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What is the best Autobiography that you have read and why?

57 replies

biglips · 08/07/2006 16:32

as ive never had read one till i read Bob Marley - Died too young (summat like that) mini book and i was so absorbed into it.. i would like to try out another again

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LadyTophamHatt · 08/07/2006 16:35

I've never read one either....

LadyTophamHatt · 08/07/2006 16:36

thats really bad grammer isn't it?

I'm sure it should be "i haven't read one either" or just "I've never read one"

biglips · 08/07/2006 16:38
Grin
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Harold · 08/07/2006 16:39

I enjoyed frank Skinner's and Clive James' Unreliable memoirs is fab.

MrsJohnCusack · 08/07/2006 16:41

I think that's a biography biglips - autobiographies are by the actual person, biographies are written by somebody else.

I love both though. one of my favourites has to be 'The Mitford Girls' by Mary S Lovell, also I love any biogs about Audrey Hepburn, Cary Grant, other film stars.

MrsJohnCusack · 08/07/2006 16:41

I just reread all the UNreliable Memoirs books - they were fab!

biglips · 08/07/2006 16:42

sorry i am talking about both

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biglips · 08/07/2006 16:44

MrsJohnCusack - yes i am looking into the old film stars books (Autobiography ones)

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southeastastra · 08/07/2006 16:55

something like 'hollywood babylon' is good with lots of juicy gossip

MrsJohnCusack · 08/07/2006 17:14

I love all the ones about old Hollywood stars - all the old fashioned glamour, and they led pretty fantastic and racy lives.

autobiographies- have really enjoyed John Simpson's ones & also funnily enough the 'lighter' ones e.g. by June Whitfield, Richard Whiteley etc. Plus I've fairly recently read ones by Anne Robinson, Janet Street-Porter and John McEnroe. And I love the crappy ones like Victoria Beckham's and Geri Halliwell's, whether they actually wrote them or not - don't care, I'm just terminally nosy and love reading about other people's lives!

PrettyCandles · 08/07/2006 17:19

Gorky: My Childhood, My Apprenticeship, My Universities (it's a trilogy). They read more like novels, and give you a glimpse into a world totally alien to what we know nowadays.

brimfull · 08/07/2006 17:23

margeret forster has written some great biographies

biglips · 08/07/2006 17:30

im looking at Cilla Black "Whats it all about" and Paula Yates one atm on Ebay

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Northerner · 08/07/2006 17:37

I have read Jordsn's, Ulrika Johnsons's, Geri Haliwell's and VB's (Gawd, what does that say about me? and Road Dahl's and Annabelle Goldsmith.

I am currently reading Sharon Osbourne's.

FrannyandZooey · 08/07/2006 17:43

Is it only an autobiography if it covers the person's whole life? (feeling rather embarrassed to not know this but still)

Because the best book about a person's life I have ever read is An Evil Cradling by Brian Keenan but it only covers the period when he was in Beirut. It's an absolutely blinding book and unbelievable inspiring, given the subject matter.

I think the best straightforward biography I have read is probably the Oscar Wilde one with the green cover (can't remember who wrote it . For stories about their lives I love Alan Bennett and John Irving. What are these books called that are not strictly auto-biographies? Memoirs? You couldn't call An Evil Cradling a memoir, though, that sounds far too trivial and light...

Northerner · 08/07/2006 17:44

OOh Franny you sound so intelliegnt and I sound soo trashy.....

FrannyandZooey · 08/07/2006 17:45

Oh no hold on the absolute best one (apart from Brian Keenan) is Prick Up Your Ears, Joe Orton's biography written by John Lahr. It is absolutely hilarious, shocking, gossipy, and moving by turns

FrannyandZooey · 08/07/2006 17:46

I couldn't possibly comment on why that might be, Northerner

brimfull · 08/07/2006 17:48

I must be thick,who is joe orton ?

FrannyandZooey · 08/07/2006 17:50

He was a gay playwright in the 1960s. He wrote "What the Butler Saw" and "Entertaining Mr Sloane" before being murdered by his lover. His life was....erm....colourful

southeastastra · 08/07/2006 17:54

that joe orton book is hilarious! i especially like the letters written at the back, sad ending though

Reginald · 08/07/2006 17:55

Primo Levi's If This is a Man/The Truce is my fav

FrannyandZooey · 08/07/2006 17:57

The Edna Welthorpe letters are the business aren't they SEA? Did you read the Diaries as well? I was so shocked at all his cottaging and all the boys in Tangiers

and Kenneth Williams

southeastastra · 08/07/2006 18:01

i read it a while ago and it certainly opened my eyes! i quite liked the film too. wasn't he complaining about fray bentos pies in one letter, i must read it again!

expatinscotland · 08/07/2006 18:03

Are You Somebody?: Memoirs of a Dublin Woman by Nuala O'Faolain

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