Writing a compelling biography text is essential when you are writing the story of a person’s life. You need to do justice with it. A biography is more than just facts. It is the journey of a person, so it is crucial to do justice when writing his/her story in a book. The incidents in a biography may include milestone achievements, adverse moments, and the main turning points. If you want a biography text to stand out from the crowd, then you need to keep a few essential considerations in your mind. In this post, we will discuss how to write an influential biography of a famous person.
Table of Contents
What Is A Biography?
A biography, also known as a bio, is a concise account of a person’s life. It depicts a person’s perception of these life events rather than only the bare details such as schooling, employment, relationships, and death. A biography, unlike a profile or curriculum vitae, tells the story of a person’s life, highlighting different aspects of their life, including intimate details of experience, and may include a personality examination.
Most biographical professional writing help works are nonfiction. However, you may also use fiction to depict a person’s life. Legacy writing is a form of in-depth biographical coverage. Works in diverse media, from literature to film, form the genre known as biography. An authorized biography text is written with the permission, cooperation, and at times, participation of a subject or a subject’s heirs. An autobiography is written by the person himself or herself, sometimes with the assistance of a collaborator or ghostwriter.
What Function Does A Biography Text Server?
The aim of biographies is to provide information about a person’s or thing’s life in an enjoyable yet informative manner. By the end of a biography, readers should have a good understanding of the subject.
Biographies are frequently nonfiction, but many biographers often use a novel-like structure since a plot with solid exposition, escalating tension, and then climax will be more engaging. Furthermore, the most inspiring life stories have the ability to empower and inspire readers.
Steps To Write Effective Biography Text
To write a remarkable biography, you need to follow the below-given procedure:
1: Get permission.
Once you’ve decided on a biography subject, you’ll need to get their permission to write about their life. Although having permission might not be required (for example, if the subject is a public figure or has passed away), it will make the research portion of your writing process much simpler. If the subject is willing to be biographied, they may provide important details about their story upfront to make your writing about them more compelling.
2: Do your research.
Regardless of how much you know about your topic, you’ll need to do a lot of research to get a complete picture of them. Have details about the time period they lived in and how it influenced the way they lived their lives if they’re a historical figure. The most reliable sources are primary sources, which are firsthand accounts of your subject’s life. Journal entries, letters, interviews, and memoirs are examples of these.
Any other details the subject has given, such as a personal website, Twitter bio, social media account, or technical bio, may be considered a primary source. If the information is accurate, you may also use the secondary sources such as magazines or documentaries.
3: Form your thesis.
The first paragraph or chapter of your biography should tell the reader what they will learn about this person from it. A thesis is a statement about the biography that the rest of the biography would help with relevant details. When writing a biography, this move is critical.
4: Make a timeline.
A biography has all the major events in a person’s life in chronological order in a biography. Knowing the sequence of key events before you begin writing will save you the time and effort of later reorganising the entire story.
5: Use flashbacks.
You may want to intercut an experience from your subject’s adult life. It may also include the events from their high school days when writing the text of your biography. The author will introduce important past knowledge to the reader without bogging them down with pages of context exposition by using flashbacks.
6: Include your thoughts.
A biography text isn’t just a transaction of facts. A biographer can share their feelings and opinions on their subject’s life. If the subject did something noteworthy, the author might include why they feel that moment was significant, how it was affected by the time period, and what it meant for society. This will support why this person deserves to be written about and keep the audience reading from the first sentence to the last.
Examples Of Famous Biographies For Kids
1: Shakespeare: A Life (By Park Honan)
This biography is the most reliable, up-to-date, and comprehensive account of William Shakespeare’s life ever published. Park Honan has changed readers’ views of Shakespeare and his position as a poet and actor by using new and rich knowledge about the playwright.
Other biographies envision different positions for him, commenting on his romantic affairs and colourful intrigues, but this book is entirely different. Though extensive psychological theories and innovative reforms about the famous playwright may be entertaining, they undermine the sources’ credibility. As a result, several attempts to learn about Shakespeare have been made, but this one stands out.
2: Arthur Miller: Attention Must Be Paid (By James Campbell)
This biography is in the style of a play, with only two acts. In the first act, the author depicts Arthur Miller, a popular dramatist in his early years, falling in love with the world’s most beloved woman and resisting tyranny.
However, the author demonstrates in the second act of this biography. It showcases that the hero was severely attacked and mocked by a raucous crowd known as critics, who are expelled from the traditional theatre. He concludes his book with rhetorical information about a revival of the playwright’s fortunes.
3: The Life of Samuel Johnson (By James Boswell)
People widely acknowledge this biography as a model of modern biography and the best example of the English language. This masterpiece by James Boswell covers the entire life of Samuel Johnson. Besides, it showcases the omnipresent literary writer and Boswell company. This book is remarkable in that it portrays Johnson as a walking intellectual among us.
4: The Bronte Myth (By Lucasta Miller)
In the history of English literature, Emily, Anne, and Charlotte Bronte were well-known and eminent authors. Many rumors and gossip were associated with them when they reached the peaks of their careers. Also, how they received great approval for writing the most admired novels of the nineteenth century. In their biography text, Lucasta Miller chunks the myths related to these enigmatic young women. This is an excellent example of a biography.
5: Why this World: A Biography of Clarice Lispector (ByBenjamin Moser)
Benjamin Moser, a modernist scholar, has investigated the mystique surrounding Brazilian writer Clarice Lispector after perusing his own private manuscripts and writings. This is one of Moser’s biographies that gets closer to uncovering her true complexities. Readers who are unfamiliar with her plethora of works will find this biography fascinating. Her life story is stunning, tragic, and yet riveting.
Final Words
Reading this full post, you can get to know the effective steps to write a powerful biography text. Besides, you can also navigate through some examples of famous biographies to take reference from. If you love reading biographies, memoirs, or autobiographies, visiting our blog section can help you in finding more.