Writing Life Writing

Paul John Eakin is Ruth N. Halls Professor Emeritus of English at Indiana University. He is the author of Fictions in Autobiography: Studies in the Art of Self-Invention (1985); Touching the World: Reference in Autobiography (1992); How Our Lives Become Stories: Making Selves (1999); and Living Autobiographically: How We Create Identity in Narrative (2008). He is the editor of On Autobiography, by Philippe Lejeune 1989); American Autobiography: Retrospect and Prospect (1991); and The Ethics of Life Writing (2004).

Foreword by Craig Howes

I. Narrative

"What Are We Reading When We Read Autobiography?"

"Selfhood, Autobiography, and Interdisciplinary Inquiry: A Reply to George Butte"

"Narrative Identity and Narrative Imperialism: A Response to Galen Strawson and James Phelan"

"Travelling with Narrative: From Text to Body"

II. Life Writing: Historical Forms

"Writing Biography: A Perspective from Autobiography"

"Eye and I: Negotiating Distance in Eyewitness Narrative"

"Living in History: Autobiography, Memoir(s), and Mémoires"

"History and Life Writing: The Value of Subjectivity"

III. Autobiography Now

"Autobiography as Cosmogram"

"Self and Self-Representation Online and Off"

"Autobiography and the Big Picture"

IV. Epilogue: One Man's Story

"My Father . . ."

"James Olney and the Study of Autobiography"