Book history and biography

Biographers and book historians both study life histories, and practitioners of the two disciplines have much to learn from one another. The author illustrates this point with a document from a publisher’s archive which reveals a great deal about an author’s career as well as about publishing practices, and with a bibliographical puzzle which tells much about censorship in the British publishing industry while at the same time illuminating an important feature of a writer’s career and life. He is the author of several books and is at work on a biography of William Styron.