To write the lives of the great in separating them from their works necessarily ends by above all stressing their pettiness, because it is in their work that they have put the best of themselves.
—Simone Weil (1909–1943) French Philosopher, Political Activist
No sooner does a great man depart, and leave his character as public property, than a crowd of little men rushes towards it. There they are gathered together, blinking up to it with such vision as they have, scanning it from afar, hovering round it this way and that, each cunningly endeavoring, by all arts, to catch some reflex of it in the little mirror of himself.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
Great men have often the shortest biographies.—Their real life is in their books or deeds.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Read no history: nothing but biography, for that is life without theory.
—Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) American Political Leader, Inventor, Diplomat
Formerly we used to canonize our heroes. The modern method is to vulgarize them. Cheap editions of great books may be delightful, but cheap editions of great men are absolutely detestable.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
History is the essence of innumerable biographies.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
Freedom has never been free … I love my children and I love my wife with all my heart. And I would die, die gladly, if that would make a better life for them.
—Medgar Evers (1925–63) American Civil Rights Activist
Avoid witicisms at the expense of others.
—Horace Mann (1796–1859) American Educator, Politician, Educationalist
A good character is the best tombstone. Those who loved you, and were helped by you, will remember you when forget-me-nots are withered. Carve your name on hearts, and not on marble.
—Charles Spurgeon (1834–92) English Baptist Preacher
I don’t think anybody should write his autobiography until after he’s dead.
—Samuel Goldwyn (1879–1974) Polish-born American Film Producer, Businessperson
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
Almost any biographer, if he respects facts, can give us much more than another fact to add to our collection. He can give us the creative fact; the fertile fact; the fact that suggests and engenders.
—Virginia Woolf (1882–1941) English Novelist
There ain’t nothing that breaks up homes, country, and nations like somebody publishing their memoirs.
—Will Rogers (1879–1935) American Actor, Rancher, Humorist
In this age of specialization, I sometimes think of myself as the last ‘generalist’ in economics, with interests that range from mathematical economics down to current financial journalism. My real interests are research and teaching…
—Paul Samuelson (1915–2009) American Economist
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
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
Monuments are the grappling-irons that bind one generation to another.
—Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French Writer, Moralist
All those writers who write about their childhood! Gentle God, if I wrote about mine you wouldn’t sit in the same room with me.
—Dorothy Parker (1893–1967) American Humorist, Journalist
There was never yet an uninteresting life. Such a thing is an impossibility. Inside of the dullest exterior there is a drama, a comedy, and a tragedy.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
A well-written Life is almost as rare as a well-spent one.
—Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish Historian, Essayist
Just as there is nothing between the admirable omelet and the intolerable, so with autobiography.
—Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953) British Historian, Poet, Critic
Many heroes lived before Agamemnon; but all are unknown and unwept, extinguished in everlasting night, because they have no spirited chronicler.
—Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) (65–8 BCE) Roman Poet
All good biography, as all good fiction, comes down to the study of original sin, of our inherent disposition to choose death when we ought to choose life.
—Rebecca West (1892–1983) English Author, Journalist, Literary Critic
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
Nobody can write the life of a man but those who have eat and drunk and lived in social intercourse with him.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
If a man needs an elaborate tombstone in order to remain in the memory of his country, it is clear that his living at all was an act of absolute superfluity.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation. We say we are for the Union. The world will not forget that we say this. We know how to save the Union. The world knows we do know how to save it. Weeven we herehold the power, and bear the responsibility. In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free—honorable alike in what we give, and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best, hope of earth.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Just how difficult it is to write biography can be reckoned by anybody who sits down and considers just how many people know the real truth about his or her love affairs.
—Rebecca West (1892–1983) English Author, Journalist, Literary Critic
I have not much interest in anyone’s personal history after the tenth year, not even my own. Whatever one was going to be was all prepared before that.
—Katherine Anne Porter (1890–1980) American Short-Story Writer, Novelist
The fiery trials through which we pass will light us down in honor or dishonor to the last generation.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
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