Lifestory-sharing sites have never been as popular as today. These sites interpret the act of “sharing” life stories as a form of communal endeavor, and argue that publicly shared life stories will lead to more inclusive communities and to more effective forms of participatory democracy. The present article studies the rhetoric of this new form of lifestory-based activism, and suggests that we need to be cautious about accepting some of its more idealistic claims.

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Autobiographers can manipulate not only public issues in an indirect, suggestive way, but their autobiographies can have a similarly decisive role in modifying public opinion concerning the values of their own art. We fall pray to these seemingly innocent self-promoting strategies, even though they often influence decisively our assessment of these authors-and ultimately our literary canons. By examining the autobiography of Gertrude Stein, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas in light of a few accepted basics drawn from advertising, the present essay emphasizes the manipulative aspect of autobiographical writing by showing how the text of an autobiography can serve as a quite practical means to promote one's own art.

Abstract:The paper investigates the question of self-translation in the work of Alexander Lenard (Lénárd Sándor). Lenard, a polyglot writer and translator, rewrote his autobiography three times, in three different languages (in German, English, and Hungarian). This process of self-translation created a fascinating web of autobiographical texts, which invite a multiscopic reading. Following in the footsteps of 18th century parodists, Lenard challenges a great number of protocols associated with life-writing. The most important among these is the authority of the proper name as a guarantee of autobiographical authenticity. To challenge the authority of the proper name Lenard purposely multiplies his own authorial identities, for example by claiming that "A. L. is only a pseudonym." Thus, the word 'self-plagiarism' acquires in Lenard's case a double meaning, implying both that the author plagiarizes his own text and that he plagiarizes his own self. The paper explains why existing theories of self-translation cannot be applied to Lenard's texts, and why his unique case can enrich future studies of this topic.