Getting to Know the Famous and the Infamous: How to Select a Biography Or an Autobiography

Getting to know the famous and the infamous: How to select a biography or an autobiography at the Van Wagenen Library

What is a BIOGRAPHY? It is a written account of another person’s life. What is an AUTOBIOGRAPHY? It is a history of a person’s life, written or told, by that person. Source: The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, Second Edition.

In order to locate an individual you would like to know more about, use the following tools:

Current Biography (REF CT100 .C8 1940-2001) Encyclopedia of American Biography (REF CT213 .E53 1995) Dictionary of Science Biography (REF Q141 D5 v1-18) OR On the library’s homepage, select Online Reference Tools, scroll down to Lives: The Biography Resource

Select 2 or 3 names you are interested in; go to the library’s electronic catalog (multiLIS) to determine if our library owns a book by (autobiography) or about (biography) that individual. Once you have been successful in locating a book in our library, go upstairs to the stacks, locate the book, check it out and read it.

Whether your required writing style is APA or MLA you can find appropriate citation information by using Keys for Writers, asking for help from a Reference Librarian or checking the Library’s HomePage (Resource Guide for Students).

Attach a photocopy of the title page of the book to your report.

A 5-page report on the book is due on ______.