Abstract
This essay focuses on the changes that have taken place over the last twenty years in the study of Victorian life writing, especially autobiography and biography. Its basic contention is that whereas the canon used to be decided by the predominance given to well-shaped narratives by male authors in public life, scholarship in this area has now widely accepted the entry of many other types of life writing, and embraced notions of hybridity and instability as inherent in the genre. Scholarly interest in auto/biography has also moved beyond a bifurcation into ‘male’ and ‘female’ forms, and been revitalized by new developments in family studies, ethnicity, gender and masculinities. The article concludes with discussion of two key families, the Martineaus and Bensons, and their preoccupation with the possibilities of life writing.
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