The content and form of 'conventional' historical biography

Abstract

Biography is one of the most challenging, fruitful and also most criticized genres within the realm of history writing. A ‘dark legend’ was built up by Marxists and structuralists to undermine biography's epistemological potential. With the revival of narrative as a privileged medium for historical writing, the genre re-entered the core of the historical field. However, it did so through different approaches, which reveal different intentions stemming from rather antagonistic epistemological stances. While ‘conventional’ or ‘reconstructionist’ historians reassert the genre as an example of a ‘proper’ historical study, postmodern ‘deconstructionist’ historians theorize it as a useful and experimental means for ‘unconventional’ historical writing. The aim of this article is to present an approach not only to the problems and challenges that any practitioner of historical biography encounters but also what its ‘conventional’ content and form might include as an instrument of knowledge.