Memoirs and autobiographies are one of the most popular genres, and you'll find lots recommended in our reading lists. If you're looking for the best of the past year, Marion Winik talks us through the autobiographies that made the shortlist of the National Book Critics Circle Awards in 2022, we also have a selection of the best new memoirs.
Other 'best memoir' lists include Calvin Trillin's favourites, as well as Eva Hoffman's. The satirist, Craig Brown, talks about his preference for diaries over memoirs. Yiyun Li talks about why she prefers “anti-memoirs” (those that “de-self” the writer) and William Fiennes explains why he thinks the voice of the first person allows great freedom, but is allergic to the word “memoir”.
There is plenty on war and politics. James Holland chooses the best personal perspectives on World War II. Thomas de Waal recommends the best of the Armenian genocide, while Anne Applebaum chooses the best memoirs of Communism in Eastern Europe. Jeffrey Wasserstrom recommends two to illustrate experiences of Life in China, Confessions: An Innocent Life in Communist China by Kang Zhengguo and Factory Girls by Leslie T Chang. The former Labour MP, Chris Mullin, chooses his favourite political diaries.
Finally, Jennifer Steil chooses five memoirs of westerners visiting Eastern parts that she read while writing her own about running a newspaper in Yemen, and Georgina Godwin chooses five that illustrate the social and political traumas of her homeland, Zimbabwe.
The Best Hiking Memoirs, recommended by Gail Simmons
Accounts of journeys on foot capture the imagination; partly this is a function of the satisfaction of following a linear journey from start to finish, and partly it is a quality inherent to walking itself—a freeing of the mind. Gail Simmons, who follows an old English pilgrimage route in her book Between the Chalk and the Sea, selects five hiking memoirs that celebrate the liberation that comes from putting one foot after another.
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A Little Devil in America: Notes In Praise Of Black Performance
by Hanif Abdurraqib -
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Gay Bar: Why We Went Out
by Jeremy Atherton Lin -
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A Farewell to Gabo and Mercedes: A Son's Memoir of Gabriel García Márquez and Mercedes Barcha
by Rodrigo Garcia -
4
A Ghost in the Throat
by Doireann Ní Ghríofa -
5
Concepcion: An Immigrant Family’s Fortunes
by Albert Samaha
The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Marion Winik
The Best Memoirs: The 2022 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Marion Winik
Autobiography is evolving; increasingly we find the field dominated by ‘genre-fluid’ books that plait memoir together with strands of cultural criticism, history, journalism or even poetry. Here, Marion Winik, the memoirist and critic, talks us through the five books that have been shortlisted in the National Book Critic’s Circle autobiography category—and describes the face of memoir in 2022.
The Best Nature Memoirs, recommended by Victoria Bennett
Nature is intrinsic to our experience of being alive and reading about it allows us to connect not just with the natural world but with ourselves. Here Victoria Bennett, author of All My Wild Mothers, a memoir of grief and creating an apothecary garden, recommends five other nature memoirs, highlighting personal and reflective prose by writers including Lauret Savoy, Mary Oliver, and Jamaica Kincaid.
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Will
by Will Smith and Mark Manson -
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Unbound: My Story of Liberation and the Birth of the Me Too Movement
by Tarana Burke -
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This Much Is True
by Miriam Margolyes -
4
This Will All Be Over Soon: A Memoir
by Cecily Strong -
5
Act Like You Got Some Sense: And Other Things My Daughters Taught Me
by Jamie Foxx and Nick Chiles
The Best New Celebrity Memoirs, recommended by Sharon Marcus
The Best New Celebrity Memoirs, recommended by Sharon Marcus
While it’s easy to dismiss celebrity memoirs as offering cheap, voyeuristic thrills into the lives of famous people we like the look of, when they’re done well, they can give insight into challenges we all grapple with as human beings. They can also be very funny. Sharon Marcus, professor of literature at Columbia University and author of The Drama of Celebrity, recommends the best new celebrity memoirs.
Eva Hoffman recommends the best Memoirs
To tell your own story is to confront and construct your deepest sense of self. The author of Lost in Translation tells us about five striking memoirs of identity, dislocation, and belonging.
Margo Jefferson on Cultural Memoirs
The Pulitzer Prize-winning critic celebrates a form in constant flight from definition, that finds expression in hybrid texts and plays-within-plays, and that is as at home in high art as in pop culture.
The best books on Diaries and Autobiography, recommended by Craig Brown
The Private Eye satirist and author recommends five entertaining published diaries, from Andy Warhol to Harpo Marx – and tells us why parody is a pickpocket
The best books on Chronic Illness, recommended by Polly Atkin
Living with a long-term condition or disability is difficult, says Polly Atkin, the author of Some of Us Just Fall. Those affected often feel isolated, misunderstood, or frustrated by their interactions with the medical establishment. But books about chronic illness will remind you that you are not alone; here, she recommends five memoirs that offer insight into the “kingdom of the unwell.”
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Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning
by Cathy Park Hong -
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This is Major: On Diana Ross, Dark Girls and Being Dope
by Shayla Lawson -
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Golem Girl: A Memoir
by Riva Lehrer -
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The Dragons, the Giant, the Women: A Memoir
by Wayétu Moore -
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Home Baked: My Mom, Marijuana and the Stoning of San Francisco
by Alia Volz
The Best Memoirs: The 2021 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Marion Winik
The Best Memoirs: The 2021 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Marion Winik
From fleeing the Liberian civil war to selling pot brownies in San Francisco, the finalists for the 2021 National Book Critics Circle award for the best autobiography offer five vivid life stories, told expertly. Critic, broadcaster and author Marion Winik talks us through the brilliant memoirs that made the 2021 shortlist.
The Best Presidential Memoirs as Audiobooks, recommended by Robin Whitten
When you listen to presidential memoirs as audiobooks, you can often hear an American president telling you their own story. Veteran audiobook reviewer Robin Whitten, editor of Audiofile magazine, recommends the best audiobooks about US presidents, and explains the crucial role of professional narrators in bringing big books to life.
Calvin Trillin recommends the best Memoirs
The American journalist and humorist, Calvin Trillin, talks us through his own favourite memoirs.
The Best of Memoir: the 2020 NBCC Autobiography Shortlist, recommended by Mark Athitakis
From a brave account by the Stanford rape case survivor Chanel Miller to New Yorker reporter Ronan Farrow’s gripping tale of investigating the Harvey Weinstein scandal, it’s been a golden year for autobiography. Veteran critic Mark Athitakis talks us through the memoirs that made this year’s National Book Critics Circle autobiography shortlist.
The best books on The Lives of Artists, recommended by Maria Loh
We live in an age obsessed with self-image. Technology has made the ‘selfie’ a ubiquitous form of social currency. Renaissance means may have been very different, but celebrity artists in Medici Florence dealt with many of the issues relating to identity and authorship that we grapple with today. Maria Loh, author of Still Lives: Death, Desire, and the Portrait of the Old Master, talks to Five Books about the curated self.
The Best Addiction Memoirs, recommended by Matt Rowland Hill
The author and recovering addict Matt Rowland Hill dissects the ‘addiction memoir’—its literary potential, its formal conventions and its offer of hope and catharsis—as he recommends five books that exemplify the form, from Thomas De Quincey’s Confessions of an English Opium Eater to Mary Karr’s bestselling Lit.
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Educated: A Memoir
by Tara Westover -
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The Day That Went Missing: A Family's Story
by Richard Beard -
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All You Can Ever Know: A Memoir
by Nicole Chung -
4
What Drowns the Flowers in Your Mouth: A Memoir of Brotherhood
by Rigoberto González -
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Belonging: A German Reckons with History and Home
by Nora Krug -
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Old in Art School: A Memoir of Starting Over
by Nell Painter
The Best Memoirs: The 2019 National Book Critics Circle Awards Shortlist, recommended by Laurie Hertzel
The Best Memoirs: The 2019 National Book Critics Circle Awards Shortlist, recommended by Laurie Hertzel
An increasing diversity of voices and willingness to experiment has heralded a new golden age of autobiography, says literary critic Laurie Hertzel. Here she highlights the very best: the six memoirs recently shortlisted for the National Book Critics Circle Awards.
Yiyun Li on the ‘Anti-memoir’
Yiyun Li, author of Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life, on the sheer messiness of life, the irrelevance of ‘I’, and why brutal honesty is often the truest way to capture the people we love the most
The best books on Great Letter Writers, recommended by Jonathan Keates
Queen Victoria was anything but Victorian and Lord Byron was more vulnerable than we think, says writer Jonathan Keates – who considers emails a poor substitute for a hand-written correspondence.
The Best Autofiction, recommended by Juliet Jacques
Autofiction is writing that blurs the boundaries between autobiography and fiction. The writer of Trans: A Memoir, Juliet Jacques, picks her top five examples of the genre.
Georgina Godwin on Memoirs of Zimbabwe
Via five engrossing memoirs, the Zimbabwe-born journalist Georgina Godwin talks wistfully about her country; amongst the older generation, she says, there is a feeling that Rhodesia was sold down the river by Britain and things needn’t have turned out the way they did.
Memoirs of the Armenian Genocide, recommended by Thomas de Waal
More than 100 years after the Armenian genocide, author Tom de Waal chooses books that sidestep the politics and bring us back to the human story. He picks the best memoirs of the Armenian genocide.
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The Memoirs Of Marguerite De Valois
by Marguerite De Valois -
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Why Not Say What Happened?: A Memoir
by Ivana Lowell -
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Casting with a Fragile Thread: A Story of Sisters and Africa
by Wendy Kann -
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The Mighty Queens of Freeville
by Amy Dickinson -
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Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail
by Cheryl Strayed
The best books on Memoirs of Dauntless Daughters, recommended by Nancy Goldstone
The best books on Memoirs of Dauntless Daughters, recommended by Nancy Goldstone
In her book The Rival Queens, historian Nancy Goldstone explored the destructive relationship between Marguerite de Valois and her mother Catherine de’ Medici. Here she chooses five different memoirs that best explore the emotionally complex dynamics that characterise mother-daughter relationships.
The best books on Memoirs of Communism, recommended by Anne Applebaum
The traumas of the 20th century hit Eastern Europe hard – a region of changing borders, uncertain identity, and shattering of moral norms. The journalist and communism expert selects books that capture the spirit of the age.
The best books on First-Person Narratives, recommended by William Fiennes
Writing in the first person doesn’t have to be inward-looking or egotistical, says the author of The Snow Geese. He tells us about his favourite autobiographical works that use the first person to look out into the world
The best books on Chinese Life Stories, recommended by Jeffrey Wasserstrom
Historian and Sinologist Jeffrey Wasserstrom, Chancellor’s Professor, History at UC Irvine, says that to get a real sense of China you need to focus on individuals and their stories. Here he chooses five books that draw on the country’s long tradition of biographical writing.
The best books on Foreign Memoirs, recommended by Jennifer Steil
The first five books in the genre, as picked by a writer, journalist and actor who wrote a memoir about running a newspaper in Yemen.
The Best Political Diaries, recommended by Chris Mullin
The Labour MP on political diaries. A nugget from the day of the Norway debate, which brought down the Chamberlain government: ‘Sunny morning, went riding in Richmond Park. Strolled into the House for the Norway debate’