Autobiographical Quotes & Sayings

I wrote a book called 'Dancing The Dream'. It was more autobiographical than Moonwalk, which I did with Mrs. Onassis. It wasn't full of gossip and scandal and all that trash that people write, so I don't think people paid much attention to it, but it came from my heart. It was essays, thoughts and things that I've thought about while on tour — Michael Jackson

Well, let me try again,' he said. 'If it be true, and no doubt it is, that the proper study of mankind is man, it is also true that man is best studied in the books that he has written about himself; and all books, whatever their subject matter, are in essence autobiographical... Wherefore, it is clear - or is it? - that writers of books are what I have called them, the most fascinating people in the world. — Peter Ruber

I'd liked my first record, it was autobiographical and beautiful. — Lana Del Rey

In a way, 'Billy Elliot' was autobiographical. I can't dance, but I think his dancing was me discovering about writing and literature. — Lee Hall

In a sense, any story that anyone writes is going to be autobiographical - whether it deals directly with the author's experience or not - because it captures what we're obsessed with while working on that particular piece. — Molly Antopol

Most victims of my autobiographical verse are either far too polite, remarkably understanding unaware that I have written poems about them. — John Barton

None of my movies are autobiographical. — Susanne Bier

Silence in the shell of a city, no baby crying, no car honking, no ambulance shrieking, no lovers moaning, no drunks throwing up in the alley, no lights, nothing but wind and rain and snow in its season and rust and a rattling of open doors and carcass smell. It was a possibility like a brain tumor or a scorpion bite. — Anne Roiphe

And when Deirdre Bair went to interview Beckett for the biography the first thing he said was, 'So you've come to demonstrate that it was all, after all, autobiographical. — Tim Parks

The film was semi-autobiographical. Director Mahesh Bhatt based it on his relationship with actress Parveen Babi. — Anupama Chopra

Actually, that's one of the things I was thinking about writing a story about me, loosely based or autobiographical. I just don't want to be like some people that are in their twenties and writing autobiographies. — Matthew McGrory

Attempting to express a person's objective reality and subjective state of mind with the written word is an endless task because writing alters our perception of reality and amends our mental equilibrium. — Kilroy J. Oldster

Finally, there are the dangers inherent in any autobiographical work: the temptation to color events in ways favorable to the writer, the tendency to overestimate the interest one's experiences hold for others, — Barack Obama

But you can't fault me on my footnotes. I've worked hard on them and they look pretty impressive. And almost all the sources I quote actually exist. I must confess, however, that the idea of putting footnotes in chapter 5, the autobiographical chapter, started out simply as a joke. Who but a biblical scholar would think of footnoting an autobiography? But the joke quickly got out of hand and become a significant part of that chapter. I plan someday to write a scholarly article consisting of a single sentence and a twenty-page footnote. — Jeffrey L. Staley

My two Jamaican cousins ... were studying engineering. 'That's where the money is,' Mom advised ... I was to be an engineering major, despite my allergy to science and math ... Those who preceded me at CCNY include the polio vaccine discoverer, Dr. Jonas Salk ... and eight Nobel Prize winners ... In class, I stumbled through math, fumbled through physics, and did reasonably well in, and even enjoyed, geology. All I ever looked forward to was ROTC.
Autobiographical comments on his original reason for going to the City College of New York, where he shortly turned to his military career. — Colin Powell

All fiction is autobiographical fantasy. — James Joyce

Is a little remarkable, that - though disinclined to talk overmuch of myself and my affairs at the fireside, and to my personal friends - an autobiographical impulse should twice in my life have taken possession of me, in addressing the public. The first time was three or four years since, when I favoured the reader - inexcusably, and for no earthly reason that either the indulgent reader or the intrusive author could imagine - with a description of my way of life in the deep quietude — Nathaniel Hawthorne

He lived at a little distance from his body, regarding his own acts with doubtful side-glances. He had an odd autobiographical habit which led him to compose in his mind from time to time a short sentence about himself containing a subject in the third person and a verb in the past tense. — James Joyce

The stuff I write isn't strictly autobiographical, but it's personal, if that makes any sense. It draws all these little incidents and people out of my life and then contorts them. — Diablo Cody

A story about my life should not be particularly interesting, but it is: it's just about me and some kids who didn't know how to talk to each other. It's personal but not autobiographical. — Dito Montiel

I think any writer keeps going back to some basic theme. Sometimes it's autobiographical. I guess it usually is. — Joe Haldeman

I think novels are profoundly autobiographical. If writers deny that, they are lying. Or if it's really true, then I think it's a mistake. — Amity Gaige

The late great Horace Lloyd Swithin (1844-1917), British essayist, lecturer, satirist, and social observer, wrote in his autobiographical Appointments, 1890-1901 (1902), When one travels abroad, one doesn't so much discover the hidden Wonders of the World, but the hidden wonders of the individuals with whom one is traveling. They may turn out to afford a stirring view, a rather dull landscape, or a terrain so treacherous one finds it's best to forget the entire affair and return home. — Marisha Pessl

'Nil By Mouth' was a bit autobiographical, but as I always pointed out at the time, that's not my dad. — Gary Oldman

I very much dislike writing about myself or my work, and when pressed for autobiographical material can only give a bare chronological outline which contains no pertinent facts. — Shirley Jackson

We can study files for decades, but every so often we are tempted to throw up our hands and declare that history is merely another literary genre: the past is autobiographical fiction pretending to be a parliamentary report. — Julian Barnes

All of my songs are autobiographical. — Taylor Swift

In his 1986 autobiographical work, Confessions of a Theologian, Carl F. H. Henry, dean of twentieth-century American evangelical theologians, lamented that several Christian colleges and universities had started to veer away from the centrality of their work, by and large giving up the cognitive focus on Christian thought in favor of Christian piety and activism. — David S. Dockery

There is no doubt that this film is autobiographical, but at the same time it also tries to portray an ordinary couple in a language that everyone can understand. — Sophie Marceau

The things that I write are autobiographical in a surreal sense, like when you have a dream and you go to the doctor's office, but then you turn around and it's actually your childhood home and the doctor has turned into Ryan Reynolds. — Diablo Cody

I am a storyteller, for better and for worse. I suspect that a feeling for stories, for narrative, is a universal human disposition, going with our powers of language, consciousness of self, and autobiographical memory. — Oliver Sacks

Another trouble with poetry - and I'm gonna stop the list at two - is the presence of presumptuousness in poetry, the sense you get in a poem that the poet takes for granted an interest on the reader's part in the poet's autobiographical life, in the poet's memories, problems, difficulties and even minor perceptions. — Billy Collins

I've yet to write a stand-up show that isn't autobiographical. — Mike Birbiglia

To ask an author who hopes to be a serious writer if his work is autobiographical is like asking a spider where he buys his thread. The spider gets his thread right out of his own guts, and that is where the author gets his writing. — Robertson Davies

I think most writers ... write about episodes meaningful to them in terms of their own imaginations. Now that would include a great deal of what they experience, but I'm not sure there's an autobiographical intention. ... I believe I'm telling the truth when I say that, when I wrote Catch-22, I was not particularly interested in war; I was mainly interested in writing a novel, and that was a subject for it. That's been true of all my books. Now what goes into these books does reflect a great deal of my more morbid nature - the fear of dying, a great deal of social awareness and social protest, which is part of my personality. None of that is the objective of writing. Take five writers who have experienced the same thing, and they will be completely different as people, and they'd be completely different in what they do write, what they're able to write. — Joseph Heller

The first book I ever wrote was in fourth grade and it was called 'Billy's Booger.' It was an autobiographical piece about a kid who was really bad at math. — William Joyce

Sometimes the autobiographical link in each story is very literal, like I did work at The Texas School for the Blind, and I did once lose a mattress out of the back of a friend's truck. — Arthur Bradford

If you think of any long-term artist that makes music throughout several decades, you would hope that it's autobiographical and a form of self-expression, and that's certainly how I approach my music. — DJ Shadow

I had absolutely no trauma in my childhood. If anyone ever assumed that my books were autobiographical, they'd be sorely disappointed, because none of these things happened to me. — Jodi Picoult

I'm not an autobiographical writer, but I am a writer who deals with human emotion on all levels. — P.J. Harvey

So there was fun and magic in my relationship with Toni, even if the prevailing mood when we trained was stony and severe. — Rafael Nadal

Everything is autobiographical, and nothing is autobiographical. That's fiction. — Lisa Unger

It's a real wrenching thing to go from being a private person to being a public person, especially when you're being autobiographical. — James Taylor

Every word is autobiographical, and every word is fiction. — William S. Burroughs

What's happening in Russia is devoid of autobiographical interest for me. Maybe it's egocentric. Whatever it is, feel free to use it. — Joseph Brodsky

My work looks like a comic book in form, but it's not a typical comic book in content. I write autobiographical stuff. — Harvey Pekar

Poets can't resist the dramatic pull of their lives and so inevitably write autobiographical verse. — John Barton

All fiction becomes autobiographical when the author has true talent. — Jeanne Moreau

Over the years, I had something in principle against autobiographical writing altogether because memory plays tricks on us, and we also tend to reinvent ourselves. But there comes an age when one begins to observe life, and there are things that need time to mature, also in terms of literary form. — Gunter Grass

In many of my plays, there was a kind of autobiographical character in the form of a son or young man. The purpose of it, of course, was to write about myself. That character was always the least fully realized. Eighteen years later, you realize, That's what he was about. — Sam Shepard

Because of the wonderfully positive response to 'Life's That Way,' I am considering writing some more autobiographical stuff - maybe another book. I don't know. It doesn't help that I'm lazy. — Jim Beaver

In her autobiographical Giving Up the Ghost (2003), Hilary Mantel reveals: I have always been addicted to something or other, usually something there's no support group for. Semicolons, for instance, I can never give up for more than two hundred words at a time. — Lynne Truss

Writers can take offense when someone asks what's real or autobiographical in our work because, to us, that's not what counts. The bits taken from life are tiny scales on the dragon's tail - what about that whole beautiful writhing, fire-breathing dragon? — Michelle Huneven

Memoir is actually the most egoless genre, even though it might seem ostensibly so much ego-driven. In order for it to succeed, you have to dissolve the self into these larger universal truths, and explore these deeper mysteries. If it's purely autobiographical and ego-driven, it's going to fail. — Nick Flynn

I'm always saying that my books are not autobiographical because they're not. I can't choose any one scene and say, 'Oh, this is exactly what happened to me!' I just use little snippets of things as a starting point! — Cecily Von Ziegesar

Each one of my films is personal; each one of my films is emotionally autobiographical. And I like directors who do that. — Jason Reitman

There's always going to be a little bit of autobiographical content to everything. It's how you lend some authority to what you write - you give it that weight by drawing on your direct experiences and indirect experiences from people that you know well, or a little. — Ian Anderson

Autobiographical memory: Memory across the lifespan for both specific events and self-related information. — Alan Baddeley

Everything is autobiography, even if one writes something that is totally objective. The fact that it's a subject that seizes you makes it autobiographical. — Lisel Mueller

Jason Leopold's News Junkie, an autobiographical look at Leopold's accidental entrance into journalism, is a powerful piece that delves into one man's misery and success. — Boston Herald

In an autobiographical essay published in 1946, Albert Einstein reflected on his days as a student of physics some fifty years earlier. He recalled his teachers with affection but, referring to exams, said, This coercion had such a deterring effect that after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year. — Alfie Kohn

All artists' work is autobiographical. Any writer's work is a map of their psyche. You can really see what their concerns are, what their obsessions are, and what interests them. — Kim Addonizio

Everyone knows that a lot of memoirs have made-up scenes; it's obvious. And everyone knows that half the time at least fictions contain literal autobiographical truths. So how do we decide what's what, and does it even matter? — Lauren Slater

In fact I wonder if I should bend my own rules a little and for the sake of writing a good song it doesn't have to been so autobiographical, but that's a stupid rule to live by as some of my favourite artists' songs, they have a song that you think is about their life [which] probably even isn't, but it's a great song. — The Rocket Summer

A drawing is an autobiographical record of one's discovery of an event - either seen, remembered or imagined. A 'finished' work is an attempt to construct an event in itself. — John Berger

Could I write an autobiographical novel, I wonder? Can one make a book out of the very essence of one's self? Perhaps so, if one was left with one's gift stripped bare of all that made it worth having, and nothing else was left ... — Vera Brittain

I always sing them as though they are autobiographical, even if they're not, and most of my songs do come from something about me. — Ronee Blakley

All my movies have an autobiographical dimension, but that is indirectly, through the personages. In fact, I am behind everything that happens and that is said, but I am never talking about myself in first person singular. — Pedro Almodovar

Everything you do is autobiographical. Yeah, I grew up in a town called Redding and I had older brothers and sisters so it's all my memories of growing up. — Ricky Gervais

Of course, if I write a first-person novel about a woman writer, I am inviting every book reviewer to apply the autobiographical label
to conclude that I am writing about myself. But one must never not write a certain kind of novel out of fear of what the reaction to it will be. — John Irving

My education was interrupted only by my schooling. — Winston S. Churchill

They used to treat sheep carcasses with Lithium so if the Coyotes went after the herd and bit on the treated carcasses, the got so sick they kept their teeth to themselves. — Kay Redfield Jamison

I loathe writing autobiographical material because if it's dull no-one should have to read it anyway, and if it's interesting I should be using it for a story. — Shirley Jackson

[Tom] Wolfe's books offered a whole new world to step into, and whilst at times you could accuse him of being somewhat long-winded, he had an incredible quality of prose and a bravery of writing from the heart. He believed in being autobiographical at all times. — Jude Law

There's not a strong autobiographical strain in my fiction. A few bits of fact here and there. — Donald Barthelme

But any book that is any good must be, to some extent, autobiographical, because one cannot and should not fabricate emotions; and although style and narrative are crucial, the bulwark, emotion, is what finally matters. With luck, talent, and studiousness, one manages to make a little pearl, or egg, or something ... — Edna O'Brien

I think each album does have a different energy, otherwise you'd be doing the same thing again and not experimenting anew ... Albums are such autobiographical material, not in the material but as an expression of what you're like at the time. — Kate Bush

Anyone who writes an autobiographical work at the age of 34 is, at best, presumptuous. It occurred to me that it was time to set the record straight. — Jessica Savitch

All novels must be autobiographical because I am the only material that I know. All of the characters are me. But at the same time, a novel is never autobiographical even if it describes the life of the author. Literary writing is a completely different medium. — John Banville

If I like hardcore straight-edge punk music, gentle psychedelic folk music, gangster rap, indie-rock with a lot of guitar pedals, and I find inspiration from all these things in different songs of mine, shouldn't I be allowed to make any of this kind of music that I want? And it's the same for the comic books, why should I only make autobiographical stories? Or only political stories? Or only superhero stories? Or only comedy stories? I am a bit creatively desperate, when I sit with a pen and paper I am desperate for ANY idea that makes me excited, I don't care what kind of idea it is! — Jeffrey Lewis

I have to say in premise 'Winter Journal' is really not a memoir. And I don't even think of it as an autobiography. I think of it as a literary composition - similar to music - composed of autobiographical fragments. I'm really not telling the story of my life in a coherent narrative form. — Paul Auster

People ask, 'Are your things autobiographical?,' and I think, no, they're not autobiographical directly, but of course my life has informed my work. — Andrea Arnold

Friends and family do not believe you write fiction. They truly believe that every word you write is either autobiographical or based on them. I once had a character say that she never wanted to be invited to another children's birthday party, and I never received another children's birthday party invitation ever again. — Liane Moriarty

I learned to read at a young age and I have always read voraciously. It is one of the few things, aside from getting fucked up and getting in trouble, that I have done consistently throughout my entire life. — James Frey

All art is autobiographical. You can only create what you are. — Dale Carnegie

Sometimes when people look at the work I've done with my family, they think it's autobiographical. But it really isn't. It's more about the idea of family. — Ari Marcopoulos

To be touched is, of course, to undergo something that comes from the outside, so I am, quite fundamentally, occasioned by that which is outside of me, which I undergo, and this undergoing designates a certain passivity, but not one that is understood as the opposite of 'activity.' To undergo this touch means that there must be a certain openness to the outside that postpones the plausibility of any claim to self-identity. The 'I' is occasioned by alterity, and that occasion persists as its necessary animating structure. Indeed, if there is to be self-representation, if I am to speak the 'I' in language, then this autobiographical reference has been enabled from elsewhere, has undergone what is not itself. Through this undergoing, an 'I' has emerged. — Judith Butler

All art is autobiographical. — Federico Fellini

I do not teach truth as such; I do not transform myself into a diaphanous mouthpiece of eternal pedagogy: I settle accounts , however I can, on a certain number of problems; with you and with me or me, and through you, me and me, with a certain number of authorities represented here. I understand that the place I am now occupying will not be left out of the exhibit or withdrawn form the scene. Nor do I intend to withhold even that which I shall call, to save time, an autobiographical demonstration, although I must ask you to shift its sense a little and to listen to it with another ear. I wish to take a certain pleasure in this, so that you may learn this pleasure from me. — Jacques Derrida

Reviewers try to square the antics of a writer's life with the antics in the fiction. Even satirical verbal play is too often read and admired as autobiographical expression. And thanks to the democratic exposures of the web, it's easier than ever to document private experiences and divulge the most intimate secrets. — Joanna Scott

The film of tomorrow appears to me as even more personal than an individual and autobiographical novel, like a confession, or a diary. — Francois Truffaut

I don't think there's such a thing as autobiographical fiction. If I say it happened, it happened, even if only in my mind. — Maya Angelou

It'd be tricky to read into my lyrics - some are autobiographical, but sometimes I just like the sound of words. — Max Tundra

I think music as we know it, is autobiographical. — Julius Hemphill

I do think all art is autobiographical, and I do think I know quite a bit about women. I don't know anything about men. — Gloria Vanderbilt

There certainly is no secret in that there are plenty of people who don't like plenty of my movies. Each one of my films is personal; each one of my films is emotionally autobiographical. And I like directors who do that. With each one of my films, I'm exploring one of my own issues and I try to expose myself a little in the film. — Jason Reitman

I don't know who they are[my characters] . They're entirely invented characters. Maybe that's how I've been able to write so many books, because there are no boundaries for me. I can write a completely fantastical story like "Swept Away" or "Blinded by the Light" and then a non-comic drama like "Chicxulub" or something like "Birnam Wood" that has autobiographical underpinnings. Why not? — T.C. Boyle

Autobiographical Interview, ed. James Conant and — Thomas S. Kuhn

In a regular class I don't focus on the form, but I think that focus is helpful for brainstorming and coming up with ideas quickly, especially with autobiographical material. — Bonnie Jo Campbell

Perhaps for many Japanese, autobiographical fiction writing is life. We are a people expected to complement, to harmonize, to anticipate one another's needs. All without a single spoken clue.

And the reason is that he's in training to be a writer. Observing detail, understanding irony, interpreting motivation. Hiro knows that acts are symbolic. The hard sour fruit offered too soon in its season carries a message. He has made an error in the timing of his visit. He has inconvenienced that family.

This is the Japanese way. Cogitating on inner meaning. Revealing ourselves and perceiving others through carefully crafted scenes.

Writing our endless I-stories. — Lydia Minatoya