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Altered Egos

Authority in American Autobiography

By: G. Thomas Couser

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Hardcover | 9 November 1989

At a Glance

Hardcover
300 Pages

Dimensions(cm)
22.86 x 15.24 x 2.06

Hardcover

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This work explores the "authority" of autobiography in several related senses: first, the idea that autobiography is authoritative writing because it is presumably verifiable; second, the idea that one's life is one's exclusive textual domain; third, the idea that, because of the apparent congruence between the implicit ideology of the genre and that of the nation, autobiography has a special prestige in America. Aware of the recent critiques of the notion of autobiography as issuing from, determined by, or referring to a pre-existing self, Couser examines the ways in which the authority of particular texts is called into question--for example, because they involve pseudonymity (Mark Twain), the revision of a presumably spontaneous form (Mary Chesnut's Civil War "diaries"), bilingual authorship (Richard Rodriguez and Maxine Hong Kingston), collaborative production (Black Elk), or outright fraud (Clifford Irving's "autobiography" of Howard Hughes). Couser examines both the way in
which canonical autobiographers may playfully and purposely undermine their own narrative authority and the way in which minority writers' control of their lives may be compromised. Autobiography, then, is portrayed here as an arena in which individuals struggle for self-possession and self-expression against the constraints of language, genre, and society.

Industry Reviews

'Altered Egos is a rewarding book with insights about authority, not just in individual texts and authors, but in the genre itself.' Carol J. Singley, The American University, Prose Studies, Vol. 15, No. 2, August 1992

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction History General & World History Literature, Poetry & Plays History & Criticism of Literature General Literary Studies Philosophy Metaphysics & Ontology

Prologue: The Case of the Counterfeit Autobiography	p. 3
Introduction: Authority, Autobiography, America	p. 13
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin: Self-Constitutional Conventions	p. 28
Prose and Cons: The Autobiographies of P. T. Barnum	p. 52
False "I's": Mark Twain's Pseudonymous Autobiography	p. 70
(En)Slave(d) Narrative: Early Afro-American Autobiography	p. 110
Mary Boykin Chesnut: Secession, Confederacy, Reconstruction	p. 156
Black Elk Speaks With Forked Tongue	p. 189
Biculturalism in Contemporary Autobiography: Richard Rodriguez and Maxine Hong Kingston	p. 210
Conclusion	p. 246
Notes	p. 257
Selected Bibliography	p. 271
Index	p. 277
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

Altered Egos

Authority in American Autobiography

At a Glance

Hardcover

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

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