When studying

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

, biography and its relationship to literature is often a subject of literary criticism, and is treated in several different forms. Two scholarly approaches use

biography A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description of a person's life. It involves more than just the basic facts like education, work, relationships, and death; it portrays a person's experience of these life events. Unlike a profile or ...

or biographical approaches to the past as a tool for interpreting literature: literary biography and biographical criticism. Conversely, two genres of fiction rely heavily on the incorporation of biographical elements into their content:

biographical fiction When studying literature, biography and its relationship to literature is often a subject of literary criticism, and is treated in several different forms. Two scholarly approaches use biography or biographical approaches to the past as a tool for ...

and autobiographical fiction.

Literary biography

A literary biography is the biographical exploration of the lives of writers and artists. Biographies about artists and writers are sometimes some of the most complicated forms of

. Not only does the author of the biography have to write about the subject of the biography but also must incorporate discussion of the subject-author's literary works into the biography itself.Karl, Frederick R. "Joseph Conrad" in Meyers (ed.) ''The Craft'', pp 69–88 Literary biographers must balance the weight of commentary on the subject-author's ''oeuvre'' (complete body of works) against the biographical content to create a coherent narrative of the subject-author's live. This balance is interpretively-influenced by the degree of biographical elements inherent in an author's literary works. The close relationship between writers and their work relies on ideas that connect human psychology and literature and can be examined through psychoanalytic theory. Literary biography may address subject-authors whose ''oeuvre'' contains a plethora of autobiographical information and who welcome the biographical analysis of their work.

Elizabeth Longford Elizabeth Pakenham, Countess of Longford, (''née'' Harman; 30 August 1906 – 23 October 2002), better known as Elizabeth Longford, was a British historian. She was a member of the Royal Society of Literature and was on the board of trustees ...

, a biographer of

Wilfrid Blunt Wilfrid Scawen Blunt (17 August 1840 – 10 September 1922), sometimes spelt Wilfred, was an English poet and writer. He and his wife Lady Anne Blunt travelled in the Middle East and were instrumental in preserving the Arabian horse bloodline ...

, noted, "Writers are articulate and tend to leave eloquent source material which the biographer will be eager to use."Longford, Elizabeth "Wilfrid Scawen Blunt" of Meyers (ed.) ''The Craft'', pp 55-68 The opposite may also be the case, some authors and artists go out of their way to discourage the writing of their biographies, as was the case with Kafka, Eliot, Orwell and Auden. Auden said, "Biographies of writers whether written by others or themselves are always superfluous and usually in bad taste.... His private life is, or should be, of no concern to anybody except himself, his family and his friends."Meyers, Jeffrey "Introduction" in Meyers (ed.) ''The Craft'', pp 1–8 Well-received literary biographies include

Richard Ellmann Richard David Ellmann, FBA (March 15, 1918 – May 13, 1987) was an American literary critic and biographer of the Irish writers James Joyce, Oscar Wilde, and William Butler Yeats. He won the U.S. National Book Award for Nonfiction for ''Jame ...

's ''James Joyce'' and

George Painter George Duncan Painter OBE (5 June 1914 – 8 December 2005), known as George D. Painter, was an English author most famous as a biographer of Marcel Proust. Career Painter was born in Birmingham, England. His father was a schoolmaster, and his mot ...

's ''Marcel Proust''.Backschneider 11-13

Biographical criticism

Biographical fiction

Biographical fiction is a type of historical fiction that takes a historical individual and recreates elements of his or her life, while telling a fictional narrative, usually in the genres of film or the novel. The relationship between the biographical and the fictional may vary within different pieces of biographical fiction. It frequently includes selective information and self-censoring of the past. The characters are often real people or based on real people, but the need for "truthful" representation is less strict than in

. The various philosophies behind biographical fiction lead to different types of content. Some asserts itself as a factual narrative about the historical individual, like

Gore Vidal Eugene Luther Gore Vidal (; born Eugene Louis Vidal, October 3, 1925 – July 31, 2012) was an American writer and public intellectual known for his epigrammatic wit, erudition, and patrician manner. Vidal was bisexual, and in his novels and e ...

's ''

Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincol ...

''. Other biographical fiction creates two parallel strands of narrative, one in the contemporary world and one focusing on the biographical history, such as

Malcolm Bradbury Sir Malcolm Stanley Bradbury, (7 September 1932 – 27 November 2000) was an English author and academic. Life Bradbury was born in Sheffield, the son of a railwayman. His family moved to London in 1935, but returned to Sheffield in 1941 with ...

's '' To the Hermitage'' and

Michael Cunningham Michael Cunningham (born November 6, 1952) is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is best known for his 1998 novel '' The Hours'', which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the PEN/Faulkner Award in 1999. Cunningham is a senior lectur ...

's '' The Hours''. No matter what style of biographical fiction is used, the novelist usually starts the writing process with historical research. Biographical fiction has its roots in late 19th and early 20th-century novels based loosely on the lives of famous people, but without direct reference to them, such as

George Meredith George Meredith (12 February 1828 – 18 May 1909) was an English novelist and poet of the Victorian era. At first his focus was poetry, influenced by John Keats among others, but he gradually established a reputation as a novelist. '' The Ord ...

's ''

Diana of the Crossways ''Diana of the Crossways'' is a novel by George Meredith which was published in 1885, based on the life of socialite and writer Caroline Norton. Background ''Diana of the Crossways'' was first serialized in the ''Fortnightly'' in 1884, then p ...

'' (1885) and

Somerset Maugham William Somerset Maugham ( ; 25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was an English writer, known for his plays, novels and short stories. Born in Paris, where he spent his first ten years, Maugham was schooled in England and went to a German un ...

's ''

The Moon and Sixpence ''The Moon and Sixpence'' is a novel by W. Somerset Maugham, first published on 15 April 1919. It is told in episodic form by a first-person narrator providing a series of glimpses into the mind and soul of the central character, Charles Stric ...

'' (1919). During the early part of the 20th century this became a distinct genre, with novels that were explicitly about individuals' lives.

Autobiographical fiction

Autobiographical fiction, or autofiction, is fiction that incorporates the author's own experience into the narrative. It allows authors to both relay and reflect on their own experience. However, the reading of the autobiographical fiction need not always be associated with the author. Such books may be treated as distinct fictional works. Autobiographical fiction includes the thoughts and view of the narrator which describes their way of thinking.

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Literary biography

Biographical criticism

Biographical fiction

Autobiographical fiction

References

Works cited

Further reading