Well known biographies
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The 30 Best Biographies of All Time
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Blog – Posted on Monday, Jan 21
Biographer Richard Holmes once wrote that his work was “a kind of pursuit… writing about the pursuit of that fleeting figure, in such a way as to bring them alive in the present.”
At the risk of sounding cliché, the best biographies do exactly this: bring their subjects to life. A great biography isn’t just a laundry list of events that happened to someone. Rather, it should weave a narrative and tell a story in almost the same way a novel does. In this way, biography differs from the rest of nonfiction.
All the biographies on this list are just as captivating as excellent novels, if not more so. With that, please enjoy the 30 best biographies of all time — some historical, some recent, but all remarkable, life-giving tributes to their subjects.
If you're feeling overwhelmed by the number • I’ve read a lot of biographies and memoirs since I began posting book reviews in January 2010. I’m listing here 100 titles that I can recommend, omitting many that underwhelmed me (in addition to others I couldn’t finish reading). This post was updated on February 8, 2025. These books cover a wide range of both historical and contemporary figures, every one of them prominent in a significant way, from Cleopatra and Catherine the Great to Clarence Darrow, Allen Dulles, and Steve Jobs. As you can see, most of these 100 biographies and memoirs fall into a few categories that describe some of the topics I’m most interested in: espionage, science, business, and American history. The categories are arbitrary: many of these books fall into more than one. However, I chose just one for each book, not wanting to list any titles twice. Each title below is hyperlinked to my review. Although I was forced to be somewhat arbitrary, my 12 favorite great biographies a • The supposed “American Brontës,” the three Peabody sisters influenced the thinking of writers like Thoreau and Hawthorne. The youngest sister, Sophia, married Nathaniel Hawthorne. After you finish the story of the Peabody sisters and are searching for more stories about American Romanticism and the role women played in the literary scene at the time, pick up Megan Marshall’s other book, about Margaret Fuller. True Story Newsletter Sign up for True Story to receive nonfiction news, new releases, and must-read forthcoming titles. Thank you for signing up! Keep an eye on your inbox. By signing up you agree to our terms of use This is a biography of the biographies that have been written about Sylvia Plath. It tries to co 50 Must-Read Literary Biographies
The Peabody Sisters: Three Women Who Ignited American Romanticism by Megan Marshall
Margaret Fuller: A New American Life by Megan Marshall
The Silent Woman: Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes by Janet Malcolm