Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with autobiography

Mama Said Knock You Out

azure_swing — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 10:50:16 -0800

What are the best boxer autobiographies? Looking for first-person accounts of being a boxer. Autobiography, "as-told-to" books, oral history, even ghostwritten accounts.

"Mmm... you're a dandy!"

brittanyq — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 00:38:54 -0800

What are the best Old Hollywood (auto)biographies? I've recently become fascinated by a number of old movies (1930s to 1950s) and the actors in them. I'm having trouble sorting through the bajillions of biographies out there - what are the best, juiciest and most interesting biographies of the stars of this time period? The actors I'm particularly interested in are James Stewart, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers, Gene Kelly, Judy Garland, Audrey Hepburn, Vivien Leigh, Marilyn Monroe and Katherine Hepburn, but I'm open to others.

Can you recommend some autobiographic titles for me?

helios410 — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:25:46 -0800

I am looking for autobiographies with charismatic male role models who carry some sort of leadership role. Think Randy Pausch's "The Last Lecture" or Barack Obama's "The Audacity of Hope". Any suggestions?

Autobiography by a former criminal turned author?!

mrhaydel — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 17:24:03 -0800

NameThatBookFilter: Autobiography by a former criminal/hard timer that later became an author? I'm getting sucked in to going through and adding books on Goodreads.com, and I'm having the darndest time remembering a particular book.

It was an autobiography written by a former criminal, who did hard time in a well known prison (not Alcatraz, but maybe Folsom, San Quentin, or Attica?), probably in the 50s or 60s.

The cover of the book, I'm fairly certain, was simply a face shot of said author, not his mugshot, but what seemed like a recent photo at the time (he looked to be in his 60s maybe). He was white, fairly short hair, possibly with a mustache.

In it, he basically traces his life from childhood and being in correctional facilities all the way up to him doing time in prison. While in prison though, I'm almost positive he authored at least one or two works of fiction, that might have even been somewhat popular.

I read this book somewhere back between around 2003-2004.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Life writing anthologies?

laumry — Sat, 28 Feb 2009 02:34:27 -0800

Can anyone recommend any life writing anthologies? Hello all. I'm on a creative writing course, and am about to start its Life Writing module. At the end of the module, I will have to write a 1500 word piece of biography or autobiography (using the techniques of creative writing - not a dry academic piece).

I was wondering if you could recommend an anthology of short pieces of life writing that would help me on this module? It would be especially helpful if you explained why your recommendation was worth investigating, rather than just posting titles and Amazon links.

(I'd prefer biography to autobiography, but all recommendations appreciated.)

Any good books about 'stone soup' days?

Catch — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 15:34:40 -0800

I'd like to read some good books, preferably autobiographical, about managing a household in hard times. For purposes of 'professional development' and generally cheering myself up about being the housewife in a single-income family, I have a craving to read good books about successful living on low resources.

Please recommend some! First-hand accounts preferred - depression-era, wartime, or just circumstantial modern hard-times.

You Know Who Else Read Books on Nazi Girls?

Parasite Unseen — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 14:33:53 -0800

Does anyone recognize this book about a girl living in Nazi Germany? A friend of mine is looking for a book that she read when she was younger, and I was hoping that the hivemind could identify it. Her description is below:

There was this book I read a zillion times in grade school, and I'd like to see it again but can't remember the title. Basically, it was action Anne Frank; it was about a girl who spent WWII being shuttled around various Hitler youth programs while her father was in a concentration camp (this is itself one of those stories - dad was an electrical engineer, spent most of the war hearing he'd probably be killed as soon as he fixed the next power outage, and survived).

I haven't had much luck with Google, but I figure that if anyone can locate this title, it's AskMe. Release the hounds!

Internet autobiography - safe?

NeoLeo — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 01:38:44 -0800

Writing about yourself on the internet - safe or unsafe? Usually, as a rule of thumb, I try to keep overly personal information off the internet. The saying goes that anything you post on the internet, even on semi-private or private sites, should be assumed to be public (eventually).

Of course, I want to keep sensitive information off the net. I don't want people going off using my personal information to open a bank account or what not. Yet all the hoopla about privacy on the internet seems to revolve around very minor issues (in addition to the major issues), such as: "oh no! there are cookies on my computer" or "oh no! google monitors my search patterns!" or "oh god my ISP is monitoring my bandwidth rates!" In hindsight, these aren't very big issues. I think these kinds of worries are just paranoia and aren't worth the worry they may cause.

Recently, I've been considering writing a semi-autobiographical piece to help people (especially friends) know me better. I feel that there are certain things that are hard to communicate verbally because they may require too much thought to say off the tip of your tongue. Also, sometimes the opportunity just doesn't come up to talk deeply about who you are and what motivates you. For some reason, messaging or emailing out this kind of writing makes me feel more uncomfortable than just posting it on a personal site or blog.

I'm not too worried about doing this, but I do wonder if there might be something bad that would result from this. I really can't think of too much bad coming from this, aside from people who may feel that the autobiographical content is way too unexpected/different from who they thought you were. The worst possible scenario would be some stranger "stealing your identity" and using your biographical content to emulate your life... but I think that is just being paranoid.

Thus, my questions:
- Do you consider writing an autobiographical piece on the internet to be unsafe?
- For those who have done it, what are the worst things that have happened? What positive things have resulted from your writing being available?
- How would you go about posting this kind of writing? On a blog? Through email? Or would you just ditch the writing part and say it verbally?

online autobio

airplain — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 01:18:43 -0800

How should I put my diary / autobiography online? I'm almost asking how best to order and annotate my old photos, but I'd like the possibility of more extensive writing as well. I'm expecting to order things by date, but advice on categories would be good. It's not a commercial venture, just fun for the extended family. Simplicity for submitting photos and text is the premier requirement. I'd like this to be shared with family with varying computer literacy. Cost is the next - probably not possible if not free-ish. After that comes ease of setup - I don't have time for extensive customization of a system. A sensible way to include a family tree would be neat.

I have a website (with almost zero content) so the solution could be hosted there if that's best; I've rudimentary web coding skill (Dreamweaver, HTML & CSS, not design) so could probably manage a wiki (but I haven't tried.)

How do we split it?

Anonymous — Mon, 10 Dec 2007 21:36:16 -0800

I'm planning to co-author a book with a semi-famous person who wants to tell her own story, but needs help with the writing part. My biggest question is about money - how should we split it? It's her story, but I'll be doing most of the writing. Yet we are attempting to treat this as a real collaboration where we edit together, pass drafts back and forth, and so forth. Any sense of what percentage is appropriate for each of us? Also, should I join the Writers Union to get help with this type of question? I'd like to join on principal but I'm your classic broke writer, so the dues feel prohibitive. Thanks!

Well-written memoirs and autobiographies

serazin — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 15:19:25 -0800

What are your favorite autobiographies? For the purposes of this discussion, I'm including "autobiographies" that were written collaboratively (like Alex Haley's The Autobiography of Malcolm X) or that were straight up written by someone else (like Gertrude Stein's The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas). The point is, the book is written from the point of view of the subject and it's (ostensibly at least) non-fiction. If possible, I'd love to hear what you liked about the book too. (I'm asking because I'm researching a related writing project.)

Funny Jewish Memoir

Secret Life of Gravy — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 08:47:53 -0800

Author/Title? Comic memoir about Jewish childhood in pre-WWII tenements in NYC. Help! I've been driving myself crazy trying to remember the title and author of a book that I read 30 years ago. I think the author might have been fairly famous in the 60's and 70's but not so widely read now. I thought the title was Penny Candy but that turned out to be a Jean Kerr book. The author wrote at least two memoirs of his life growning up in NYC.

And if you want to recommend other books about life in NYC between 1890-1940 that would would be great.

Great biographies?

pracowity — Sun, 10 Apr 2005 07:14:20 -0800

I want to read great biographies. Which are the best? I want scholarly biographies with reliable sources and footnotes. I am particular to creative people working in the arts or sciences. I don't much care for generals and kings, though a great biographer could change my mind. I want to learn about what they created, not just about where they lived and who they loved. But above all, I want great writing. If there are several biographies of a person, I want to know which are best.

Quirky autobiography suggestions

Secret Life of Gravy — Thu, 17 Feb 2005 10:42:49 -0800

I'm looking for quirky, contemporary autobiographies such as those written by Augusten Burroughs and David Sedaris. (MI) I really enjoy reading droll, off-beat memoirs such as:

A Girl Named Zippy
Candy and Me
Don't Let's Go To The Dogs Tonight
Kick Me
Devil in the Details
Enslaved by Ducks

Are there any others you can recommend?