A biography is a detailed account of a person's life that goes beyond basic facts such as education, work, relationships and death to portray the subject's experience of those events. Unlike a profile or a curriculum vitae, a biography presents a subject's life story, including intimate details of experience, and may analyze the subject's personality.
Facts
Place of OriginAncient Greece and Rome; early Roman biography includes Cornelius Nepos's Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae (Lives of Outstanding Generals), published in 44 BC. 1 Notable ExamplePlutarch's Parallel Lives, published in Greek around 80 AD, an early and extensive work of biographical writing. 1 Defining TraitA detailed non-fiction (or occasionally fictionalized) account of a person's life that goes beyond basic facts of education, work, relationships and death to portray the subject's experience of those events, distinguished from a profile or curriculum vitae. 1 Connections
Encompasses Form
Form Of Genre
Sources
1. Biography (Wikipedia)
Wikimedia FoundationLead paragraph, first sentence
A biography, or simply bio, is a detailed description or account of a person's life.
History section, on Plutarch's Parallel Lives
Longer and more extensive biographies were written in Greek by Plutarch, in his Parallel Lives, published about 80 AD.
History section, on Cornelius Nepos
One of the earliest Roman biographers was Cornelius Nepos, who published his work Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae ("Lives of outstanding generals") in 44 BC.
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