AS I HEAR MY VOICE CALLING: ISSUES AND MATTERS IN AUTOBIOGRAPHY

Abstract

When asked to write her autobiography, dancer Isadora Duncan replied: “How can we write the truth about ourselves? Do we even know it?”. Autobiography, the writing of the self, constitutes a difficult genre, and poses several challenges in terms of style and narrative strategies: a) Which moments in the life of an individual should be selected? b) How can one turn public private and intimate experiences?; c) Which techniques belonging to the realm of fictional narrative can be successfully adapted to the art of autobiography? In this paper, I’m interested in debating the main problems that writers, musicians and actors, such as Maya Angelou, Bob Dylan or Michael J. Fox, associate with autobiographical writing. I also analyze a few techniques authors employed to solve or minimize those issues. To do so, I resort to the opinion of autobiographers; to the essays of specialists in creative writing; and to my experience as a teacher and researcher in that field.