CARL ROLLYSON
Mr. Rollyson is the author of The Life of William Faulkner and The Last Days of…
Latest Articles
Robert Frost and the Future of Biography
The expertly edited ‘Biography Across the Digitized Globe’ is a kind of battle for recognition of biographers and their subjects that AI may tend to usurp but that cannot be silenced so long as biographers continue to pursue the genre.
This Edgar Allan Poe Biography Is One for the Ages
More than from any other Poe biographer, we get the nuances of the writer’s life, almost on a day-by-day basis, an approach that is an indispensable way of re-creating the whole man.
The Counterfeit World of Merle Oberon
Oberon’s biographer argues against blaming her for a life of practiced deceit, for denying her ethnic origins in a Hollywood that offered precious few roles for Asian actors other than the stereotyped ones.
Vera Miles, a Hitchcock Actress Who Was Nearly a Star, Eludes Her Biographer
Miles is 95 and has been retired from acting for nearly 30 years. She has not written a memoir, and the author makes no mention of having tried to contact her. His biography is mainly based on secondary sources.
Alexis Smith: The Star Who Got Away
The actress, as Peter Shelley admits, is ‘a somewhat forgotten figure in movie history.’ Hollywood tried to build her up, but she never ascended to the top echelon of movie stars.
The Sun Never Really Set on Gloria Swanson
‘I have decided that when I become a star, I will be every inch and every moment a star.’ Hers was an exhausting ambition, and yet Swanson never swerved from the demands of stardom.
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