The Arvon Book of Life Writing: Writing Biography, Autobiography and Memoir - Softcover

Cline, Sally; Angier, Carole

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1408124181 ISBN 13: 9781408124185

Publisher: Methuen Drama, 2010

Synopsis

This practical handbook for writers includes the best resources and techniques from the world famous Arvon writing course. It answers the key questions writers have when tackling a biography or memoir—methods of research, authorization, interpretation, and a variety of ethical issues. The book is filled with practical exercises to develop writing skills in empathy, managing drama and suspense, interviewing, narration and reflection and developing the story line. It also has professional advice from twenty well-known literary, cultural, political, sports and celebrity biographers, family memoirists, travel writers and ghost writers.

About this title

About the Author:

Carole Angier has written biographies of Jean Rhys (winner of the Writers' Guild Non-Fiction Award) and Primo Levi. She is a regular critic for The Independent, The Spectator and The Literary Review, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and teaches life writing at Birkbeck College, London University.  Sally Cline, award-winning biographer, short story writer and winner of the BBC short story contest, is the author of nine books, including ground-breaking biographies of Radclyffe Hall, Zelda Fitzgerald, and Lillian Hellman and Dashiell Hammett. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Advisory Fellow for the Royal Literary Fund and a judge and mentor for the Arts Council Escalator scheme.  Both Carole and Sally work as one-to-one mentors with emerging writers.

Review:

“For anyone who has ever read a biography or memoir, or  thought of writing  one—this book of advice from the best writers in the U.K. is an instant classic."—Elaine Showalter

About this edition

• Publisher: Methuen Drama
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1408124181
• ISBN 13: 9781408124185
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 288