly seven years from design to launch to landing.

    The great arrival of the spacecraft­designed to listen for quakes and shakes as a way to discover the Red Planet's inner secrets, how it formed billions of years ago and, how other planets like Earth took shape­marked the eighth successful landing on Mars in Nasa's history.

    Minutes after InSight landed on the surface of Mars, the first image was sent back, showing a wide flat area as seen through a dirty camera.

    The touchdown came after a nearly seven-month, 300 million-mile travel from Earth to Mars, during which the InSight spacecraft had to slow down from a speed of more than 12,000 mph. The spacecraft's heat shelter helped the lander survive temperatures as high as 2,700℉.

    Each step along the way was watched nervously at JPL, with updates delayed by the eight-minute light travel time between Earth and Mars. Mission controllers hugged each other with joy when the signals were received. "We are proud of everything that has gone on today," they told us reporters.

    The first picture of the surface of Mars was sent back to Earth by one of the MarCO nanosatellites (马可纳米卫星) that accompanied InSight during its travel to Mars. The dust from the landing made the view unclear. Pictures from it were expected to be clearer once the dust settled and the lens cover (镜头盖) was removed.

    Hours later, InSight's batteries were charging as expected. The InSight team also passed on another picture, taken by a different camera that's fixed on the lander's robotic arm. The view is clearer, showing the robotic arm and the seismometer, which is used to discover the actual movement of the ground.