<P> With the rise of education, cheap newspapers and cheap printing, modern concepts of fame and celebrity began to develop, and the beneficiaries of this were not slow to cash in on this by producing autobiographies . It became the expectation--rather than the exception--that those in the public eye should write about themselves--not only writers such as Charles Dickens (who also incorporated autobiographical elements in his novels) and Anthony Trollope, but also politicians (e.g. Henry Brooks Adams), philosophers (e.g. John Stuart Mill), churchmen such as Cardinal Newman, and entertainers such as P.T. Barnum . Increasingly, in accordance with romantic taste, these accounts also began to deal, amongst other topics, with aspects of childhood and upbringing--far removed from the principles of "Cellinian" autobiography . </P> <P> From the 17th century onwards, "scandalous memoirs" by supposed libertines, serving a public taste for titillation, have been frequently published . Typically pseudonymous, they were (and are) largely works of fiction written by ghostwriters . So - called "autobiographies" of modern professional athletes and media celebrities--and to a lesser extent about politicians, generally written by a ghostwriter, are routinely published . Some celebrities, such as Naomi Campbell, admit to not having read their "autobiographies". . Some sensationalist autobiographies such as James Frey's A Million Little Pieces have been publicly exposed as having embellished or fictionalized significant details of the authors' lives . </P> <P> Autobiography has become an increasingly popular and widely accessible form . A Fortunate Life by Albert Facey (1979) has become an Australian literary classic . With the critical and commercial success in the United States of such memoirs as Angela's Ashes and The Color of Water, more and more people have been encouraged to try their hand at this genre . </P> <P> A genre where the "claim for truth" overlaps with fictional elements though the work still purports to be autobiographical is autofiction . </P>

Autobiographies give an account of the authors life and