The Floating Press / Biography & autobiography

Autobiography of John Stuart Mill

by John Stuart Mill

John Stuart Mill (1806 – 1873) was a great liberal thinker of the nineteenth century, a noted philosopher, political theorist, and Member of Parliament. Mill was given a disciplined upbringing, his father...

Confessions of an English Opium-Eater

by Thomas De Quincey

I have often been asked how I first came to be a regular opium-eater, and have suffered, very unjustly, in the opinion of my acquaintance from being reputed to have brought upon myself all the sufferings which...

A Personal Record

by Joseph Conrad

A Personal Record is writer Joseph Conrad's autobiography. The writing is lyrical and atmospheric and commonly believed to be somewhat embellished. It does, however, give great insight into his Polish childhood,...

Indian Boyhood

by Charles A. Eastman

Charles Eastman, whose Sioux name was Ohiyesa (pronounced Oh hee' yay suh), was a Native American author, doctor and reformer who also helped to establish the Boy Scouts of America. His autobiographical Indian...

The Story of My Life

by Helen Keller

Helen Keller's autobiography, The Story of My Life, tells of her early life and of her experiences with Annie Sullivan, her teacher and companion. It was first published in 1903. Keller was the first deaf-blind...

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

by Benjamin Franklin

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, which Franklin himself called his Memoirs, is the unfinished record of his life written between 1771 and 1790. It has become one of the most well-known and influential...

In the South Seas

by Robert Louis Stevenson

In the South Seas is a collection of Robert Louis Stevenson's articles and essays on his travels in the Pacific. In his words: "For nearly ten years my health had been declining; and for some while before I...

The Americanization of Edward Bok

Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography 1921

by Edward William Bok

The Americanization of Edward Bok is an autobiography, told in the third person, that shares the life of a little Dutch boy unceremoniously set down in America unable to make himself understood or even to know...

Stories of Inventors

by Russell Doubleday

There are many thrilling incidents - all the more attractive because of their truth - in the study, the trials, the disappointments, the obstacles overcome, and the final triumph of the successful inventor.

Every...