How to Write a Biography

Many people decide to write a biography because they want to be able to research and learn more about a fascinating person. Other people have a school assignment to write a biography. In either one of these instances, there are guidelines about what should be included in a biography to make the picture of the person as clear as possible.

Difficulty: Moderately Challenging

Instructions

1. Choose a way of chronicling the person's life. Some biographies are a complete record of a person's life, starting with their birth and continuing until their death or the present day. Other biographies include only a specific time period in the person's life. Still other biographies just touch on what a person means to a movement, a cause or the history of something. Once you define the scope of your biography you can begin to put together the story.

2. Gather the dry details. A biography should have at least some names and dates, even if there is little known about the person. You should include the place the person was born and the date, if known, as well as the place they died and the date of death. The major accomplishments of the person's life should be mentioned, even if those accomplishments aren't a part of the story you are telling. Major accomplishments are part of who a person is and why that person is relevant.

3. Put together the more interesting details about the person. These may not be found in the same places are the dry facts. Look in offbeat places that would have interesting, little-known information about the person. Think about the questions you'd want to know about the person and figure out from there where that information would be. If the person is living or recently deceased, you may be able to ask people who knew him.

4. Write about the circumstances that surrounded this person. Most biographies include some information about the person's family, friends and the circumstances that shaped his or her life. These can go a long way in helping people to understand why the person turned out the way he did.

5. Get descriptive. Even if you have pictures to go along with your biography, keep describing the scene in a way that will make your readers feel like they're there. By the end of the biography, people should feel like they knew the person, or at least like they could clearly picture him doing the things that he did.

6. Mention that ways that the person changed things around him. It may be in a huge, obvious way, or it may be in a much more subtle fashion. Every life has some impact on the ones around it. In the biography you write, find as many ways as you can that the person left behind a legacy.

7. Keep a record of your sources of information for a bibliography.