I was born, the third of seven children, in Medford, Massachusetts, so near to Boston that even as a small boy kicking along side streets to the Washington School, I could see the pencil stub of the ...

‘WHAT is biography for? What useful purpose does it serve? Why should one write it? What is its actual importance in the field of literature? Above all, what is autobiography for, and what proper ...

A century ago, the novel was universally acknowledged as the greatest and most all-encompassing of literary genres, and writers seeking to understand the world around them naturally turned to it as ...

Much has been written about the therapeutic effects of reading. Carmen Martin Gaite, for example, expressed her views on the subject in 1989. “Reading provides insight into a secret world that ...

A number of reviews have challenged the idea that Hope: the Autobiography of Pope Francis is in fact an autobiography. The Irish Times reviewer suggested that “it is some recollections from his life ...

Stanford University Press, 650 pages, $70. ‘This is the Life Story of Judah Aryeh…. Few and evil have been the days of my life in this world… on Monday the 28th day of Nissan — corresponding to the ...

Dickens began his autobiography in 1847, when he was only 35, but abandoned it and, overcome with memories of his deprivations, a few years later was inspired to write the autobiographical David ...