ABSTRACT
Catherine Burr, in his books on autobiography, estimates the contribution on knowledge of human nature, is quite apart from the fact that their most valuable contribution is often the involuntary self-revelation of the author. Mrs. Burr finds that Goethe's Poetry and Truth is tedious, because it tells us little that is psychologically startling, thus ignoring the main concerns and interest of one of the greatest autobiographies. If Darwin's or Freud's theories were proved to be false, it would not affect the quality of autobiographies; or it is the quality of their spiritual personalities, that provides the sufficient guarantee of the truth of their doctrines. All autobiographies must, like novels, have a story-structure. The biography, in being more objective, that is, in seeing the person concerned as an object, misses the specific dynamic truth of the autobiography; and with the change of time, biographies have to be re-written. There is no tribunal which can deliver a final judgement.
