If he is not that he is nothing. He must start with the
assumption that people want to hear about him and to hear it from
himself. Further, he must be genuinely and actively interested in his
own life and therefore write about it willingly and with zest. If you
get anywhere near the position of an autobiographer, "_invitus_,"
addressing a reader, "_invitum_," the game is up.
It would, then, be an absurdity to pretend to avoid egotism.
It would be almost as futile to apologise for being trivial. All details
of human life are interesting, or can be made interesting, especially if
they can be shown to be contributory to the development of the subject
on the Anatomy-table. The elements that contributed to the building up
of the man under observation are sure to be worth recording.
The autobiographer who is going to succeed with his task must set down
whatever he believes went to the making of his mind and soul, and of
that highly composite product which constitutes a human being. Nothing
is too small or too unimportant to be worthy of record. But people to
whom criticism is a passion and who love it even more than life, and
they are often very valuable people, will say, "Are we not, then, to be
allowed to dub your book trivial, if we think so?" Of course they must
have that license, but they must make good the plea of triviality, not
in the facts but in the exposition.
Pages:
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55