ABSTRACT
In literature and literary studies, the ‘biographical turn’ takes the form of a return of the biographical in many ways, which can be analysed as a predictable sequel to the ‘linguistic turn’, in so far as this phrase encapsulates the dominant discourse of an epoch in the history of literary science, from American New Criticism to French post-structuralism, which focused on the text ‘qua text’, thus applying to literature a radically linguistic paradigm. The first stirrings of the biographical turn, as well as some exemplary productions of its inchoative stage, can be traced in the theoretical works of some of the most remarkable luminaries of that period. The biographical turn in literature and literary studies revolves around the notion of a life effect, that interrogates the articulation between fiction and non-fiction.
