Assignment Choice I: Biography
In your insanely rushed world of school, work, and extracurricular activities, how often do you
have the opportunity to simply sit and talk to someone about life? Long before technology came
into our existence, we learned about life by listening to others who could share their experiences
with us. We gained our understanding of the world from those who were “older and wiser.” Early
literature, in fact, originated orally, as story tellers sat around the communal fire and related the
tales of heroes and their adventures, through which the culture gained its identity. Without their
knowledge and their stories, society would never have been able to pass on the traditions which
have kept us alive, well and connected.
Technology, although it has the potential to connect us over time and space, also has a tendency
to complete with this kind of one-on-one contact. Generations ago, children had little else to do
in their spare time but play with neighborhood friends in the street. Today, television, video-
games, and the Internet offer us the choice to stay inside, connected to the screen rather than to
the people.
So, you are going to have the opportunity now to go back in time. You will engage in a process
of listening to someone who is “older and wiser,” face to face, in order to gain new insight into
the human condition. You will go through a process of interviewing a person and eventually
writing a biographical story which highlights how that person’s life has been remarkable. Some
people call this an oral history. The ultimate benefit of this process will be your gaining further
insight into your own life. This process will take you about a week.
Follow these steps in the process.
- Find an older person in your community with whom you can spend an hour or two. Good
choices would be parents, grandparents or other relatives, teachers or school personnel,
neighbors, or elderly people in local retirement homes. Naturally, you do not want to choose a
stranger, or place yourself in any situation which could be unsafe, so be sure you talk about your
plan with your parents.
- Interview the person. You’ll need to take some notes, but you’ll also need to actively listen.
You might even tape record the interview, but you must ask the person’s permission first. Begin
by just chatting comfortably about the person’s life. Listen to the language the person uses to
describe his/her experience. Pay attention to the person’s attitudes, tone of voice, body language,
and facial expressions. This will make you aware of the person’s voice. Remember, the topic of
conversation is not you; it is the person you are interviewing. If you need to, you can use the
following questions:
So, tell me about your life:
- What is remarkable about your life?
- What is admirable about your life?
- In what ways has your life been unique?
- What are some of the stories you could tell about your life?
- What good and bad decisions have you made?
- What human qualities have you developed through your experience?
- In what ways have you influenced your times or have your times influenced you?
- What lessons have you learned about life?
- What is your code of beliefs?
- What is the most dramatic experience you ever had?
- What was your most difficult moment? Your happiest? Your most tragic?
- What were your greatest failures? Successes?
- If you could go back in time, what would you have done differently?
- What advice about life would you give to today’s teens?
You will notice as you conduct your interview, that even if your subject is not a famous celebrity,
he/she will have fascinating life stories to tell! If you can get this person to focus on one
particular story in detail, it will be especially helpful to you.
- Write! Begin your writing by thinking about what insight your subject’s life offers you. How
could this person’s life story matter to young people today. (Think: who then, is your audience?)
Now, using everything you know about good ideas, strong organization, sentence fluency,
conventions, voice and diction, write a biography of this person. As you organize, decide which
details to omit, and which to highlight. Avoid just writing lists of facts about the person. You do
not have to include every detail you heard about in the interview process. Remember, the
purpose of this process is to write a compelling story which reveals insight about this person’s
life.
Revise! Try this authentic revision process. Go back to the person you interviewed and read the
story to him or her. Watch his/her body language and facial expressions to see where he/she
reacts favorably or with confusion to your story. Ask if there are any areas where you should
revise the story to make it truer to life.
Show, Don’t Tell.
Remember to show what happened, don’t tell what happened. If there is a lesson to be learned,
we should see it for ourselves from your vivid description. In your biography, you may have to
create dialogue you did not actually hear, and it will not be completely accurate. Is that all right
to do? Go to Section 6 for a discussion.