a definition of biography

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[ bahy- og -r uh -fee , bee- ]

the biography of Byron by Marchand.

• an account in biographical form of an organization, society, theater, animal, etc.
• such writings collectively.
• the writing of biography as an occupation or field of endeavor.

/ ˌbaɪəˈɡræfɪkəl; baɪˈɒɡrəfɪ /

• an account of a person's life by another
• such accounts collectively
• The story of someone's life. The Life of Samuel Johnson , by James Boswell , and Abraham Lincoln , by Carl Sandburg , are two noted biographies. The story of the writer's own life is an autobiography .

Discover More

Derived forms.

• biographical , adjective
• ˌbioˈgraphically , adverb
• biˈographer , noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of biography 1

Example Sentences

Barrett didn’t say anything on Tuesday to contradict our understanding of her ideological leanings based on her past rulings, past statements and biography.

Republicans, meanwhile, focused mostly on her biography — including her role as a working mother of seven and her Catholic faith — and her credentials, while offering few specifics about her record as a law professor and judge.

She delivered an inspiring biography at one point, reflecting on the sacrifice her mother made to emigrate to the United States.

As Walter Isaacson pointed out in his biography of Benjamin Franklin, Franklin proposed the postal system as a vital network to bond together the 13 disparate colonies.

Serving that end, the book is not an in-depth biography as much as a summary of Galileo’s life and science, plus a thorough recounting of the events leading up to his famous trial.

The Amazon biography for an author named Papa Faal mentions both Gambia and lists a military record that matches the FBI report.

For those unfamiliar with Michals, an annotated biography and useful essays are included.

Did you envision your Pryor biography as extending your previous investigation—aesthetically and historically?

But Stephen Kotkin's new biography reveals a learned despot who acted cunningly to take advantage of the times.

Watching novelists insult one another is one of the primary pleasures of his biography.

He also published two volumes of American Biography, a work which his death abridged.

Mme. de Chaulieu gave her husband the three children designated in the duc's biography.

The biography of great men always has been, and always will be read with interest and profit.

I like biography far better than fiction myself: fiction is too free.

The Bookman: "A more entertaining narrative whether in biography or fiction has not appeared in recent years."

Related Words

• autobiography

[ ak -s uh -lot-l ]

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Definition of biography noun from the Oxford Advanced American Dictionary

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Meaning of biography in English

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• This biography offers a few glimpses of his life before he became famous .
• Her biography revealed that she was not as rich as everyone thought .
• The biography was a bit of a rush job .
• The biography is an attempt to uncover the inner man.
• The biography is woven from the many accounts which exist of things she did.
• exercise book
• novelistically
• young adult

biography | Intermediate English

• biographical

Examples of biography

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be chasing your tail

to be busy doing a lot of things but achieving very little

Binding, nailing, and gluing: talking about fastening things together

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What Is a Biography?

Learning from the experiences of others is what makes us human.

At the core of every biography is the story of someone’s humanity. While biographies come in many sub-genres, the one thing they all have in common is loyalty to the facts, as they’re available at the time. Here’s how we define biography, a look at its origins, and some popular types.

“Biography” Definition

A biography is simply the story of a real person’s life. It could be about a person who is still alive, someone who lived centuries ago, someone who is globally famous, an unsung hero forgotten by history, or even a unique group of people. The facts of their life, from birth to death (or the present day of the author), are included with life-changing moments often taking center stage. The author usually points to the subject’s childhood, coming-of-age events, relationships, failures, and successes in order to create a well-rounded description of her subject.

Biographies require a great deal of research. Sources of information could be as direct as an interview with the subject providing their own interpretation of their life’s events. When writing about people who are no longer with us, biographers look for primary sources left behind by the subject and, if possible, interviews with friends or family. Historical biographers may also include accounts from other experts who have studied their subject.

The biographer’s ultimate goal is to recreate the world their subject lived in and describe how they functioned within it. Did they change their world? Did their world change them? Did they transcend the time in which they lived? Why or why not? And how? These universal life lessons are what make biographies such a meaningful read.

Origins of the Biography

Greco-Roman literature honored the gods as well as notable mortals. Whether winning or losing, their behaviors were to be copied or seen as cautionary tales. One of the earliest examples written exclusively about humans is Plutarch’s Parallel Lives (probably early 2 nd century AD). It’s a collection of biographies in which a pair of men, one Greek and one Roman, are compared and held up as either a good or bad example to follow.

In the Middle Ages, Einhard’s The Life of Charlemagne (around 817 AD) stands out as one of the most famous biographies of its day. Einhard clearly fawns over Charlemagne’s accomplishments throughout, yet it doesn’t diminish the value this biography has brought to centuries of historians since its writing.

Considered the earliest modern biography, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) by James Boswell looks like the biographies we know today. Boswell conducted interviews, performed years of research, and created a compelling narrative of his subject.

The genre evolves as the 20th century arrives, and with it the first World War. The 1920s saw a boom in autobiographies in response. Robert Graves’ Good-Bye to All That (1929) is a coming-of age story set amid the absurdity of war and its aftermath. That same year, Mahatma Gandhi wrote The Story of My Experiments with Truth , recalling how the events of his life led him to develop his theories of nonviolent rebellion. In this time, celebrity tell-alls also emerged as a popular form of entertainment. With the horrors of World War II and the explosion of the civil rights movement, American biographers of the late 20 th century had much to archive. Instantly hailed as some of the best writing about the war, John Hersey’s Hiroshima (1946) tells the stories of six people who lived through those world-altering days. Alex Haley wrote the as-told-to The Autobiography of Malcom X (1965). Yet with biographies, the more things change, the more they stay the same. One theme that persists is a biographer’s desire to cast its subject in an updated light, as in Eleanor and Hick: The Love Affair that Shaped a First Lady by Susan Quinn (2016).

Types of Biographies

Contemporary Biography: Authorized or Unauthorized

The typical modern biography tells the life of someone still alive, or who has recently passed. Sometimes these are authorized — written with permission or input from the subject or their family — like Dave Itzkoff’s intimate look at the life and career of Robin Williams, Robin . Unauthorized biographies of living people run the risk of being controversial. Kitty Kelley’s infamous His Way: The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra so angered Sinatra, he tried to prevent its publication.

Historical Biography

The wild success of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton is proof that our interest in historical biography is as strong as ever. Miranda was inspired to write the musical after reading Ron Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton , an epic 800+ page biography intended to cement Hamilton’s status as a great American. Paula Gunn Allen also sets the record straight on another misunderstood historical figure with Pocahontas: Medicine Woman, Spy, Entrepreneur, Diplomat , revealing details about her tribe, her family, and her relationship with John Smith that are usually missing from other accounts. Historical biographies also give the spotlight to people who died without ever getting the recognition they deserved, such as The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks .

Biography of a Group

When a group of people share unique characteristics, they can be the topic of a collective biography. The earliest example of this is Captain Charles Johnson’s A General History of the Pirates (1724), which catalogs the lives of notorious pirates and establishes the popular culture images we still associate with them. Smaller groups are also deserving of a biography, as seen in David Hajdu’s Positively 4th Street , a mesmerizing behind-the-scenes look at the early years of Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Mimi Baez Fariña, and Richard Fariña as they establish the folk scene in New York City. Likewise, British royal family fashion is a vehicle for telling the life stories of four iconic royals – Queen Elizabeth II, Diana, Kate, and Meghan – in HRH: So Many Thoughts on Royal Style by style journalist Elizabeth Holmes.

Autobiography

This type of biography is written about one’s self, spanning an entire life up to the point of its writing. One of the earliest autobiographies is Saint Augustine’s The Confessions (400), in which his own experiences from childhood through his religious conversion are told in order to create a sweeping guide to life. Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings is the first of six autobiographies that share all the pain of her childhood and the long road that led to her work in the civil rights movement, and a beloved, prize-winning writer.

Memoirs are a type of autobiography, written about a specific but vital aspect of one’s life. In Toil & Trouble , Augusten Burroughs explains how he has lived his life as a witch. Mikel Jollett’s Hollywood Park recounts his early years spent in a cult, his family’s escape, and his rise to success with his band, The Airborne Toxic Event. Barack Obama’s first presidential memoir, A Promised Land , charts his path into politics and takes a deep dive into his first four years in office.

Fictional Biography

Fictional biographies are no substitute for a painstakingly researched scholarly biography, but they’re definitely meant to be more entertaining. Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Anne Fowler constructs Zelda and F. Scott’s wild, Jazz-Age life, told from Zelda’s point of view. The Only Woman in the Room by Marie Benedict brings readers into the secret life of Hollywood actress and wartime scientist, Hedy Lamarr. These imagined biographies, while often whimsical, still respect the form in that they depend heavily on facts when creating setting, plot, and characters.

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Literary Devices

Literary devices, terms, and elements, definition of biography.

A biography is a description of a real person’s life, including factual details as well as stories from the person’s life. Biographies usually include information about the subject’s personality and motivations, and other kinds of intimate details excluded in a general overview or profile of a person’s life. The vast majority of biography examples are written about people who are or were famous, such as politicians, actors, athletes, and so on. However, some biographies can be written about people who lived incredible lives, but were not necessarily well-known. A biography can be labelled “authorized” if the person being written about, or his or her family members, have given permission for a certain author to write the biography.

The word biography comes from the Greek words bios , meaning “life” and – graphia , meaning “writing.”

Difference Between Biography and Autobiography

A biography is a description of a life that is not the author’s own, while an autobiography is the description of a writer’s own life. There can be some gray area, however, in the definition of biography when a ghostwriter is employed. A ghostwriter is an author who helps in the creation of a book, either collaborating with someone else or doing all of the writing him- or herself. Some famous people ask for the help of a ghostwriter to create their own autobiographies if they are not particularly gifted at writing but want the story to sound like it’s coming from their own mouths. In the case of a ghostwritten autobiography, the writer is not actually writing about his or her own life, but has enough input from the subject to create a work that is very close to the person’s experience.

Common Examples of Biography

The genre of biography is so popular that there is even a cable network originally devoted to telling the stories of famous people’s lives (fittingly called The Biography Channel). The stories proved to be such good television that other networks caught on, such as VH1 producing biographies under the series name “Behind the Music.” Some examples of written biographies have become famous in their own right, such as the following books:

• Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow (made even more famous by the musical “Hamilton,” created by Lin-Manuel Miranda)
• Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand
• Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson
• Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
• The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
• Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder
• Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace … One School at a Time by Greg Mortenson

Significance of Biography in Literature

The genre of biography developed out of other forms of historical nonfiction, choosing to focus on one specific person’s experience rather than all important players. There are examples of biography all the way back to 44 B.C. when Roman biographer Cornelius Nepos wrote Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae (“Lives of those capable of commanding”). The Greek historian Plutarch was also famous for his biographies, creating a series of biographies of famous Greeks and Romans in his book Parallel Lives . After the printing press was created, one of the first “bestsellers” was the 1550 famous biography Lives of the Artists by Giorgio Vasari. Biography then got very popular in the 18th century with James Boswell’s 1791 publication of The Life of Samuel Johnson . Biography continues to be one of the best selling genres in literature, and has led to a number of literary prizes specifically for this form.

Examples of Biography in Literature

And I can imagine Farmer saying he doesn’t care if no one else is willing to follow their example. He’s still going to make these hikes, he’d insist, because if you say that seven hours is too long to walk for two families of patients, you’re saying that their lives matter less than some others’, and the idea that some lives matter less is the root of all that’s wrong with the world.

( Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World by Tracy Kidder)

Tracy Kidder’s wonderful example of biography, Mountains Beyond Mountains , brought the work of Dr. Paul Farmer to a wider audience. Dr. Farmer cofounded the organization Partners in Health (PIH) in 1987 to provide free treatment to patients in Haiti; the organization later created similar projects in countries such as Russia, Peru, and Rwanda. Dr. Farmer was not necessarily a famous man before Tracy Kidder’s biography was published, though he was well-regarded in his own field. The biography describes Farmer’s work as well as some of his personal life.

On July 2, McCandless finished reading Tolstoy’s “Family Happiness”, having marked several passages that moved him: “He was right in saying that the only certain happiness in life is to live for others…” Then, on July 3, he shouldered his backpack and began the twenty-mile hike to the improved road. Two days later, halfway there, he arrived in heavy rain at the beaver ponds that blocked access to the west bank of the Teklanika River. In April they’d been frozen over and hadn’t presented an obstacle. Now he must have been alarmed to find a three-acre lake covering the trail.

( Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer)

Jon Krakauer is a writer and outdoorsman famous for many nonfiction books, including his own experience in a mountaineering disaster on Mount Everest in 1996. His book Into the Wild is a nonfiction biography of a young boy, Christopher McCandless who chose to donate all of his money and go into the wilderness in the American West. McCandless starved to death in Denali National Park in 1992. The biography delved into the facts surrounding McCandless’s death, as well as incorporating some of Krakauer’s own experience.

A commanding woman versed in politics, diplomacy, and governance; fluent in nine languages; silver-tongued and charismatic, Cleopatra nonetheless seems the joint creation of Roman propagandists and Hollywood directors.

( Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff)

Stacy Schiff wrote a new biography of Cleopatra in 2010 in order to divide fact from fiction, and go back to the amazing and intriguing personality of the woman herself. The biography was very well received for being both scrupulously referenced as well as highly literary and imaginative.

Confident that he was clever, resourceful, and bold enough to escape any predicament, [Louie] was almost incapable of discouragement. When history carried him into war, this resilient optimism would define him.

( Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption by Laura Hillenbrand)

Laura Hillenbrand’s bestselling biography Unbroken covers the life of Louis “Louie” Zamperini, who lived through almost unbelievable circumstances, including running in the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, being shot down as a bomber in WWII, surviving in a raft in the ocean for 47 days, and then surviving Japanese prisoner of war camps. Zamperini’s life story is one of those narratives that is “stranger than fiction” and Hillenbrand brings the drama brilliantly to the reader.

I remember sitting in his backyard in his garden, one day, and he started talking about God. He [Jobs] said, “ Sometimes I believe in God, sometimes I don’t. I think it’s 50/50, maybe. But ever since I’ve had cancer, I’ve been thinking about it more, and I find myself believing a bit more, maybe it’s because I want to believe in an afterlife, that when you die, it doesn’t just all disappear. The wisdom you’ve accumulated, somehow it lives on.”

( Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson)

Steve Jobs is one of the most famous cultural icons of modern-day America and, indeed, around the world, and thus his biography was eagerly awaited. The author, Walter Isaacson, was able to interview Jobs extensively during the writing process. Thus, the above excerpt is possible where the writer is a character in the story himself, asking Jobs about his views on life and philosophy of the world.

Test Your Knowledge of Biography

1. Which of the following statements is the best biography definition? A. A retelling of one small moment from another person’s life. B. A novel which details one specific character’s full life. C. A description of a real person’s entire life, written by someone else.

2. Which of the following scenarios qualifies as a biography? A. A famous person contracts a ghostwriter to create an autobiography. B. A famous author writes the true and incredible life story of a little known person. C. A writer creates a book detailing the most important moments in her own life.

3. Which of the following statements is true? A. Biographies are one of the best selling genres in contemporary literature. B. Biographies are always written about famous people. C. Biographies were first written in the 18th century.

What Is Biography? Definition, Usage, and Literary Examples

Biography definition.

A  biography  (BYE-og-ruh-fee) is a written account of one person’s life authored by another person. A biography includes all pertinent details from the subject’s life, typically arranged in a chronological order. The word  biography  stems from the Latin  biographia , which succinctly explains the word’s definition:  bios  = “life” +  graphia  = “write.”

Since the advent of the written word, historical writings have offered information about real people, but it wasn’t until the 18th century that biographies evolved into a separate literary genre.  Autobiographies  and memoirs fall under the broader biography genre, but they are distinct literary forms due to one key factor: the subjects themselves write these works. Biographies are popular source materials for documentaries, television shows, and motion pictures.

The History of Biographies

The biography form has its roots in Ancient Rome and Greece. In 44 BCE, Roman writer Cornelius Nepos published  Excellentium Imperatorum Vitae  ( Lives of the Generals ), one of the earliest recorded biographies. In 80 CE, Greek writer Plutarch released  Parallel Lives , a sweeping work consisting of 48 biographies of famous men. In 121 CE, Roman historian Suetonius wrote  De vita Caesarum  ( On the Lives of the Caesars ), a series of 12 biographies detailing the lives of Julius Caesar and the first 11 emperors of the Roman Empire. These were among the most widely read biographies of their time, and at least portions of them have survived intact over the millennia.

During the Middle Ages, the Roman Catholic Church had a notable influence on biographies. Historical, political, and cultural biographies fell out of favor. Biographies of religious figures—including saints, popes, and church founders—replaced them. One notable exception was Italian painter/architect Giorgio Vasari’s 1550 biography,  The Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects , which was immensely popular. In fact, it is one of the first examples of a bestselling book.

Still, it wasn’t until the 18th century that authors began to abandon multiple subjects in a single work and instead focus their research and writing on one subject. Scholars consider James Boswell’s 1791  The Life of Samuel Johnson  to be the first modern biography. From here, biographies were established as a distinct literary genre, separate from more general historical writing.

As understanding of psychology and sociology grew in the 19th and early 20th centuries, biographies further evolved, offering up even more comprehensive pictures of their subjects. Authors who played major roles in this contemporary approach to biographing include Lytton Strachey, Gamaliel Bradford, and Robert Graves.

Types of Biographies

While all biographical works chronicle the lives of real people, writers can present the information in several different ways.

• Popular biographies are life histories written for a general readership.  The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks  by Rebecca Skloot and  Into the Wild  by Jon Krakauer are two popular examples.
• Critical biographies discuss the relationship between the subject’s life and the work they produced or were involved in; for example,  The Billionaire Who Wasn’t: How Chuck Feeney Secretly Made and Gave Away a Fortune  by Conor O’Clery and  Unpresidented: A Biography of Donald Trump  by Martha Brockenbrough.
• Historical biographies put greater understanding on how the subject’s life and contributions affected or were affected by the times in which they lived; see  John Adams  by David McCullough and  Catherine the Great  by Peter K. Massie.
• Literary biographies concentrate almost exclusively on writers and artists, blending a conventional  narrative  of the historical facts of the subject’s life with an exploration of how these facts impacted their creative output. Some examples include  Savage Beauty: The Life of Edna St. Vincent Millay  by Nancy Milford and  Jackson Pollock: An American Saga  by Gregory White Smith and Steven Naifeh.
• Reference biographies are more scholarly writings, usually written by multiple authors and covering multiple lives around a single topic. They verify facts, provide background details, and contribute supplemental information resources, like bibliographies, glossaries, and historical documents; for example,  Black Americans in Congress, 1870-2007  and the  Dictionary of Canadian Biography .
• Fictional biographies, or biographical novels, like  The Other Boleyn Girl  by Philippa Gregory, incorporate creative license into the retelling of a real person’s story by taking on the structure and freedoms of a novel. The term can also describe novels in which authors give an abundance of background information on their characters, to the extent that the novel reads more like a biography than fiction. An example of this is George R.R. Martin’s  Fire and Blood , a novel detailing the history of a royal family from his popular  A Song of Ice and Fire

Biographies and Filmed Entertainment

Movie makers and television creators frequently produce biographical stories, either as dramatized productions based on real people or as nonfiction accounts.

Documentary

This genre is a nonfictional movie or television show that uses historical records to tell the story of a subject. The subject might be a one person or a group of people, or it might be a certain topic or theme. To present a biography in a visually compelling way, documentaries utilize archival footage, recreations, and interviews with subjects, scholars, experts, and others associated with the subject.

Famous film documentaries include  Grey Gardens,  a biography of two of Jacqueline Kennedy’s once-wealthy cousins, who, at the time of filming, lived in squalor in a condemned mansion in the Hamptons; and  I Am Not Your Negro , a biography of the life and legacy of pioneering American author James Baldwin.

Television documentary series tell one story over the course of several episodes, like  The Jinx :  The Life and Deaths of Robert Durst , a biography of the real estate heir and alleged serial killer that focused on his suspected crimes. There are many nonfiction television shows that use a documentary format, but subjects typically change from one episode to the next, such as A&E’s  Biography  and PBS’s  POV .

These films are biographical motion pictures, written by screenwriters and performed by actors. They often employ a certain amount of creative liberty in their interpretation of a real life. This is largely done to maintain a feasible runtime; capturing all of the pivotal moments of a subject’s life in a 90- or 120-minute movie is all but impossible. So, filmmakers might choose to add, eliminate, or combine key events and characters, or they may focus primarily on one or only a few aspects of the subject’s life. Some popular examples:  Coal Miner’s Daughter , a biography of country music legend Loretta Lynn;  Malcom X , a biopic centered on the civil rights leader of the same name; and  The King’s Speech , a dramatization of Prince Albert’s efforts to overcome a stutter and ascend the English throne.

Semi-fictionalized account

This approach takes a real-life event and interprets or expands it in ways that stray beyond what actually happened. This is done for entertainment and to build the story so it fits the filmmaker’s vision or evolves into a longer form, such as a multi-season television show. These accounts sometimes come with the disclaimer that they are “inspired by true events.” Examples of semi-fictionalized accounts are the TV series  Orange Is the New Black ,  Masters of Sex , and  Mozart of the Jungle —each of which stem from at least one biographical element, but showrunners expounded upon to provide many seasons of entertainment.

The Functions of Biography

Biographies inform readers about the life of a notable person. They are a way to introduce readers to the work’s subject—the historical details, the subject’s motivations and psychological underpinnings, and their environment and the impact they had, both in the short and long term.

Because the author is somewhat removed from their subject, they can offer a more omniscient, third-person narrative account. This vantage point allows the author to put certain events into a larger context; compare and contrast events, people, and behaviors predominant in the subject’s life; and delve into psychological and sociological themes of which the subject may not have been aware.

Also, a writer structures a biography to make the life of the subject interesting and readable. Most biographers want to entertain as well as inform, so they typically use a traditional  plot  structure—an introduction,  conflict , rising of tension, a climax, a resolution, and an ending—to give the life story a narrative shape. While the ebb and flow of life is a normal day-to-day rhythm, it doesn’t necessarily make for entertaining reading. The job of the writer, then, becomes one of shaping the life to fit the elements of a good plot.

Writers Known for Biographies

Many modern writers have dedicated much of their careers to biographies, such as:

• Kitty Kelley, author of  Jackie Oh! An Intimate Biography; His Way: The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra ; and  The Family: The Real Story of the Bush Dynasty
• Antonia Fraser, author of  Mary Queen of Scots ;  Cromwell; Our Chief of Men ; and  The Gunpowder Plot: Terror and Faith in 1605
• David McCullough, author of  The Path Between the Seas; Truman ; and  John Adams
• Andrew Morton, author of  Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words; Madonna ; and  Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography
• Alison Weir, author of  The Six Wives of Henry VIII; Eleanor of Aquitaine: By the Wrath of God; Queen of England ; and  Katherine Swynford: The Story of John of Gaunt and His Scandalous Duchess

Examples of Biographies

1. James Boswell,  The Life of Samuel Johnson

The biography that ushered in the modern era of true-life writing,  The Life of Samuel Johnson  covered the entirety of its subject’s life, from his birth to his status as England’s preeminent writer to his death. Boswell was a personal acquaintance of Johnson, so he was able to draw on voluminous amounts of personal conversations the two shared.

What also sets this biography apart is, because Boswell was a contemporary of Johnson, readers see Johnson in the context of his own time. He wasn’t some fabled figure that a biographer was writing about centuries later; he was someone to whom the author had access, and Boswell could see the real-world influence his subject had on life in the here and now.

2. Sylvia Nasar,  A Beautiful Mind

Nasar’s 1998 Pulitzer Prize-nominated biography of mathematician John Nash introduced legions of readers to Nash’s remarkable life and genius. The book opens with Nash’s childhood and follows him through his education, career, personal life, and struggles with schizophrenia. It ends with his acceptance of the 1994 Nobel Prize for Economics. In addition to a Pulitzer nomination,  A Beautiful Mind  won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography, was a  New York Times  bestseller, and provided the basis for the Academy Award-winning 2001 film of the same name.

3. Catherine Clinton,  Harriet Tubman: The Road to Freedom

Clinton’s biography of the abolitionist icon is a large-scale epic that chronicles Tubman’s singular life. It starts at her birth in the 1820s as the slave Araminta Ross, continuing through her journey to freedom; her pivotal role in the Underground Railroad; her Moses-like persona; and her death in 1913.

Because Tubman could not read or write, she left behind no letters, diaries, or other personal papers in her own hand and voice. Clinton reconstructed Tubman’s history entirely through other source material, and historians often cite this work as the quintessential biography of Tubman’s life.

4. Megan Mayhew Bergman,  Almost Famous Women

Almost Famous Women  is not a biography in the strictest sense of the word; it is a fictional interpretation of real-life women. Each short story revolves around a woman from history with close ties to fame, such as movie star Marlene Dietrich, Standard Oil heiress Marion “Joe” Carstairs, aviatrix Beryl Markham, Oscar Wilde’s niece Dolly, and Lord Byron’s daughter Allegra. Mayhew Bergman imagines these colorful women in equally colorful episodes that put them in a new light—a light that perhaps offers them the honor and homage that history denied them.

Further Resources on Biography

Newsweek  compiled their picks for the  75 Best Biographies of All Time .

The Open Education Database has a list of  75 Biographies to Read Before You Die .

Goodreads put together a list of readers’  best biography selections .

If you’re looking to write biographies,  Infoplease  has instructions for writing shorter pieces, while  The Writer   has practical advice for writing manuscript-length bios.

Ranker  collected  a comprehensive list of famous biographers .

Related Terms

• Autobiography
• Short Story

What is biography?

by Professor Dame Hermione Lee FBA

What is biography? A big fat book about a dead person, you might reply. A book with lots of dates and some pictures and chapters going chronologically from cradle to grave. A book about a single person’s life and work, but probably with a great deal, too, about their family and friends, relations and children, colleagues and acquaintances.

The word ‘biography’ means ‘life-writing’: the two halves of the word derive from medieval Greek bios , ‘life’, and graphia , ‘writing’. Dictionary definitions give you “the history of the lives of individual men, as a branch of literature”, or “a written record of the life of an individual” ( Oxford English Dictionary , 1971), or, more up-to-date and succinct, “An account of someone’s life written by someone else” ( New Oxford Dictionary of English, 2001). Essentially, it’s the written story of another person’s life.

The word started to be used, in western literature, in the late 18th century, but biography reaches far back through histories and cultures to all kinds of older forms: the ancient Sumerian epic of Gilgamesh, full of conflict and adventure; classical and Egyptian lives of rulers and illustrious heroes, with warning stories of triumphs turning to disaster and decline; venerating biographies of Tibetan Buddhist leaders or medieval Christian saints, showing you how best to live under the eye of God. Mainly, biography used to be the Lives of Great Men (and less often, women), written to give you something to live up to or learn from. But it’s become a more democratic form of writing. ‘Lives’ can be written of ‘ordinary’ people as well as kings and saints.

And there have come to be many different kinds of biographical narratives. It doesn’t have to be the written story of a dead person. Biography can take the form of a film or a poem, an obituary or an opera. It can be about a living subject, or a group, or a city, or a river, or an animal. You can start at the end, with a death-bed, or tell the story of one year in a life. Biography often goes back to a famous life-story that’s been told before – think of Van Gogh, Nelson Mandela, Keats, Sylvia Plath, or Mahatma Gandhi – so it can be a form of revision. Virginia Woolf said: “There are some stories which have to be retold by each generation”.

It might be easier to say what it’s not, than what it is. It is supposed to be true and factual: so it isn’t fiction. (Though biography is capable of making things up or missing things out). It is supposed to be objective and not written in the first person: so it isn’t autobiography. (But all biographers write out of their own point of view, race, class, gender and time, so complete objectivity is never possible). It is about an individual or individuals: so it isn’t history. (But history, inevitably, plays a part). It tries to analyse character and motives: but biographers aren’t usually psychologists or psychoanalysts (though they have sometimes pretended to be). It follows clues, tries to unpick secrets and often needs to rely on witnesses: but it isn’t quite the same as a detective story or a thriller. There isn’t always a murder, though some critics of biography feel that it can be the next thing to it: a well-known quotation says that “biography adds a new terror to death”.

A more interesting question about biography might be, not “what is it?” but “what is it for?” or “why does it matter”? Is it for learning lessons, or bringing history alive, or providing information about the sources and circumstances of a person’s work? All of the above. But more than that, biography takes us beyond ourselves, into the experience of a life that’s not our own. It expands our knowledge of life and widens our boundaries. It makes us imagine and understand what it’s like to be somebody else. That’s why it matters.

Dame Hermione Lee is Emeritus Professor of English Literature at the University of Oxford. Her works include biographies of Virginia Woolf , Edith Wharton and Penelope Fitzgerald . Her biography of Tom Stoppard will be published by Faber on 1 October 2020. She was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2001.

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What is a Biography? Definition, Elements, and More

POSTED ON Oct 12, 2023

Written by Nicole Ahlering

Have you found yourself browsing the biography section of your favorite library or bookstore and wondered what is a biography book ? 

Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered! 

In this brief guide, we’ll explore the definition of a biography, along with its purpose, how you might write one yourself, and more. Let’s get started.

Need A Nonfiction Book Outline?

In this article, we'll explore:

What is a biography of a person .

A biography is simply a written account of someone’s life. It is written by someone other than whom the book is about. For example, an author named Walter Isaacson has written biographies on Steve Jobs , Leonardo da Vinci , and Einstein . 

Biographies usually focus on the significant events that occurred in a person’s life, along with their achievements, challenges they’ve overcome, background, relationships, and more. 

They’re an excellent way to get a comprehensive understanding of someone you admire. 

What is the point of a biography? 

Biographies have a few purposes. They can serve as historical records about a notable figure, inspire and educate readers, and give us more insight into how the folks we’re interested in lived their lives. 

They can also be valuable research resources for people studying a notable figure, like Einstein! 

Does a biography cover someone’s entire life? 

Biographies typically encompass most of a person’s life. Obviously, if the subject of the book is still alive, their entire life cannot be written about. 

If the person lived a long and eventful life with many achievements, the author may cover only an especially noteworthy period of the subject’s life. 

Even so, the point of a biography is to learn about your subject beyond just what they achieved, so there will likely still be contextual information about the subject’s childhood, formative experiences, and more. 

Is a biography always nonfiction? 

Surprisingly, a biography is not always nonfiction . There is a genre called biographical fiction in which the author uses real-life people and events to inspire their fictional narrative . 

This genre is fun because the author can postulate about what their subject may have been thinking, feeling, and more in a way they may not be able to with a nonfiction biography. 

Just keep in mind that biographical fiction blends facts with made-up information, so it can’t be used as a primary research source. That said, it’s a fun supplement to learning about a figure you’re interested in, and can help generate curiosity and insights about their lives. 

If you’d like to read a biographical fiction book, check out books like: 

• The Paris Wife by Paula McLain
•   The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory
• The Aviator’s Wife by Melanie Benjamin 

Why would someone write a biography? 

An author may want to write a biography about someone because they’re inspired by them and want to educate the public about them. Or, they want to create a historical resource for scholars to study. 

An author may even have a commercial motivation for writing a biography, like a lucrative celebrity profile or a biography that has the potential to be adapted into a film or television series. 

Is it possible to write a biography about yourself? 

If you write a book about yourself, it’s called an autobiography or a memoir—not a biography. So, when you start writing your book, make sure you don't get caught in the autobiography vs biography or biography vs memoir maze.

If you’d like a book written about you that you’re not the author of, you can hire a writer to create one for you. You may choose to do this if you feel your writing skills are not up to par or you don’t have time to write your own biography .

Hiring a writer to write your biography can also make sense if you’d like to make sure the book is as objective and professional as it can be. Of course, this means you have to surrender control of the narrative! 

Some folks may also feel that a biography has more credence than an autobiography or memoir since the book’s subject doesn’t get to decide what is said about them. So hiring a writer for your biography can be a good way to credibly get your story out there. 

Can you write a biography about anyone you’d like? 

When it comes to writing about other people’s lives, it’s wise to proceed with an abundance of caution. After all, you don’t want to be sued for defamation or find yourself in other legal hot water. 

We highly suggest you look into the legal ramifications of writing about your chosen subject before you begin writing about them, but here are a couple of general things to know: 

• Typically, you don’t need permission to write about someone who is a public figure. However, the definition of a public figure can vary depending on your jurisdiction and more, so you’ll need to do your research.
• Even if you discover that you can write about your subject without permission, it’s still advisable to contact the subject and or their family. Not only is it good manners, but it may afford you some insider information about your subject. 
• If your subject or the family of your subject tells you they don’t want a biography about them, you may still legally be able to proceed—consult a lawyer—but you might face backlash when the book is published, limited access to information about your subject, and perhaps a pressing sense of guilt. Not worth it, if you ask us! 

Examples of biographies

Ready to get started reading biographies? Here are a few of the best biographies you should add to your list: 

• Frida: A Biography of Frida Kahlo by Hayden Herrera 
• Heavier Than Heaven: A Biography of Kurt Cobain by Charles R. Cross
• Anne Frank: The Biography by Melissa Müller
• You Never Forget Your First: A Biography of George Washington by Alexis Coe
• The Beatles: The Biography by Bob Spitz
• Victoria the Queen: An Intimate Biography of the Woman Who Ruled an Empire by Julia Baird

Final thoughts 

Reading a biography is a great way to get inspired, learn from other people’s experiences, and more. And writing a biography can be an excellent educational experience in its own right! If you’d like to publish a biography but don’t know where to start, we’re here to help. Simply schedule a book consultation to get started. 

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Jung’s Five Pillars of a Good Life

The great Swiss psychoanalyst left us a surprisingly practical guide to being happier.

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I n the world of popular psychology, the work of one giant figure is hard to avoid: Carl Jung, the onetime associate of Sigmund Freud who died more than 60 years ago. If you think you have a complex about something, the Swiss psychiatrist invented that term. Are you an extrovert or an introvert ? Those are his coinages, too. Persona , archetype , synchronicity : Jung, Jung, Jung.

When it comes to happiness, though, Jung can seem a bit of a downer. “‘Happiness,’” he wrote, “is such a remarkable reality that there is nobody who does not long for it.” So far, so good. But he does not leave it there: “And yet there is not a single objective criterion which would prove beyond all doubt that this condition necessarily exists.”

Carl G. Jung: God, the devil, and the human soul

Clearly, this observation should not discourage any serious student of happiness. On the contrary, Jung is stating the manifest truth that we cannot lay hold of any blissful end state of pure happiness, because every human life is bound to involve negative emotions, which in fact arose to alert us to threats and keep us safe. Rather, the objective should be progress—or, in the words of Oprah Winfrey, my co-author on our recent book, Build the Life You Want , “ happierness .”

If Jung was a happiness skeptic in some sense, however, he was by no means a denialist. In 1960, as he neared the end of his long life, Jung shared his own strategy for realizing that goal of progress. Refined with the aid of modern social science, Jung’s precepts might be just what you’re looking for in your life.

J ung believed that making progress toward happiness was built on five pillars.

1. Good physical and mental health Jung believed that getting happier required soundness of mind and body. His thesis is supported by plenty of research. For example, the longest-running study of happiness—the Harvard Study of Adult Development—has shown that four of the biggest predictors of a senior citizen’s well-being are not smoking excessively, drinking alcohol moderately if at all, maintaining a healthy body weight, and exercising. Even more important for well-being is good mental health. Indeed, one study from 2013 showed that poor mental health among Britons, Germans, and Australians predicted nearly two to roughly six times as much misery as poor physical health did.

This raises what might seem like a nitpick with Jung’s contention: Good health practices seem not to raise happiness, but rather to lower un happiness. Today, many emotion researchers have uncovered evidence of a phenomenon that Jung did not conceive of: Negative and positive emotions appear to be separable phenomena and not opposites; well-being requires a focus on each. Furthermore, researchers have identified how activities such as physical exercise can interrupt the cycle of negative emotion during moments of heightened stress, by helping moderate cortisol-hormone levels. I have found in my own work that this helps explain why people with naturally low levels of negative emotion tend to struggle with staying on a regular exercise regimen: They may feel less benefit to their well-being from going to the gym than people naturally higher in negative feelings do.

Arthur C. Brooks: Why so many people are unhappy in retirement

2. Good personal and intimate relations, such as those of marriage, family, and friendships The intertwined notions that close relationships are at the heart of well-being and that cultivating them will reliably increase happiness are unambiguously true. Indeed, of the four best life investments for increasing personal satisfaction, two involve family and friendships (the others are in faith or philosophy, and meaningful work; more on these in a moment). And as for marriage, an institution that has taken a beating over recent decades, more and more evidence is piling up from scholars that being wed makes the majority of people happier than they otherwise would be, as the University of Virginia sociologist Brad Wilcox has argued. This research seemed so conclusive to Wilcox that he titled his recent book, simply, Get Married . Jung himself was married to his wife, Emma, for 52 years, until her death at the age of 73.

The Harvard Study of Adult Development comes to one conclusion more definitively than any other. In the words of my Harvard colleague Robert Waldinger, who has directed the project for nearly two decades, and his co-author, Marc Schulz, “Good relationships keep us healthier and happier. Period .” Waldinger’s predecessor running the study, George Vaillant, was just as unequivocal about the evidence: “Happiness is love. Full stop.”

3. Seeing beauty in art and in nature Jung believed that happiness required one to cultivate an appreciation for beautiful things and experiences. Although this might sound intuitively obvious, the actuality is more complicated.

Long before I focused my scholarly life on happiness, I was dedicated to art and beauty. My earliest memories are of painting with my artist mother; I learned to read music before written language; I made my living as a classical musician from ages 19 to 31. News flash: Artists are generally not the world’s most blissfully satisfied people. In a 1992 study from Britain, researchers found that performing artists reported depression at higher rates than the control group. At some point, I will write a book not on the art of happiness but on the very troublesome happiness of art .

Among nonartists, however, the issue is somewhat simpler and in line with Jung’s thinking. First, a big difference exists between beauty in nature and beauty in art. Specifically, engagement with nature’s beauty is known , across different cultures, to enhance well-being. Second, with aesthetic experience, happiness depends on the artistic mood. For example, experiments have shown that if you listen to happy music on your own, it makes you feel happier; if you listen to sad music while alone, it makes you feel sadder.

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4. A reasonable standard of living and satisfactory work As with physical and mental health, employment and income seem tied more to eliminating unhappiness than to raising happiness. For one thing, scholars have long shown that unemployment is a reliable source of misery: Depressive symptoms typically rise when people, both men and women, are unemployed. This cannot be explained simply by the lack of material and social resources that typically accompanies joblessness; rather, work itself helps protect mental health.

But if we can upgrade “satisfactory work” in Jung’s list to “meaningful work,” then positive gains in happiness do come into play. The two elements that make work meaningful for most people are earned success (a sense of accomplishing something valuable) and service to others . These can be achieved in almost any job.

The relationship between money and happiness is a hotly contested topic; older studies show that well-being tops out at relatively low income levels, but more recent studies show that such contentment continues to rise for much higher incomes. My own assessment of the evidence is that money alone cannot buy happiness, nor can spending money to acquire possessions make one happy; but having the money to pay for experiences with loved ones, to free up time to spend on meaningful activities, and to support good causes does enhance happiness.

5. A philosophical or religious outlook that fosters resilience Jung argued that a good life requires a way of understanding why things happen the way they do, being able to zoom out from the tedious quotidian travails of life, and put events—including inevitable suffering—into perspective. The son of a pastor, Jung was deeply Christian in his worldview, as his own words published many years ago in The Atlantic make clear: “For it is not that ‘God’ is a myth, but that myth is the revelation of a divine life in man.” He did not insist that his spiritual path was the only one—“I do not imagine that in my reflections,” he wrote, “I have uttered a final truth”—and allowed that even a nonreligious, purely philosophical attitude could do. But everyone, he thought, should have some sense of transcendent belief or higher purpose.

Research clearly backs up Jung’s contention. Religious belief has been noted as strongly predictive of finding meaning in life, and spirituality is positively correlated with better mental health; both faith and spiritual practice seem protective against depression. Secular philosophies can provide this benefit as well. Recent papers on Stoicism , for example, have demonstrated that this ancient way of thinking and acting can yield well-being benefits . Many books have been written on the subject, including the psychotherapist Donald Robertson’s Stoicism and the Art of Happiness .

Arthur C. Brooks: What the second-happiest people get right

T aken together , Jung’s ideas about happiness and his five pillars of well-being stand up solidly to modern research findings. I propose this practical seven-point summary:

1. Do not fall prey to seeking pure happiness. Instead, seek lifelong progress toward happierness . 2. Manage as best you can the main sources of misery in your life by attending to your physical and mental health, maintaining employment, and ensuring an adequate income. 3. If you’re earning enough to take care of your principal needs, remember that happiness at work comes not from chasing higher income but from pursuing a sense of accomplishment and service to others. 4. Cultivate deep relationships through marriage, family, and real friendships. Remember that happiness is love. 5. If you have discretionary income left over, use it to invest in your relationships with family and friends. 6. Spend time in nature, surround yourself with beauty that uplifts you, and consume the art and music that nourish your spirit. 7. Find a path of transcendence—one that explains the big picture in life and helps you comprehend suffering and the purpose of your existence.

Beyond the scientific research that supports this strategy, we also have the evidence of its effectiveness in the example of Jung’s life. He made his list to mark his 85th birthday, which was to be the last one he celebrated. By all accounts, he made progress toward happiness over his life, had a long and devoted marriage, died surrounded by the people he loved, and was satisfied that he had used his abilities in a meaningful way that served others. In this world, that sounds pretty good to me.

More From Forbes

Understanding the keys to supporting employees' work-life balance.

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Paaras Parker, CHRO, Paycor .

Finding a healthy work-life balance has always been a challenge. At one point, we thought tools like email, smartphones and AI would tip the scales, freeing up time people used to spend in the office. But in reality, that kind of tech is a double-edged sword.

On one hand, technology can automate tedious tasks, revolutionizing the way we think about HR. But on the other, this has created higher standards for productivity. Because we can do more, we expect more from our employees, our managers and ourselves. While this spurs innovation in the short term, constant growth can be unsustainable. We don’t need to do more, anymore—and I’m not sure we can. Instead, we need to do better .

Don’t Fan The Flames Of Burnout

It’s no surprise that burnout has become a buzzword in the past few years. Between the pandemic, political tension and economic stress, it’s hard for employees to get a real break both inside and outside of work. Industry leaders cite burnout as a top risk for the workforce in 2024 , and it can lead to high rates of turnover . So how can leaders help?

First and foremost, take responsibility for your employees’ workload. You can’t do their work for them, but you can control their deadlines. Sometimes that means managing and prioritizing. your own high expectations. If you had to choose, would you rather have that report done by Friday or have Bob stay with your company for another five years? If an employee is on the edge of burning out, you might have to pick just one.

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Second, don’t underestimate the power of communication. Whether you’re setting a schedule or asking someone how their day was, take the time to listen to your people. When employees feel they have a voice—in the company at large or just in a conversation—they grow more confident. Empowering your team is one of the best ways to fight burnout.

It might seem counterintuitive, but working too much actually lowers productivity . When you define clear expectations, you invite employees to set better boundaries between work and their personal lives. That’s good for business.

Flexibility Has A Broad Definition

A lot of people hear “flexibility” and think “working from home.” Quite often, that’s exactly what it means. In fact, " 71% of remote workers said remote work helps balance their work and personal life." This is especially important for employees with ongoing family commitments, like parents of young children or adults who care for aging parents.

But location is just one aspect of flexibility. Plenty of industries, like healthcare and food service, just can’t go fully remote. That doesn’t stop employees from wanting more freedom at work. Specifically, frontline workers want more scheduling flexibility . In-person employees mostly want to decide which days of the week they work. They care less about their exact hours and even less about work-from-home options.

This may sound like a headache at first. But with a little creativity and attention to detail, your team could easily accommodate this need. Here are some examples of potential actions to take.

• Discuss scheduling during the hiring process. Let candidates know your policy, and ask if there are certain days they would or wouldn’t be willing to work. If you need someone to open every Saturday, there’s no point in hiring someone who can’t work on weekends.

• Use tech tools to open lines of communication so workers can easily request schedule changes and managers can fill in the gaps.

• Track metrics like sales or foot traffic to see which days of the week need the most hands on deck. Then use that info to prioritize the company-wide schedule.

• Give employees plenty of notice about schedule changes; in some states, this is mandatory. Regardless of whether it’s a compliance issue for your business, this strategy boosts morale and engagement.

Company Culture Is Key

There’s more to company culture than the sum of its parts. Sometimes I think building a positive culture is HR’s only job. All the details of our work, from compliance to scheduling to interfacing with the C-suite, are in service of that goal. And our team members can feel it. It’s no wonder that employees with a positive perception of their work-life balance are 10% more likely to stay in their current role. In other words: Company culture has a direct impact on employee engagement and retention.

As leaders, we can boost these numbers when we lead by example. Self-care really is community care, and sometimes supporting your employees means taking a step back and reviewing your own work-life balance. That could mean using up your PTO each year or being transparent with your team about why you check your email on Saturdays. This kind of self-reflection will make you a better leader.

The important thing is to set clear expectations and hold yourself and your employees accountable. But remember, expectations shouldn't be applied universally. Don't hold entry-level workers to the same high standards you'd have for more-senior workers.

More Versus Better, In Practice

Every healthy relationship has boundaries. In some situations, they’re incredibly obvious. Your librarian can recommend your next great read, but they can't (and shouldn’t) prescribe you antidepressants. But in the context of work, boundaries can get complicated. How do you maintain a professional atmosphere without pushing your employees too hard? How do you give them great benefits without bleeding revenue?

These questions are trying to balance two things: empathy and big-picture planning. The magic happens when HR leaders realize those aren’t competing goals. Empathy informs big-picture planning and vice versa. For example, will your company go under if Suzie goes on vacation? If so, it’s probably time to hire her an assistant (and give her a raise). Supporting your team’s work-life balance isn’t just about engagement or retention. It’s also a good business strategy.

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Netflix’s Baby Reindeer : The Shocking True Story, Explained

By Charley Ross

Netflix's Baby Reindeer just dropped on April 11 and already has us all thinking.

The new Netflix show sees comedian Richard Gadd turn his experiences with a female stalker into an eight-episode miniseries, which began as a one-man show at the Edinburgh Fringe. Gadd explores his own culpability and how the law didn't support him or others like him.

This is amid news that the Metropolitan Police in the UK has reported a “ stark rise ” in the number of stalking cases, and the Office for National Statistics has estimated that 2.5 million people every year experience stalking in England and Wales alone.

So to what extent is Baby Reindeer on Netflix a true story ? Here's everything to know about Gadd's story and the real Martha Scott.

What is Baby Reindeer about?

Gadd's fictionalized character, Donny Dunn, develops a warped and complicated relationship with a woman named Martha after meeting her at the bar where he works. Although she initially appears to be friendly, her behavior unravels into stalking—in real life and over social media. What begins as an act of kindness soon becomes something much more sinister for them both.

Although the show certainly explores the dark side of Gadd's story, there is also some comedy. After all, he is a comedian!

Is Baby Reindeer a true story?

Gadd has been very open about the fact that he was stalked for four years by a woman who called him “Baby Reindeer.” Apparently, she constantly followed him to his comedy gigs and even showed up at his house. She sent Gadd a staggering 41,071 emails, 350 hours of voicemail, 744 tweets, 46 Facebook messages, and 106 pages of letters. She also sent him an array of slightly sinister gifts—sleeping pills, a woolly hat, brand-new boxer shorts, and a reindeer toy.

As the comedian explained to UK's The Times , his friends didn't initially think anything of it. “At first everyone at the pub thought it was funny that I had an admirer,” he said. “Then she started to invade my life, following me, turning up at my gigs, waiting outside my house, sending thousands of voicemails and emails.”

In another interview with The Guardian , Gadd shared that he was far from perfect during this time of his life. “I did loads of things wrong and made the situation worse,” he said. “I wasn’t a perfect person [back then], so there’s no point saying I was. And I know as I’m doing those sections that people are thinking I’m not a nice person—which make them difficult to perform.”

Although Baby Reindeer is mostly true, Gadd revealed that he did amp up the tension and suspense for the sake of the show. “The feeling you get most of all when you’re getting harassed is relentless tediousness and frustration,” he said. “I didn’t want the audience to feel that.”

Based on this experience, Gadd said he wanted to create something to tell his story and represent stalking in a different way—particularly how it is rooted in mental illness.

“Stalking on television tends to be very sexed up. It has a mystique. It’s somebody in a dark alley way. It’s somebody who’s really sexy, who’s very normal, but then they go strange bit by bit,” Gadd said in an interview with Netflix's Tudum. “But stalking is a mental illness. I really wanted to show the layers of stalking with a human quality I hadn’t seen on television before. It’s a stalker story turned on its head. It takes a trope and turns it on its head.”

He added that he didn't want to write a “victim narrative” for his character. “I think art is quite interesting when you don’t know who you are on the side of. I wanted it to be layered, and I wanted it to capture the human experience. The human experience is that people are good, but they have bits of bad and they make mistakes.”

By Danielle Sinay

By Macaela MacKenzie

By Elizabeth Logan

Gadd was also clear that this story has been one that he's wanted to tell for a long time. “In a weird way, I first started feeling like this could be a good story during the whole ordeal itself,” he said. “It was one of the most intense periods, when I was listening to these voicemails. I’d go to sleep at night and these voicemails—her words would bounce around my eyelids.”

He continued, “I remember thinking, God, if I was ever to speak about this onstage, I’d fire the words around. Put the voicemails in a big cacophony and fire it. That’s how the play was born.”

Who is in the Baby Reindeer cast?

Joining Gadd is Jessica Gunning as Martha (who stalks Donny), Nava Mau as Teri, and Tom Goodman-Hill as Darrien.

Is there a Baby Reindeer trailer?

Here's a taster of the show:

This story was originally published in Glamour UK.

By Kathleen Walsh

By Abby Gardner

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What is a long-term care insurance cash policy?

By Joshua Rodriguez

Edited By Matt Richardson , Angelica Leicht

April 16, 2024 / 12:46 PM EDT / CBS News

Have you thought about purchasing  long-term care insurance ? With  most American retirees needing long-term care  at some point in their retirement, it's important to plan for the cost of that care. And that  care isn't cheap . Though long-term care insurance can help cover that cost , different policy types may do so in different ways. 

With more than one type of long-term care insurance to choose from, it's important that you purchase a policy that meets your needs . And, if you're looking for a policy that gives you the most flexibility in the types of care you receive and how your benefits are used, a long-term care insurance cash policy may be what you're looking for. But what exactly is a long-term care insurance cash policy and how does this policy differ from traditional long-term care insurance options?

Compare your long-term care insurance coverage options now . 

Long-term care insurance cash policies, also commonly called cash benefit policies, cash indemnity policies or cash disability policies, are a form of long-term care insurance that provides a predetermined daily or monthly cash benefit while the insured party is in need of care (up to the policy's coverage cap).

Traditional policies typically either pay qualified care providers (like nursing homes or home health aides) directly or reimburse you for the money you pay to those providers. Since long-term care insurance cash policies pay a set amount of cash per day or per month when you need long-term care, you have more flexibility in determining the type of care you'll use your benefits to pay for.  

Find out how affordable a long-term care insurance cash benefit policy can be now . 

How does a long-term care insurance cash policy work?

Long-term care insurance cash policies work just like traditional long-term care insurance policies in many ways. When you purchase either type, your premiums and ability to qualify will be affected by your age, health status and other factors relating to the risk the insurance company accepts when writing your policy. Both of these policies also help pay for the high cost of long-term care if you need it. 

However, there are also significant differences to think about. 

Most traditional long-term care insurance policies either reimburse you for the cost of your long-term care or pay your care providers directly. However, long-term care insurance policies with cash benefits usually pay the policyholder a preset cash amount for each day they meet the benefit trigger (whether they receive paid care or not on those days). That's an important difference for a few reasons. 

"Cash indemnity benefits in LTC insurance policies provide a tremendous amount of flexibility and simplicity at claim time versus reimbursement benefits," explains Kelly Augspurger, CLTC, CSA, and trainer for Certification for Long-Term Care, a firm that provides certifications for long-term care insurance agents. 

That flexibility is especially important for those who want to age at home and depend on informal caregivers  (like family members or friends). "With cash benefits, you can pay whoever you want: family members, friends, neighbors, professionals, etc. Heck, you can even pay robots in the future, if they provide care! This means you have the flexibility to pay formal and informal caregivers," says Augspurger. 

Long-term care insurance policies with cash benefits may make it easier to receive your benefits, too. "Cash benefits also simplify receiving benefits because they send you your full monthly benefit, regardless of care expenses, and don't ask for evidence of your care expenses," Augspurger says. 

Also, a cash benefit policy could provide supplemental retirement income beyond the cost of your long-term care. For example, say your monthly insurance benefit is $6,000, but you only need $5,000 per month in care. "With cash benefits, the insurance company will send you the full $6k," says Augspurger. "However, reimbursement policies will only reimburse up to your monthly benefit. In the example above, the insurance company will only reimburse you $5k."

So, in the above example, a cash benefit long-term care insurance policy could add $1,000 in supplemental income to your monthly budget once a long-term care event takes place. 

Then again, there are a couple of caveats to consider before you choose a cash benefit long-term care insurance policy: 

• Policies with cash benefits may have higher premiums than reimbursement policies. 
• You may have to pay income tax  on any cash benefit you receive that you don't use to pay for qualified long-term care services. 

The bottom line

Choosing between a cash benefit and traditional long-term care insurance policy can be difficult. While cash benefit policies may be more expensive and can come with tax implications, they usually give you far more flexibility in how your benefits can be used than traditional policies. If you're not sure which policy type is right for you, reach out to a long-term care insurance professional now to discuss your options .

Joshua Rodriguez is a personal finance and investing writer with a passion for his craft. When he's not working, he enjoys time with his wife, two kids, two dogs and two ducks.

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