86-489: An autobiography , sometimes informally called an autobio , is a self-written biography of one's own life. The word "autobiography" was first used deprecatingly by William Taylor in 1797 in the English periodical The Monthly Review , when he suggested the word as a hybrid, but condemned it as "pedantic". However, its next recorded use was in its present sense, by Robert Southey in 1809. Despite only being named early in
172-401: A persona . That is, for such subjects the dominant passages of the presentation of themselves in everyday life are already formed by what might be called a 'self-biofication' process. Several countries offer an annual prize for writing a biography such as the: Moll Flanders Moll Flanders is a novel by Daniel Defoe , first published in 1722. It purports to be the true account of
258-489: A (stolen) gold watch. At last, her life of conniving and desperation seems to be over. After her husband/brother dies, Moll tells her (Lancashire) husband the entire story and he is "perfectly easy on that account... For, said he, it was no fault of yours, nor of his; it was a mistake impossible to be prevented." Aged 69 (in 1683), the two return to England to live "in sincere penitence for the wicked lives we have lived." According to Swaminathan (2003), Moll Flanders provides
344-535: A Solitude, for that was the first instance where a woman told her life story, not as finding "beauty even in pain" and transforming "rage into spiritual acceptance," but acknowledging what had previously been forbidden to women: their pain, their rage, and their "open admission of the desire for power and control over one's life." In recent years, multimedia biography has become more popular than traditional literary forms. Along with documentary biographical films , Hollywood produced numerous commercial films based on
430-452: A bank clerk, who while still married to an adulterous wife (a "whore"), proposes to Moll after she entrusts him with her financial holdings. While waiting for the banker to divorce, Moll pretends to have a great fortune to attract another wealthy husband in Lancashire, assisted by a new female acquaintance who attests to Moll's (fictitious) social standing. The ruse is successful and she marries
516-561: A bestseller in London ), philosophers, such as John Stuart Mill , churchmen – John Henry Newman – and entertainers – P. T. Barnum . The sciences of psychology and sociology were ascendant at the turn of the 20th century and would heavily influence the new century's biographies. The demise of the "great man" theory of history was indicative of the emerging mindset. Human behavior would be explained through Darwinian theories. "Sociological" biographies conceived of their subjects' actions as
602-480: A biography from this period is the life of Charlemagne by his courtier Einhard . In Medieval Western India , there was a Sanskrit Jain literary genre of writing semi-historical biographical narratives about the lives of famous persons called Prabandhas . Prabandhas were written primarily by Jain scholars from the 13th century onwards and were written in colloquial Sanskrit (as opposed to Classical Sanskrit ). The earliest collection explicitly titled Prabandha-
688-497: A demonstration of divine intention through encounters with the Divine. The earliest example of a spiritual autobiography is Augustine's Confessions though the tradition has expanded to include other religious traditions in works such as Mohandas Gandhi 's An Autobiography and Black Elk 's Black Elk Speaks . Deliverance from Error by Al-Ghazali is another example. The spiritual autobiography often serves as an endorsement of
774-487: A fall back into sin, and eventually culminating in a conversion experience that has a profound impact on the course of their life from that point. The two scholars to first analyze the pattern of spiritual autobiography in Defoe's works, publishing within the same year, were George A. Starr and J. Paul Hunter. George Starr's book, titled Defoe and Spiritual Autobiography , analyses the pattern of spiritual autobiography, and how it
860-500: A ghostwriter, are routinely published. Some celebrities, such as Naomi Campbell , admit to not having read their "autobiographies". Some sensationalist autobiographies such as James Frey's A Million Little Pieces have been publicly exposed as having embellished or fictionalized significant details of the authors' lives. Autobiography has become an increasingly popular and widely accessible form. A Fortunate Life by Albert Facey (1979) has become an Australian literary classic. With
946-405: A large segment of the population than other works of that period. The earliest biographical dictionaries initially focused on the lives of the prophets of Islam and their companions , with one of these early examples being The Book of The Major Classes by Ibn Sa'd al-Baghdadi . And then began the documentation of the lives of many other historical figures (from rulers to scholars) who lived in
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#17328527587091032-471: A match that leads her to Virginia Colony with a kindly man who introduces her to his mother. After three children (one dies), Moll learns that her mother-in-law is actually her biological mother, which makes her husband her half-brother. She dissolves their marriage and after continuing to live with her brother for three years, travels back to England, leaving her two children behind, and goes to live in Bath to seek
1118-667: A new husband. Again she returns to her con skills and develops a relationship with a man in Bath whose wife is elsewhere confined due to insanity. Their relationship is at first platonic, but eventually develops into Moll becoming something of a " kept woman " in Hammersmith , London. They have three children (one lives), but after a severe illness he repents, breaks off the arrangement, and commits to his wife. However, he assures Moll that their son will be well cared for, so she leaves yet another child behind. Moll, now 42, resorts to another beau,
1204-667: A rapid growth, thanks to an expanding reading public. This revolution in publishing made books available to a larger audience of readers. In addition, affordable paperback editions of popular biographies were published for the first time. Periodicals began publishing a sequence of biographical sketches. Autobiographies became more popular, as with the rise of education and cheap printing, modern concepts of fame and celebrity began to develop. Autobiographies were written by authors, such as Charles Dickens (who incorporated autobiographical elements in his novels) and Anthony Trollope (his Autobiography appeared posthumously, quickly becoming
1290-469: A subject's heirs. An unauthorized biography is one written without such permission or participation. An autobiography is written by the person themselves, sometimes with the assistance of a collaborator or ghostwriter . At first, biographical writings were regarded merely as a subsection of history with a focus on a particular individual of historical importance. The independent genre of biography as distinct from general history writing, began to emerge in
1376-453: A supposedly rich man who claims to own property in Ireland. They each quickly realise that they were both conned and manipulated by the acquaintance. He discharges her from the marriage, telling her nevertheless that she should inherit any money he might ever get. After enjoying each other's company for about a month, they part ways, but Moll soon discovers that she is pregnant. She gives birth and
1462-460: A window into women’s ways of being that do not reflect 18th century gender norms . Moll is reliant on alliances and friendships with women, many of whom also fall outside of the gendered expectations of the era, she marries five times, and she has sexual relationships outside of marriage. One of Defoe’s notable contributions to 18th century ideas of female empowerment rests on the notion of women as agents of their own wealth. As Kuhlisch notes, “From
1548-432: A work that exerted considerable influence on the evolution of the genre, was James Boswell 's The Life of Samuel Johnson , a biography of lexicographer and man-of-letters Samuel Johnson published in 1791. While Boswell's personal acquaintance with his subject only began in 1763, when Johnson was 54 years old, Boswell covered the entirety of Johnson's life by means of additional research. Itself an important stage in
1634-506: Is Jinabhadra 's Prabandhavali (1234 CE). In Medieval Islamic Civilization ( c. AD 750 to 1258), similar traditional Muslim biographies of Muhammad and other important figures in the early history of Islam began to be written, beginning the Prophetic biography tradition. Early biographical dictionaries were published as compendia of famous Islamic personalities from the 9th century onwards. They contained more social data for
1720-436: Is Robert Remini whose books on Andrew Jackson idolize its hero and fends off criticisms. The study of decision-making in politics is important for scholarly political biographers, who can take different approaches such as focusing on psychology/personality, bureaucracy/interests, fundamental ideas, or societal forces. However, most documentation favors the first approach, which emphasizes personalities. Biographers often neglect
1806-884: Is William Hazlitt 's Liber Amoris (1823), a painful examination of the writer's love-life. With the rise of education, cheap newspapers and cheap printing, modern concepts of fame and celebrity began to develop, and the beneficiaries of this were not slow to cash in on this by producing autobiographies. It became the expectation—rather than the exception—that those in the public eye should write about themselves—not only writers such as Charles Dickens (who also incorporated autobiographical elements in his novels) and Anthony Trollope , but also politicians (e.g. Henry Brooks Adams ), philosophers (e.g. John Stuart Mill ), churchmen such as Cardinal Newman , and entertainers such as P. T. Barnum . Increasingly, in accordance with romantic taste, these accounts also began to deal, amongst other topics, with aspects of childhood and upbringing—far removed from
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#17328527587091892-517: Is alive, as is her husband/brother. Moll carefully introduces herself to her brother and their son, in disguise. With the help of a Quaker, the two found a farm with 50 servants in Maryland . Moll reveals herself now to her son in Virginia and he gives her her mother's inheritance, a farm for which he will now be her steward, providing £100 a year income for her. In turn, she makes him her heir and gives him
1978-837: Is another such classic, and J.D. Salinger 's The Catcher in the Rye is a well-known modern example of fictional autobiography. Charlotte Brontë 's Jane Eyre is yet another example of fictional autobiography, as noted on the front page of the original version. The term may also apply to works of fiction purporting to be autobiographies of real characters, e.g., Robert Nye 's Memoirs of Lord Byron . In antiquity such works were typically entitled apologia , purporting to be self-justification rather than self-documentation. The title of John Henry Newman 's 1864 Christian confessional work Apologia Pro Vita Sua refers to this tradition. The historian Flavius Josephus introduces his autobiography Josephi Vita ( c. 99 ) with self-praise, which
2064-628: Is based partially on the life of Moll King , a London criminal whom Defoe met while visiting Newgate Prison . Historically, the book was occasionally the subject of police censorship. Moll's mother is a convict in Newgate Prison in London who is given a reprieve by " pleading her belly ," a reference to the custom of postponing the executions of pregnant criminals. Her mother is eventually transported to British America , and Moll Flanders (not her birth name, she emphasises, taking care not to reveal it)
2150-472: Is considered one of the great masterpieces of western literature. Peter Abelard 's 12th-century Historia Calamitatum is in the spirit of Augustine's Confessions , an outstanding autobiographical document of its period. In the 15th century, Leonor López de Córdoba , a Spanish noblewoman, wrote her Memorias , which may be the first autobiography in Castillian . Zāhir ud-Dīn Mohammad Bābur , who founded
2236-487: Is death in any case. Yet Moll convinces a minister of her repentance, and together with her Lancashire husband is transported to the Colonies to avoid hanging, where they live happily together (she even talks the ship's captain into letting them stay in his quarters, apart from the other convicts, who are sold on arrival). Once in the colonies, Moll learns her mother has left her a plantation and that her own son (by her brother)
2322-511: Is defined by Miller as a research method that collects and analyses a person's whole life, or portion of a life, through the in-depth and unstructured interview, or sometimes reinforced by semi-structured interview or personal documents. It is a way of viewing social life in procedural terms, rather than static terms. The information can come from "oral history, personal narrative, biography and autobiography" or "diaries, letters, memoranda and other materials". The central aim of biographical research
2408-428: Is followed by a justification of his actions as a Jewish rebel commander of Galilee. The rhetor Libanius ( c. 314 –394) framed his life memoir Oration I (begun in 374) as one of his orations , not of a public kind, but of a literary kind that would not be read aloud in privacy. Augustine of Hippo (354–430) applied the title Confessions to his autobiographical work, and Jean-Jacques Rousseau used
2494-412: Is found in Defoe's books. His focus in the book is primarily on Robinson Crusoe , as that is Defoe's book that follows the clearest pattern of spiritual autobiography. He does discuss Moll Flanders at length, stating that the disconnectedness of the events in the book can be attributed to the book's spiritual autobiographical nature. He examines the pattern of spiritual autobiography in these events, with
2580-422: Is raised from the age of three until adolescence by a kindly foster mother. Thereafter she gets attached to a household as a servant where she is loved by both sons, the elder of whom convinces her to "act like they were married" in bed. Unwilling to marry her, he persuades her to marry his younger brother. After five years of marriage, she then is widowed, leaves her children in the care of in-laws, and begins honing
2666-403: Is seen through a perspective that is the product of one's contemporary society and as a result, biographical truths are constantly shifting. So, the history biographers write about will not be the way that it happened; it will be the way they remembered it. Debates have also arisen concerning the importance of space in life-writing. Daniel R. Meister in 2017 argued that: Biographical research
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2752-564: Is that of Julius Caesar 's Commentarii de Bello Gallico , also known as Commentaries on the Gallic Wars . In the work, Caesar describes the battles that took place during the nine years that he spent fighting local armies in the Gallic Wars . His second memoir, Commentarii de Bello Civili (or Commentaries on the Civil War ) is an account of the events that took place between 49 and 48 BC in
2838-411: Is to produce rich descriptions of persons or "conceptualise structural types of actions", which means to "understand the action logics or how persons and structures are interlinked". This method can be used to understand an individual's life within its social context or understand the cultural phenomena. There are many largely unacknowledged pitfalls to writing good biographies, and these largely concern
2924-459: The Duc de Saint-Simon . The term "fictional autobiography" signifies novels about a fictional character written as though the character were writing their own autobiography, meaning that the character is the first-person narrator and that the novel addresses both internal and external experiences of the character. Daniel Defoe 's Moll Flanders is an early example. Charles Dickens ' David Copperfield
3010-531: The Mughal dynasty of South Asia kept a journal Bāburnāma ( Chagatai / Persian : بابر نامہ ; literally: "Book of Babur" or "Letters of Babur" ) which was written between 1493 and 1529. One of the first great autobiographies of the Renaissance is that of the sculptor and goldsmith Benvenuto Cellini (1500–1571), written between 1556 and 1558, and entitled by him simply Vita ( Italian : Life ). He declares at
3096-496: The Renaissance promoted a focus on secular subjects, such as artists and poets, and encouraged writing in the vernacular. Giorgio Vasari 's Lives of the Artists (1550) was the landmark biography focusing on secular lives. Vasari made celebrities of his subjects, as the Lives became an early "bestseller". Two other developments are noteworthy: the development of the printing press in
3182-455: The Victorian era for future generations to read. Up until this point, as Strachey remarked in the preface, Victorian biographies had been "as familiar as the cortège of the undertaker", and wore the same air of "slow, funereal barbarism." Strachey defied the tradition of "two fat volumes ... of undigested masses of material" and took aim at the four iconic figures. His narrative demolished
3268-505: The midwife gives a tripartite scale of the costs of bearing a child, with one value level per social class. She continues to correspond with the bank clerk, hoping he will still have her. Moll leaves her newborn in the care of a countrywoman in exchange for the sum of £5 a year. Moll marries the banker, but realises "what an abominable creature I am! and how this innocent gentleman is going to be abused by me!" They live in happiness for five years before he becomes bankrupt and dies of despair,
3354-644: The 15th century and the gradual increase in literacy . Biographies in the English language began appearing during the reign of Henry VIII . John Foxe 's Actes and Monuments (1563), better known as Foxe's Book of Martyrs , was essentially the first dictionary of the biography in Europe, followed by Thomas Fuller 's The History of the Worthies of England (1662), with a distinct focus on public life. Influential in shaping popular conceptions of pirates, A General History of
3440-443: The 18th century and reached its contemporary form at the turn of the 20th century. Biography is the earliest literary genre in history. According to Egyptologist Miriam Lichtheim , writing took its first steps toward literature in the context of the private tomb funerary inscriptions. These were commemorative biographical texts recounting the careers of deceased high royal officials. The earliest biographical texts are from
3526-472: The 19th century – in many cases there was a reversal to the more familiar hagiographical method of eulogizing the dead, similar to the biographies of saints produced in Medieval times. A distinction between mass biography and literary biography began to form by the middle of the century, reflecting a breach between high culture and middle-class culture. However, the number of biographies in print experienced
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3612-479: The 26th century BC. In the 21st century BC, another famous biography was composed in Mesopotamia about Gilgamesh . One of the five versions could be historical. From the same region a couple of centuries later, according to another famous biography , departed Abraham . He and his 3 descendants became subjects of ancient Hebrew biographies whether fictional or historical. One of the earliest Roman biographers
3698-532: The German artist Ralph Ueltzhoeffer . Media scholar Lev Manovich says that such archives exemplify the database form, allowing users to navigate the materials in many ways. General "life writing" techniques are a subject of scholarly study. In recent years, debates have arisen as to whether all biographies are fiction, especially when authors are writing about figures from the past. President of Wolfson College at Oxford University, Hermione Lee argues that all history
3784-530: The Pyrates (1724), by Charles Johnson, is the prime source for the biographies of many well-known pirates. A notable early collection of biographies of eminent men and women in the United Kingdom was Biographia Britannica (1747–1766) edited by William Oldys . The American biography followed the English model, incorporating Thomas Carlyle 's view that biography was a part of history. Carlyle asserted that
3870-455: The anti-sex and anti-marriage Manichaeism in attempts to seek sexual morality; and his subsequent return to Christianity due to his embracement of Skepticism and the New Academy movement (developing the view that sex is good, and that virginity is better, comparing the former to silver and the latter to gold; Augustine's views subsequently strongly influenced Western theology). Confessions
3956-441: The author to accurately recall memories has in certain cases resulted in misleading or incorrect information. Some sociologists and psychologists have noted that autobiography offers the author the ability to recreate history. Spiritual autobiography is an account of an author's struggle or journey towards God, followed by conversion a religious conversion, often interrupted by moments of regression. The author re-frames their life as
4042-472: The autobiographer's life from the moment of composition. While biographers generally rely on a wide variety of documents and viewpoints, autobiography may be based entirely on the writer's memory. The memoir form is closely associated with autobiography but it tends, as Pascal claims, to focus less on the self and more on others during the autobiographer's review of their own life. Autobiographical works are by nature subjective. The inability—or unwillingness—of
4128-425: The basic pattern of her spiritual development. In examining her conversion experience, Starr highlights her motive as being "the reunion with her Lancashire husband, and the news that she is to be tried at the next Session, caused her 'wretched boldness of spirit' to abate. 'I began to think,’ she says, 'and to think indeed is one real advance from hell to heaven" (157). The final culmination of her repentance then comes
4214-418: The beginning of her fall into sin being a direct results of her vanity prevailing over her virtue. Moll's "abortive repentances" are highlighted, such as her "repentance" after marrying the bank clerk. However, Moll is unable to break the pattern of sin that she falls into, one of habitual sin, in which one sin leads to another. Starr describes this gradual process as "hardening", and points to it as what makes up
4300-399: The beginning, [Moll] does not believe that she is naturally poor but considers herself entitled to a more affluent life… [and she] defines her identity through her social position, which results from the material effects of her economic activities" (341). That said, it may also be Defoe's “antipathy for England's commoners” that contributed to Moll's socioeconomic ascension (p. 99). One of
4386-500: The civil war against Gnaeus Pompeius and the Senate . Leonor López de Córdoba (1362–1420) wrote what is supposed to be the first autobiography in Spanish. The English Civil War (1642–1651) provoked a number of examples of this genre, including works by Sir Edmund Ludlow and Sir John Reresby . French examples from the same period include the memoirs of Cardinal de Retz (1614–1679) and
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#17328527587094472-498: The critical and commercial success in the United States of such memoirs as Angela’s Ashes and The Color of Water , more and more people have been encouraged to try their hand at this genre. Maggie Nelson 's book The Argonauts is one of the recent autobiographies. Maggie Nelson calls it autotheory —a combination of autobiography and critical theory. A genre where the "claim for truth" overlaps with fictional elements though
4558-493: The development of the modern genre of biography, it has been claimed to be the greatest biography written in the English language . Boswell's work was unique in its level of research, which involved archival study, eye-witness accounts and interviews, its robust and attractive narrative, and its honest depiction of all aspects of Johnson's life and character – a formula which serves as the basis of biographical literature to this day. Biographical writing generally stagnated during
4644-480: The earlier tradition of a life story told as an act of Christian witness, the book describes Margery Kempe 's pilgrimages to the Holy Land and Rome , her attempts to negotiate a celibate marriage with her husband, and most of all her religious experiences as a Christian mystic. Extracts from the book were published in the early sixteenth century but the whole text was published for the first time only in 1936. Possibly
4730-491: The fate of their two children left unstated. Truly desperate now, Moll begins a career of artful thievery, which, by employing her wits, beauty, charm, and femininity, as well as hard-heartedness and wickedness, brings her the financial security she has always sought. She becomes well known among those "in the trade," and is given the name Moll Flanders. She is helped throughout her career as a thief by her Governess, who also acts as receiver . (During this time she briefly becomes
4816-521: The first publicly available autobiography written in English was Captain John Smith's autobiography published in 1630 which was regarded by many as not much more than a collection of tall tales told by someone of doubtful veracity. This changed with the publication of Philip Barbour's definitive biography in 1964 which, amongst other things, established independent factual bases for many of Smith's "tall tales", many of which could not have been known by Smith at
4902-465: The life of the eponymous Moll, detailing her exploits from birth until old age. By 1721, Defoe had become a recognised novelist, with the success of Robinson Crusoe in 1719. His political work was tapering off at this point, due to the fall of both Whig and Tory party leaders with whom he had been associated; Robert Walpole was beginning his rise, and Defoe was never fully at home with Walpole's group. Defoe's Whig views are nevertheless evident in
4988-529: The lives of famous people. The popularity of these forms of biography have led to the proliferation of TV channels dedicated to biography, including A&E , The Biography Channel , and The History Channel . CD-ROM and online biographies have also appeared. Unlike books and films, they often do not tell a chronological narrative: instead they are archives of many discrete media elements related to an individual person, including video clips, photographs, and text articles. Biography-Portraits were created in 2001, by
5074-425: The lives of great human beings were essential to understanding society and its institutions. While the historical impulse would remain a strong element in early American biography, American writers carved out a distinct approach. What emerged was a rather didactic form of biography, which sought to shape the individual character of a reader in the process of defining national character. The first modern biography, and
5160-472: The major themes within the book, and a popular area of scholarly research regarding its writer Daniel Defoe, is that of spiritual autobiography . Spiritual autobiography is defined as "a genre of non-fiction prose that dominated Protestant writing during the seventeenth century, particularly in England , particularly that of dissenters ". Books within this genre follow a pattern of shallow repentances, followed by
5246-472: The medieval Islamic world. By the late Middle Ages, biographies became less church-oriented in Europe as biographies of kings , knights , and tyrants began to appear. The most famous of such biographies was Le Morte d'Arthur by Sir Thomas Malory . The book was an account of the life of the fabled King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table . Following Malory, the new emphasis on humanism during
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#17328527587095332-454: The mid-1920s. Allan Nevins was a major contributor in the 1930s to the multivolume Dictionary of American Biography . Nevins also sponsored a series of long political biographies. Later biographers sought to show how political figures balanced power and responsibility. However, many biographers found that their subjects were not as morally pure as they originally thought, and young historians after 1960 tended to be more critical. The exception
5418-404: The mistress of a man she robbed.) Moll is finally caught by two maids whilst trying to steal from a house. In Newgate she is led to her repentance. At the same time, she reunites with her soulmate, her "Lancashire husband", who is also jailed for his robberies (before and after they first met, he acknowledges). Moll is found guilty of felony, but not burglary, the second charge; still, the sentence
5504-713: The myths that had built up around these cherished national heroes, whom he regarded as no better than a "set of mouth bungled hypocrites". The book achieved worldwide fame due to its irreverent and witty style, its concise and factually accurate nature, and its artistic prose. In the 1920s and 1930s, biographical writers sought to capitalize on Strachey's popularity by imitating his style. This new school featured iconoclasts, scientific analysts, and fictional biographers and included Gamaliel Bradford , André Maurois , and Emil Ludwig , among others. Robert Graves ( I, Claudius , 1934) stood out among those following Strachey's model of "debunking biographies." The trend in literary biography
5590-479: The next three hundred years conformed to them. Another autobiography of the period is De vita propria , by the Italian mathematician, physician and astrologer Gerolamo Cardano (1574). One of the first autobiographies written in an Indian language was Ardhakathānaka , written by Banarasidas , who was a Shrimal Jain businessman and poet of Mughal India . The poetic autobiography Ardhakathānaka (The Half Story),
5676-406: The nineteenth century, first-person autobiographical writing originates in antiquity. Roy Pascal differentiates autobiography from the periodic self-reflective mode of journal or diary writing by noting that "[autobiography] is a review of a life from a particular moment in time, while the diary, however reflective it may be, moves through a series of moments in time". Autobiography thus takes stock of
5762-524: The only repositories of knowledge and records of the early history in Europe were those of the Roman Catholic Church . Hermits , monks , and priests used this historic period to write biographies. Their subjects were usually restricted to the church fathers , martyrs , popes , and saints . Their works were meant to be inspirational to the people and vehicles for conversion to Christianity (see Hagiography ). One significant secular example of
5848-438: The principles of "Cellinian" autobiography. From the 17th century onwards, "scandalous memoirs" by supposed libertines , serving a public taste for titillation, have been frequently published. Typically pseudonymous , they were (and are) largely works of fiction written by ghostwriters . So-called "autobiographies" of modern professional athletes and media celebrities—and to a lesser extent about politicians—generally written by
5934-402: The relation between firstly the individual and the context, and, secondly, the private and public. Paul James writes: The problems with such conventional biographies are manifold. Biographies usually treat the public as a reflection of the private, with the private realm being assumed to be foundational. This is strange given that biographies are most often written about public people who project
6020-403: The result of the environment, and tended to downplay individuality. The development of psychoanalysis led to a more penetrating and comprehensive understanding of the biographical subject, and induced biographers to give more emphasis to childhood and adolescence . Clearly these psychological ideas were changing the way biographies were written, as a culture of autobiography developed, in which
6106-604: The same title in the 18th century, initiating the chain of confessional and sometimes racy and highly self-critical autobiographies of the Romantic era and beyond. Augustine's was arguably the first Western autobiography ever written, and became an influential model for Christian writers throughout the Middle Ages . It tells of the hedonistic lifestyle Augustine lived for a time within his youth, associating with young men who boasted of their sexual exploits; his following and leaving of
6192-407: The second wave of feminist activism. She cited Nancy Milford's 1970 biography Zelda , as the "beginning of a new period of women's biography, because "[only] in 1970 were we ready to read not that Zelda had destroyed Fitzgerald , but Fitzgerald her: he had usurped her narrative." Heilbrun named 1973 as the turning point in women's autobiography, with the publication of May Sarton's Journal of
6278-399: The skill of passing herself off as a fortuned widow to attract a man who will marry her and provide her with security. The first time she does this, her "gentleman-tradesman" spendthrift husband goes bankrupt and flees to mainland Europe, leaving her on her own with his blessing to do the best she can to forget him. (They had one child together, but "it was buried.") The second time, she makes
6364-399: The start: "No matter what sort he is, everyone who has to his credit what are or really seem great achievements, if he cares for truth and goodness, ought to write the story of his own life in his own hand; but no one should venture on such a splendid undertaking before he is over forty." These criteria for autobiography generally persisted until recent times, and most serious autobiographies of
6450-476: The story of Moll, and the novel's full title gives some insight into this and the outline of the plot. It is usually assumed that the novel was written by Daniel Defoe , and his name is commonly given as the author in modern printings of the novel. However, the original printing did not have an author, as it was an apparent autobiography. The attribution of Moll Flanders to Defoe was made by bookseller Francis Noble in 1770, after Defoe's death in 1731. The novel
6536-403: The subject's personality. Biographical works are usually non-fiction , but fiction can also be used to portray a person's life. One in-depth form of biographical coverage is called legacy writing. Works in diverse media, from literature to film, form the genre known as biography. An authorized biography is written with the permission, cooperation, and at times, participation of a subject or
6622-518: The telling of one's own story became a form of therapy. The conventional concept of heroes and narratives of success disappeared in the obsession with psychological explorations of personality. British critic Lytton Strachey revolutionized the art of biographical writing with his 1918 work Eminent Victorians , consisting of biographies of four leading figures from the Victorian era : Cardinal Manning , Florence Nightingale , Thomas Arnold , and General Gordon . Strachey set out to breathe life into
6708-449: The time of writing unless he was actually present at the events recounted. Other notable English autobiographies of the 17th century include those of Lord Herbert of Cherbury (1643, published 1764) and John Bunyan ( Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners , 1666). Jarena Lee (1783–1864) was the first African American woman to have a published biography in the United States. Following
6794-429: The trend of Romanticism , which greatly emphasized the role and the nature of the individual, and in the footsteps of Jean-Jacques Rousseau 's Confessions , a more intimate form of autobiography, exploring the subject's emotions, came into fashion. Stendhal 's autobiographical writings of the 1830s, The Life of Henry Brulard and Memoirs of an Egotist , are both avowedly influenced by Rousseau. An English example
6880-541: The voting blocs and legislative positions of politicians and the organizational structures of bureaucracies. A more promising approach is to locate a person's ideas through intellectual history, but this has become more difficult with the philosophical shallowness of political figures in recent times. Political biography can be frustrating and challenging to integrate with other fields of political history. The feminist scholar Carolyn Heilbrun observed that women's biographies and autobiographies began to change character during
6966-520: The work still purports to be autobiographical is autofiction . Biography A biography , or simply bio , is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or curriculum vitae ( résumé ), a biography presents a subject's life story, highlighting various aspects of their life, including intimate details of experience, and may include an analysis of
7052-521: The work survive. Another well-known collection of ancient biographies is De vita Caesarum ("On the Lives of the Caesars") by Suetonius , written about AD 121 in the time of the emperor Hadrian . Meanwhile, in the eastern imperial periphery, Gospel described the life of Jesus . In the early Middle Ages (AD 400 to 1450), there was a decline in awareness of the classical culture in Europe. During this time,
7138-420: The writer's religion. A memoir is slightly different in character from an autobiography. While an autobiography typically focuses on the "life and times" of the writer, a memoir has a narrower, more intimate focus on the author's memories, feelings and emotions. Memoirs have often been written by politicians or military leaders as a way to record and publish an account of their public exploits. One early example
7224-542: Was Cornelius Nepos , who published his work Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae ("Lives of outstanding generals") in 44 BC. Longer and more extensive biographies were written in Greek by Plutarch , in his Parallel Lives , published about 80 A.D. In this work famous Greeks are paired with famous Romans, for example, the orators Demosthenes and Cicero , or the generals Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar ; some fifty biographies from
7310-612: Was accompanied in popular biography by a sort of "celebrity voyeurism", in the early decades of the century. This latter form's appeal to readers was based on curiosity more than morality or patriotism. By World War I , cheap hard-cover reprints had become popular. The decades of the 1920s witnessed a biographical "boom." American professional historiography gives a limited role to biography, preferring instead to emphasize deeper social and cultural influences. Political biographers historically incorporated moralizing judgments into their work, with scholarly biography being an uncommon genre before
7396-563: Was composed in Braj Bhasa , an early dialect of Hindi linked with the region around Mathura .In his autobiography, he describes his transition from an unruly youth, to a religious realization by the time the work was composed. The work also is notable for many details of life in Mughal times. The earliest known autobiography written in English is the Book of Margery Kempe , written in 1438. Following in
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