BIOGRAPHIES OF ACCOMPLISHED PEOPLE fill many categories. They have aspects of history, classic literature, comedy, tragedy, farce, even fiction. And more: “We have escapist fiction,” said John Kenneth Galbraith, “so why not escapist biography.” People with unique personalities who led notable lives – Mark Twain, Winston Churchill, Maria Callas, to name just three – have something to teach us, lessons from which we can profit by their trial and error. A well-researched and written biography allows you to live with the person in the comfort of your easy chair and vicariously experience their life. There are sub-categories of this genre: autobiography and memoir. The former typically attempts to provide a full picture, the latter usually will focus on a limited time period. Both will be opinionated, of course, unlike a bio written by someone else, although even then the author can’t help but reveal his own perception of his subject. Then there’s autobiographical novels, such as Gore Vidal’s work on Burr and Lincoln, both of which succeed in making their subjects more real than the typical bio. In sum, all biography is history come alive.
Hello HenryM.
Thank you for presenting us with yet another interesting and thought-provoking subject.
My own perspective on such writing is (of course) biased in favour of what might be termed ‘the underdog’. I always felt that writers such as Charles Dickens and Catherine Cookson wrote ‘biographies’ about those who were unnecessarily oppressed in society. Yet their works were not classified as ‘biographies’.
When someone draws my attention to the endless writings about ‘notable’ people such as the royal family , my response is usually to ask what they know about the royal family’s ‘servants’( modern day slaves). Following this up with my belief that the ‘WORKERS’ have ’unique personalities’ and have led ‘notable’ lives (which have worthwhile lessons embedded within the storylines), it is just that their stories are not artificially elevated to the same degree as those who wish to dominate in our societies.
I tend to be much more interested in those millions of unique individuals who gave their lives in wars, rather than those who stayed safe and orchestrated these disasters; The poetry of Siegfried Sassoon; Wilfred Owen; Christine Brook-Rose is as relevant to the war effort as that of Winston Churchill. Those who built the pyramids were just as important as the Pharaohs, who treated them as slaves and, if their stories had been told, we might have learned a lot.
Writers such as Alex Haley –author of ‘Roots’ classified their works as ‘fiction’, whereas most of us would believe that a more accurate classification would have been ‘biography’.
My own work, in systematically and accurately documenting and publishing ‘Constructive Conversations ‘ (educed from people with personal problems) along with their rhyming counterparts, could easily be classified as biographic.
One of the reasons I published this stuff, was that I firmly believed that what these people had to say was at least equally (if not more) important than the ramblings and rhetoric of those considered to be ‘of note’ in our society.
In 2018 I published my own memoirs, largely because I came close to dying and wanted to jot down my own version of my life. I did not want to chance that someone else might grasp the opportunity to write on my behalf after my demise.
Best wishes
Bill
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Thanks, Bill. Two of the best works that I've read about WW I were written by Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen.
