About

Lifewriting Annual: Biographical and Autobiographical Studies (LA) presents critical and scholarly essays on lifewriting in all its forms - biography, autobiography, memoir, journals, diaries, letters, and works in media other than print. It publishes articles that describe and assess scholarly resources for biographical writing, especially collections of manuscripts and letters, and includes reviews of recently published biographies, autobiographies, and other works of lifewriting. The annual is a forum for the discussion of all aspects of lifewriting - theoretical, critical, and scholarly. Its broad scope aims to foster lively discussion of the ways that various forms of lifewriting inform and interact with each other.

Journal History

LA arose from the ashes of Biography and Source Studies, a scholarly journal published from 1994 to 2004 by AMS Press, Inc., New York. In 2005 Thomas R. Smith became its editor, changed its direction somewhat and its name to Lifewriting Annual: Biographical and Autobiographical Studies. The first volume under this name was published in 2006. Volume 2 appeared in 2008 and Volume 3 in 2012. Carol DeBoer-Langworthy took over in 2013 and brought out Volume 4 in December 2015. Altogether, LA appeared in print volume form from 2006-2017. LA was later published by the Open Library of Humanities until 2025, and this site remains as an archive of the journal's published content.