Call for Research Papers

Biographies and Autobiographies occupy an important place in Literature for various reasons. Authors used this genre to communicate their worldviews to people. Gandhi’s The Story of My Experiments with Truth is an excellent example. My Truth by Indira Gandhi is yet another example of communicating the message of an individual to a larger world. Jivansmriti (Reminiscences) of Rabindranath Tagore narrates his early years of life, while in Toward Freedom: the Autobiography of Jawaharlal Nehru Nehru writes to his “own countrymen and women.” Nirad C. Chaudhuri’s The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian, published in 1951, stands apart as a great master-piece, combining personal life experiences with a strong motivated worldview (“the conditions in which an Indian grew to manhood in the early decades of this century” [20^th century].

Rationale and Justification for Writing Autobiography

These leaders have also debated on the need or otherwise for writing such works.

Jawaharlal Nehru writes in his Autobiography: “… this account is wholly one-sided and, inevitably, egotistical; many important happenings have been completely ignored and many important persons, who shaped events, have hardly been mentioned. In a real survey of past events this would have been inexcusable, but a personal account can claim this indulgence.”

Gandhi justified writing an autobiography with these words:

But a God-fearing friend had his doubts, which he shared with me on my day of silence. 'What has set you on this adventure? he asked. 'Writing an autobiography is a practice peculiar to the West. I know of nobody in the East having written one, except amongst those who have come under Western influence. And what will you write? Supposing you reject tomorrow the things you hold as principles today, or supposing you revise in the future your plans of today, is it not likely that the men who shape their conduct on the authority of your word, spoken or written, may be misled. Don't you think it would be better not to write anything like an autobiography, at any rate just yet?'

This argument had some effect on me. But it is not my purpose to attempt a real

autobiography. I simply want to tell the story of my numerous experiments with truth, and as my life consists of nothing but those experiments, it is true that the story will take the shape of an autobiography. But I shall not mind, if every page of it speaks only of my experiments. I believe, or at any rate flatter myself with the belief, that a connected account of all these experiments will not be without benefit to the reader.

Language Medium for Major Autobiographies and Biographies

Indira Gandhi’s work is a compilation of her writings in a manner that the book has an autobiographical format. Nehru wrote his Autobiography in English. Gandhi and Tagore wrote their autobiographies first in their mother tongues (Gujarati and Bengali respectively) and then they sort of translated or recreated their works in English. Nirad Chaudhuri wrote his celebrated work in English.

Biographies in Indian Writing in English

There are many biographies written by Indian authors. These biographies cover many personalities from every field: politics, science, sports, cinema, drama, religion, literature, etc. Indeed, biography writing is a very popular pursuit among Indian writers in English and other Indian languages. Sahitya Akademi has brought out a number of biographies of varied quality.

Controversial nature of Biographies and Autobiographies

Both biographies and autobiographies may raise controversies of various types: political, social, familial, regional, religious, etc.

A recent biography-like book on Muhammad Ali Jinnah by Jaswant Singh (Jinnah: India-Partition-Independence) raised a hue and cry among Jaswant Singh’s own party members.  Earlier in recent times, actor Om Puri’s biography Unusual Hero by his wife created strong and deep controversies. Such controversies arise out of revelations in public of private personal acts and thoughts that may involve others and thus hurt the feelings, careers and interests of people referred to. It looks like that the biographer or the autobiographer never asks the permission of others to narrate the incidents which involve these “friends”, etc.!

Autobiography and Biography versus Fiction Writing

Writing an autobiography or biography is quite different from writing a novel or short story or any type of material that aims at catering to the literary sensibility of its readers. Facts and related, relevant and appropriate interpretation of facts and events become the hall mark of autobiography and biography, in some sense.

Narration is usually straightforward following the course of events and implications presented in these works. Authors of fiction have greater freedom and employ many techniques of presentation in their narratives. Hidden and explicit metaphors, lack of any explicit didactic conversations, creating curiosity to look forward to the next event, conflict, confrontation, resolution, etc. play an important role here. Characterization and characters follow a different course in fiction than in autobiography or biography. Actually, most events narrated in biographies and even autobiographies are already public knowledge. On the other hand, fiction offers a progressive revelation of unknown events, etc.

However, autobiographies and biographies have their own aspects difficult to master. Even the authors of these works are burdened with the responsibility of ensuring that the readers are with them and are comfortable with the journey they choose to undertake with the authors.

The Goal of This Special Volume

The goal of this Special Volume is to make a survey of some of the major autobiographies and biographies written in English. It is assumed that work should try to bring put some hidden fact or incident of the life of the person.

How to go for it?

1. Choose an autobiography or biography.

2. Describe the content briefly.

3. Focus on the structure of the chosen autobiography or biography: introduction, chapterization, language and style, narrative techniques, idioms and metaphors, their justification for writing the autobiography or biography and how this justification is revealed in their works, clarity of language and thought, effect on readers, readability of the text, gaps in information, gaffes, etc. This is only suggestive of what you can do. You need to be creative and imaginative to work on your plan of research, description, analysis and interpretation, conclusion, etc.

4. You may also make a comparative or contrastive of two or more autobiographies or biographies available in English and in other languages.

Please write to the editors of this special volume for any clarification you need.

CALL FOR RESEARCH PAPERS ON

Revelation of Truths:

Critical Perspectives on Autobiographies and Biographies in English

Editors

Dr. Arvind Nawale,

(Head, Dept of English, Shivaji Mahavidhylaya, Udgir, Dist: Latur (M.S.)

Ankita Khanna,

(Lecturer in English, Sardar Vallabhbhai National Institute of Technology, Surat (Gujarat)

No Contribution/Subscription fees. Papers will be accepted and published free of cost and only on basis of quality and each contributor will get a free complimentary copy from publisher

Dear All,

We are glad to inform you that we are going to edit jointly a book of research papers on Autobiographies and Biographies in English tentatively titled as Revelation of Truths: Critical Perspectives on Autobiographies and Biographies in English. Authentic, scholarly and unpublished research papers are invited from scholars/faculty/researchers/writers/professors from all over the world for this volume.

Proposed Publisher:

The volume will be published with an ISBN (International Standard Book Number) by a renowned publisher from India.

Thematic Focus of the Volume:

The articles should be on any theme of confession, revelation of truth on any work of English Autobiographies and Biographies.

Editing requirements:

●      Paper size: A4, Font & size: Times New Roman 12, Spacing: Single line, Margin of 1 inch on all four sides.

●      Title of the paper: bold, title case (Capitalize each word), centered.

●      Text of the paper: justified. Font & size: Times New Roman 12.

●      References: Please follow MLA style (Only Author-Date or Number System) strictly. Don’t use Foot Notes. Instead use End Notes.

●      Titles of books: Italics.

●      Titles of articles from journals and books: “quoted”.

●      Articles should be submitted as MS Word 2003-2007attachments only.

●      The paper should not usually exceed 14 pages maximum, 5 pages minimum in single spacing.

●      Each paper must be accompanied by i)  A declaration that it is an original work and has not been published anywhere else or send for publication  ii) Abstract of paper about 100-200 words and iii) A short bio-note of the contributor(s) indicating name, institutional affiliation, brief career history, postal address, mobile number and e-mail, in a single attachment. Please don’t send more attachments. Give these things below your paper and send all these things in a separate single MS-Word attachment.

●      The papers submitted should evince serious academic work contributing new knowledge or innovative critical perspectives on the subject explored.

Mode of Submission:

Each contributor is advised to send full paper with brief bio-note, declaration and abstract as a single MS-Word email attachments to email addresses: ankita.khanna@ymail.com up to 15^th April 2012. The contributors are also supposed to submit one hard copy of (i) Full paper (ii) A declaration and (iii) Abstract and (iv) Brief bio-note typed in above mentioned format to the postal address given bellow. One hard copy is required for our record. Without hard copy, no paper will be considered for publication.

Selection Procedure:

All submissions will be sent for blind peer reviewing. Final selection will be made only if the papers are recommended for publication by the reviewers. The details of the selection of your paper will be informed to you telephonically or on your email. The editor has the right to make necessary editing of selected papers for the sake of conceptual clarity and formatting. Non-selected papers will not be sent back to the contributor in any form. So, all contributors are advised to keep a copy of their submission with them. Each contributor will get a free complimentary copy from publisher but in case of joint paper, only first writer will get free copy. Overseas contributors will get a soft copy (pdf) of their papers with details of ISBN specification.

Plagiarism Alert:

Contributors are advised to adhere to strict academic ethics with respect to acknowledgment of original ideas from others. The editors will not be responsible for any such lapse of the contributor. All submissions should be original and must be accompanied by a declaration that it is an original work and has not been published anywhere else. It will be your sole responsibility for such lapses, if any. Neither editor, nor publisher will be responsible for it.

 For more details email the editor at ankita.khanna@ymail.com

Freelancers: What to charge?

When someone hires you to do a special writing job, they give you the assignment and you do the job. Sounds pretty simple, right? Well, not really.

These are examples of complaints I've received over the years:

A local drycleaner thought he could write his own brochure, but he just "didn't have the time." He hired Melanie, a professional copywriter, to write it for him for a flat fee, and gave her a list of bullet points to include. After the job was complete, he decided he wanted to add a few more bullet points and remove some he'd provided previously...but he didn't understand why Melanie asked for more money.

The marketing manager of an old business downtown hired Jeff to ghostwrite a historical book about the company. The book would be offered to local bookstores and be used to generate publicity, of course, but the main purpose of the project was to provide a marketing freebie to potential clients. The marketing manager sent Jeff a very detailed outline of the project along with a list of interviewees. A few weeks later, after more executives at the firm got excited about the project, they all started getting ideas. Some items Jeff had already written were deleted and the list of interviewees suddenly got much longer. When Jeff asked for a contract amendment and more money, the marketing manager told him there were no more funds in the budget and that the original flat fee was the only money available for the project. He even threatened to sue Jeff if he refused to finish the book, saying there was nothing in the contract that allowed Jeff to quit the project.

Linda was hired to write a series of press releases by the co-owner of a company. After completing the third press release, the company's other owner decided he didn't like the way the series was progressing. He wanted the first three press releases changed. Linda asked for additional payment to make the changes because the scope of the project had changed so drastically. The company balked at her request, fired her, hired another writer to finish the series, and never paid Linda's invoices.

Scott was hired to ghostwrite a novel for an individual. He completed the work and sent the manuscript and his invoice to his client. The client phoned a few weeks later to say she now wanted the book written in first-person. When Scott requested more money, she told him he should have thought about this possibility before he agreed to the contracted price.

I receive emails almost daily from writers asking me what they should charge for special projects like these. My answer is always the same - charge them BY THE HOUR!

Most people who have an idea for a new project only have a very rough idea of what they want, and they almost always change their minds about some or all of the project along the way. Unfortunately, when this happens, especially when writing is involved, many people don't think the writer deserves any more money to incorporate the changes. Why? Perhaps they think "it won't take very long." Or, maybe they think you "just have to move a few sentences around." They don't want their budget disturbed and almost always want to blame the writer if something doesn't turn out as they'd hoped it would.

A sad fact of being in our industry, and probably the main reason why some people think writers don't deserve payment for their work, is because most people think that, just because they can type or hold a pen, they can write. Thus, they think writers' jobs are easy. One certainty about our industry is that books, brochures, websites, and even most articles are NEVER published as first written. The boss almost always wants some changes, often because they've changed their mind about the scope of the project.

The way to avoid getting into this mess in the first place is to:

1. Get the entire preliminary scope of the project in writing. Be sure to list as many details as possible. If the project description seems too broad, ask lots of questions and include the additional information they provide in your proposal and the contract itself. This will be your best weapon later when they don't want to pay you for additional work.
   
2. Estimate the total number of hours you believe will be required. Stress in bold that this is a rough estimate, based on the scope of work initially provided to you for this project.
   
3. Quote an hourly rate. If the client wants to see a round number, multiply the hourly rate by the projected number of hours. But, remember to stress that the figure is a rough estimate based on the information initially provided by the client and again state you'll be billing them by the hour.
   
4. Include a clause in your proposal and in the contract that any change requests may require additional time and will therefore increase the cost of the project.
   
5. Make your payment terms no longer than net 14 days.
   
6. Include a clause in the contract specifying that prepayment is required for delivery of the final installment of the project. Withhold delivery of the final 15% of the project until your final invoice is paid.
   
7. VERY IMPORTANT! Include a clause in the contract specifying that you own all copyrights to the work until all your invoices are paid.
   
8. Submit the project in increments (every 25 or 50 pages, or every other week, or every 20 hours of work). Send them an invoice each time you submit a piece of the project and stop work immediately if even one invoice is past due. Don't continue working until they've paid what is currently owed. (You'd be surprised how many writers keep working after their client stops paying their invoices!)
   
9. Never turn in the last part of the project without having your final payment in hand. (You'd be surprised how many writers never get that final check!)
   
10. If the information above doesn't appear on the contract, ask them to include it as an addendum to the contract and make sure you and the "boss" sign it. Don't start work until you have a signed copy of the contract in hand. (You'd be surprised how many companies never return signed contracts and then never pay the writers, saying the contract was never signed!)
    
11. When change requests come through, save all emails and letters and document all changes in detail. If the changes come via a phone call, make a list of the changes requested, send the list to the "boss" and request he sign the list and return it to you. (You'd be surprised how many clients ask for more work but then later, after their budget is blown, claim they never asked for more work!)

When two companies sign a contract, both firms usually know how to correctly handle the situation (get signed copies of the contract, include a copy of the proposal, addendums, penalty clauses, etc.). Unfortunately, when companies are dealing with freelancers, they often don't follow standard procedure and then use the freelancer's ignorance about business processes to screw them later. After reading hundreds of emails sent in by readers over the years, it's obvious, when a project goes awry, the company's attitude toward the freelancer is often, "Well, you should have known this could happen, and included it in your price!"

When the boss changes their mind about a project, it's not your fault! When those changes mean more time on the job for you, you deserve more money! Protect yourself in writing up front and remain firm and professional when they try to talk you out of charging extra for THEIR mistakes.

Angela Hoy is the co-owner of WritersWeekly.com and Booklocker. WritersWeekly.com is the free marketing emag for writers that features new paying markets and freelance job listings every Wednesday. Booklocker.com, is rated the top POD Publisher by attorney Mark Levine. Mark's book,The Fine Print, analyzes the contracts and services of 73 top POD and ebook publishers. Read morehere. Booklocker.com can publish your paperback or hardcover book in 4-6 weeks for only $217.