Skip to main content Accessibility help

We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.

Close cookie message
×
Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-gb8f7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T08:09:42.469Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

14 - Life Writing

from Part II - Prose Genres

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 November 2021

By
Jay Parini
Edited by
Daniel Tyler
Daniel Tyler
Affiliation:
University of Cambridge
Get access

Summary

Whether in biography, the biographical novel, the memoir or various other subgenres of life writing, the writer must be responsibly committed to both truth and imagination, to both fact and fiction. Jay Parini’s chapter considers a wide range of life writing and observes the various priorities afforded to truth and imagination in the work. Whatever access to archives, testimonies and evidence life writers need, they need above all, in Parini’s phrase, ‘access to the resources of language’.

Keywords

life writingbiographymemoirbiographical fictionimaginationtruthhistory
Type
Chapter
Information
The Cambridge Companion to Prose , pp. 233 - 246
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Save book to Kindle

To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.

Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.

Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.

  • Life Writing
  • Edited by Daniel Tyler, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Prose
  • Online publication: 05 November 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108939201.017
Available formats
×

Save book to Dropbox

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.

  • Life Writing
  • Edited by Daniel Tyler, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Prose
  • Online publication: 05 November 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108939201.017
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Life Writing
  • Edited by Daniel Tyler, University of Cambridge
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Prose
  • Online publication: 05 November 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108939201.017
Available formats
×