Who ever heard, indeed, of an autobiography that was not (interesting)? I can recall none in all the literature of the world
—H. L. Mencken (1880–1956) American Journalist, Literary Critic
But instinct is something which transcends knowledge. We have, undoubtedly, certain finer fibers that enable us to perceive truths when logical deduction, or any other willful effort of the brain, is futile.
—Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian-American Electrical Engineer, Inventor
An autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful. A man who gives a good account of himself is probably lying, since any life when viewed from the inside is simply a series of defeats.
—George Orwell (1903–50) English Novelist, Journalist
A poet’s autobiography is his poetry. Anything else is just a footnote.
—Yevgeny Yevtushenko (1933–2017) Russian Poet, Dissident
The gift of mental power comes from God, Divine Being, and if we concentrate our minds on that truth, we become in tune with this great power.
—Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian-American Electrical Engineer, Inventor
My Turn is the distilled bathwater of Mrs. Reagan’s life. It is for the most part sweetish, with a tart edge of rebuke, but disappointingly free of dirt or particulate matter of any kind.
—Barbara Ehrenreich (1941–2022) American Social Critic, Essayist
Autobiography begins with a sense of being alone. It is an orphan form.
—John Berger (1926–2017) English Art Critic, Novelist
My belief is firm in a law of compensation. The true rewards are ever in proportion to the labour and sacrifices made.
—Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian-American Electrical Engineer, Inventor
That which resembles most living one’s life over again, seems to be to recall all the circumstances of it; and, to render this remembrance more durable, to record them in writing.
—Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) American Political Leader, Inventor, Diplomat
It isn’t that you subordinate your ideas to the force of the facts in autobiography but that you construct a sequence of stories to bind up the facts with a persuasive hypothesis that unravels your history’s meaning.
—Philip Roth (1933–2018) American Novelist, Short-story Writer
I dislike modern memoirs. They are generally written by people who have either entirely lost their memories, or have never done anything worth remembering.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Only when one has lost all curiosity about the future has one reached the age to write an autobiography.
—Evelyn Waugh (1903–66) British Novelist, Essayist, Biographer
I am being frank about myself in this book. I tell of my first mistake on page 850.
—Henry Kissinger (1923–2023) American Diplomat, Academician
There is no psychology; there is only biography and autobiography.
—Thomas Szasz (1920–2012) Hungarian-American Psychiatrist, Psychoanalyst
The biography of a writer – or even the autobiography – will always have this incompleteness.
—V. S. Naipaul (1932–2018) Trinidadian-British Novelist, Short-story Writer
All art is autobiographical; the pearl is the oyster’s autobiography.
—Federico Fellini (1920–93) Italian Filmmaker
It is long ere we discover how rich we are. Our history, we are sure, is quite tame: we have nothing to write, nothing to infer. But our wiser years still run back to the despised recollections of childhood, and always we are fishing up some wonderful article out of that pond; until, by and by, we begin to suspect that the biography of the one foolish person we know is, in reality, nothing less than the miniature paraphrase of the hundred volumes of the Universal History.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Just as there is nothing between the admirable omelet and the intolerable, so with autobiography.
—Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) British Historian, Poet, Critic
Every autobiography is concerned with two characters, a Don Quixote, the Ego, and a Sancho Panza, the Self.
—W. H. Auden (1907–73) British-born American Poet, Dramatist
Every effort under compulsion demands a sacrifice of energy. I never paid such a price.
—Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian-American Electrical Engineer, Inventor
The course of life is unpredictable… no one can write his autobiography in advance.
—Abraham Joshua Heschel (1907–72) American Jewish Rabbi
Autobiography is probably the most respectable form of lying.
—Humphrey Carpenter (1946–2005) English Children’s Writer, Biographer, Broadcaster
I don’t think anybody should write his autobiography until after he’s dead.
—Samuel Goldwyn (1879–1974) Polish-born American Film Producer, Businessperson
This work somehow awakened my dormant powers of will and I began to practice self-control. At first my resolutions faded like snow in April, but in a little while I conquered my weakness and felt a pleasure I never knew before—that of doing as I willed.
—Nikola Tesla (1856–1943) Serbian-American Electrical Engineer, Inventor
There are people who can write their memoirs with a reasonable amount of honesty, and there are people who simply cannot take themselves seriously enough. I think I might be the first to admit that the sort of reticence which prevents a man from exploiting his own personality is really an inverted sort of egotism.
—Raymond Chandler (1888–1959) American Novelist
All autobiography is self-indulgent.
—Daphne du Maurier (1907–89) British Novelist, Playwright
What pursuit is more elegant than that of collecting the ignominies of our nature and transfixing them for show, each on the bright pin of a polished phrase?
—Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946) American-British Essayist, Bibliophile
When you put down the good things you ought to have done, and leave out the bad ones you did do—well, that’s Memoirs.
—Will Rogers (1879–1935) American Actor, Rancher, Humorist
An autobiography usually reveals nothing bad about its writer except his memory.
—Franklin P. Jones
Truth, naked, unblushing truth, the first virtue of all serious history, must be the sole recommendation of this personal narrative.
—Edward Gibbon (1737–94) English Historian, Politician
Leave a Reply