memoir

Also known as memoirs

thumb|200px|Title page of Henry David Thoreau|Henry Thoreau's memoir, [[Walden (1854)]]

AI overview

A memoir is a personal account written by someone about their own life experiences and memories. It matters because it allows readers to understand history and human experience through the authentic voice and perspective of someone who lived through significant events or periods.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Wikidata facts

Instance of: literary genre
Subclass of: autobiography
Image: Mémoires de Franklin.jpg

Show 7 more facts

different from: autobiography
topic's main category: Category:Memoirs
Commons category: Memoirs
practiced by: memoirist
partially coincident with: autobiography
P8168: Ita
P13411: Uganda

Sources (4)

via Wikidata · CC0

~10 min read

Encyclopedic overview

12 sections

Contents

Early memoirs
From the eighteenth century
Memoirs today
Political people
Scientists
Ordinary people
Collections
Terminology
See also
References
Further reading
External links

thumb|200px|Title page of Henry David Thoreau|Henry Thoreau's memoir, [[Walden (1854)]]

A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based on the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobiography since the late 20th century, the genre is differentiated in form, presenting a narrowed focus, usually a particular time phase in someone's life or career. A biography or autobiography tells the story "of a life", while a memoir often tells the story of a particular career, event, or time, such as touchstone moments and turning points in the author's life. The author of a memoir may be referred to as a memoirist or a memorialist.

Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “memoir” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.