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Outsider Biographies
Savage, de Sade, Wainewright, Ned Kelly, Billy the Kid, Rimbaud and Genet: Base Crime and High Art in Biography and Bio-Fiction, 1744-2000
Series: - Textxet: Studies in Comparative Literature, Volume: 75
Author:
Concerning itself with biography and bio-fiction written in English and in French and also taking in American and Australian subjects, Outsider Biographies focuses on writers who have a criminal record and on notorious criminals who authors of bio-fiction consider as writers. It pursues an understanding of the formal effects of life-writersâ struggles between championing their subjects and a deep ambivalence towards their subjectsâ crimes. The book analyses the challenge that these literary outsiders present to the mainstream French- and English-language traditions where many biographers assign merit to productive lives well lived. The bookâs approach illuminates both differences in those traditions from the mid-eighteenth, to the twenty-first century and a convergence between them, evident in the experimental-cum-fictional devices in recent English-language biography. Outsider Biographies advances wide-ranging new interpretations of the biographical writing on each of its seven subjects, but does so in a way that invites the reader picking up the book out of a passion for just one of those subjects, to follow the thread onto another and yet another.
âThroughout, Magedera is attentive both to the blind spots and to the moments of intimate exchange between biographer and subject, and teases out some of their ethical implications. Magederaâs study of the discourse of the âoutsiderâ prompts important questions which will be evaluated for a long time to come, resulting in some cases in a narrative framed by the ignominious killing of the outsider (Kelly, Billy the Kid) and elsewhere, as in Genet, in a standpoint of generalized opposition to âeverything else about the culture in whose language, by a broad consensus, he was held to excelâ (p. 288).â
-David Houston Jones, University of Exeter, in: Modern Language review, Vol. 111, Iss. 2 (2016), pp. 535-536
"In Outsider Biographies, Ian Magedera offers a fascinating and nimble exploration of a specific sub-set of biographies of writers, the authors who combine their authorship with a documented criminal record. This is a markedly original and substantial contribution to life-writing studies."
-Jean-Marc Moura, professeur de littératures francophones et de littérature comparée à l'Université de Paris Ouest; membre de l'Institut Universitaire de France
"A well-researched, original and frequently entertaining contribution to the burgeoning field of biography studies. By focusing on a fascinating range of outsiders, from Johnsonâs Savage to Ondaatjeâs Billy the Kid, via biographers of de Sade and Rimbaud, Magedera casts light on a host of fascinating issues raised by biographical texts, often experimental in form, which explore deviant life histories. Engagingly written, Outsider Biographies will appeal to all those interested in new approaches to life-writing.â
-Michael Sheringham, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature in the University of Oxford
"How do biographers interrogate towering figures such as Sade or Genet, Richard Savage or Billy the Kid? When criminal acts become the hinge between life and oeuvre, how do they enquire after presence, without eschewing the profound enigma of life and writing? With these biographical subjects, the ethical dimension inevitably sharpens fundamental epistemological questions. Ian Magedera expertly leads us through the maze of this fascinating subject, pursuing the genre's formal tensions by comparing francophone and anglophone traditions, from the eighteenth century to the present. Outsider Biographies is a masterpiece of analytical criticism."
-Jean-Pierre Dubost, professeur émérite de Littérature Générale et Comparée, l'Université Blaise Pascal, Clermont-Ferrand
âAs a comparative study, Outsider Biographies is always well argued and thought provoking, and the sections on French writers are particularly valuable (especially as all the French language material is cited in both the original and in English).â
-Joanne Wilkes, University of Auckland in New Zealand, in: Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 53, Iss. 1 (2016), pp. 201-204
"Corralling biographical subjects from as wide a range as 1744-2000 into a coherent framework is hard enough: choosing ones who fit the themes of both 'base crime' and 'high art' makes this harder still. Yet Ian Magedera's engaging study accepts the risks head on. By using the very obliqueness of some of the connections as a means of interrogating biographical theories 'at the edge,' he obtains results which are ultimately original and productive."
-Jane Darcy, in: Biography, Vol. 38, Iss. 4 (2015), pp. 711-713
-David Houston Jones, University of Exeter, in: Modern Language review, Vol. 111, Iss. 2 (2016), pp. 535-536
"In Outsider Biographies, Ian Magedera offers a fascinating and nimble exploration of a specific sub-set of biographies of writers, the authors who combine their authorship with a documented criminal record. This is a markedly original and substantial contribution to life-writing studies."
-Jean-Marc Moura, professeur de littératures francophones et de littérature comparée à l'Université de Paris Ouest; membre de l'Institut Universitaire de France
"A well-researched, original and frequently entertaining contribution to the burgeoning field of biography studies. By focusing on a fascinating range of outsiders, from Johnsonâs Savage to Ondaatjeâs Billy the Kid, via biographers of de Sade and Rimbaud, Magedera casts light on a host of fascinating issues raised by biographical texts, often experimental in form, which explore deviant life histories. Engagingly written, Outsider Biographies will appeal to all those interested in new approaches to life-writing.â
-Michael Sheringham, Marshal Foch Professor of French Literature in the University of Oxford
"How do biographers interrogate towering figures such as Sade or Genet, Richard Savage or Billy the Kid? When criminal acts become the hinge between life and oeuvre, how do they enquire after presence, without eschewing the profound enigma of life and writing? With these biographical subjects, the ethical dimension inevitably sharpens fundamental epistemological questions. Ian Magedera expertly leads us through the maze of this fascinating subject, pursuing the genre's formal tensions by comparing francophone and anglophone traditions, from the eighteenth century to the present. Outsider Biographies is a masterpiece of analytical criticism."
-Jean-Pierre Dubost, professeur émérite de Littérature Générale et Comparée, l'Université Blaise Pascal, Clermont-Ferrand
âAs a comparative study, Outsider Biographies is always well argued and thought provoking, and the sections on French writers are particularly valuable (especially as all the French language material is cited in both the original and in English).â
-Joanne Wilkes, University of Auckland in New Zealand, in: Comparative Literature Studies, Vol. 53, Iss. 1 (2016), pp. 201-204
"Corralling biographical subjects from as wide a range as 1744-2000 into a coherent framework is hard enough: choosing ones who fit the themes of both 'base crime' and 'high art' makes this harder still. Yet Ian Magedera's engaging study accepts the risks head on. By using the very obliqueness of some of the connections as a means of interrogating biographical theories 'at the edge,' he obtains results which are ultimately original and productive."
-Jane Darcy, in: Biography, Vol. 38, Iss. 4 (2015), pp. 711-713
Acknowledgements and Dedication Introduction: Outsider Biography: Definitions and Corpus Part One: Richard Savage 1698-1743 1. Partial Biographies by Samuel Johnson and Richard Holmes Part Two: Le Marquis De Sade 1740-1814 2. De Sade According to Sainte-Beuve, Apollinaire, Lely and Lever 3. Barthesâ and Pauvertâs Questioning of De Sade Biography Part Three: Outlaws in Fictional Biography 4. An Outlaw in Fictional Biography: Andrew Motionâs Thomas Griffiths Wainewright 1794-1847 5. An Outlaw in Fictional Biography: Peter Careyâs Ned Kelly 1855-1880 6. An Outlaw in Fictional Biography: Michael Ondaatjeâs Billy the Kid 1859-1881 Part Four: Arthur Rimbaud 1854-1891 7. âFamily Biographiesâ of Rimbaud, Followed by Scepticism and Anti-biography 8. Arthur Rimbaud: Steinmetzâs Biography and Michonâs Biographical Fiction Part Five: Jean Genet 1910-1986 9. Jean Genet: Biography and Saint Genet 10. Jean Genet: Biography after Saint Genet Conclusions: The Outsiderâs Solitude Bibliography Index