Biography, vol. 25, no. 3 (2002)

Editor’s Introduction, p. iii

ARTICLES

Richard Schur
Critical Race Theory and the Limits of Auto/Biography: Reading Patricia Williams’s The Alchemy of Race and Rights Through/Against Postcolonial Theory, p. 455

This article examines how Patricia Williams’s The Alchemy of Race and Rights develops critical race theory by carrying out the concerns, methods, and goals of Gayatri Spivak’s articulation of the subaltern and postcolonial theory within the context of U.S. law. Williams’s book performs a critique of legal subjectivity by first creating and then deconstructing a series of auto/biographical moments. By placing critical race theory and postcolonial theory into dialogue, the article demonstrates how these distinct theoretical orientations rely on auto/biography to supplement the limits of the Western political tradition in order to realize its potential.

Kevin J. Hayes
Poe, the Daguerreotype, and the Autobiographical Act, p. 477

After sitting for his first daguerreotype, Edgar Allan Poe was extremely disappointed with the resulting image, which looks nothing like the photographs of him we are accustomed to seeing. For his subsequent daguerreotypes, Poe came to understand precisely how to shape his personal image for the camera. The resulting images have become icons of American literature and culture.

SKETCHES FROM LIFE

David Parker
Counter-Transference in Reading Autobiography: The Case of Kathryn Harrison’s The Kiss, p. 493

In exploring issues of counter-transference in reading autobiography, this article compares divergent readings of Kathryn Harrison’s memoir The Kiss, and offers a personal case for thinking that some narratives of childhood may elicit powerful counter-transferential impulses originating in critics’ own lives.

REVIEWS

Traditions of Victorian Women’s Autobiography: The Poetics and Politics of Life Writing, by Linda H. Peterson, p. 505
Reviewed by Kate Flint

Solitary Travelers: Nineteenth-Century Women’s Travel Narratives and the Scientific Vocation, by Lila Marz Harper, p. 509
Reviewed by Elizabeth Sabiston

Working in Women’s Archives: Researching Women’s Private Literature and Archival Documents, edited by Helen M. Buss and Marlene Kadar, p. 513
Reviewed by Janice Dickin

Genesis, Manuscrits-Recherche-Invention, Autobiographie, edited by Philippe Lejeune and Catherine Viollet, p. 518
Reviewed by Marie-Christine Garneau

Publishing Women’s Life Stories in France, 1647–1720: From Voice to Print, by Elizabeth C. Goldsmith, p. 522
Reviewed by Roxanne Decker Lalande

May Her Likes Be Multiplied: Biography and Gender Politics in Egypt, by Marilyn Booth, p. 526
Reviewed by Faegheh Shirazi

Doña Maria’s Story: Life, History, Memory, and Political Identity, by Daniel James, p. 530
Reviewed by Catherine Davies

The Female Crucifix: Images of St. Wilgefortis since the Middle Ages, by Ilse E. Friesen, p. 534
Reviewed by Joseph M. Sullivan

The Five Crows Ledger: Biographic Warrior Art of the Flathead Indians, by James D. Keyser, p. 538
Reviewed by Larry J. Zimmerman

LIFELINES, p. 541
Upcoming events, calls for papers, and news from the field

CONTRIBUTORS, p. 543