Autobiography

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Overview

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin is an unfinished account of his life, written in several stages between 1771 and about 1790 and first published in French in 1791. It follows an ambitious printer from a large Boston family to prosperity and public life in Philadelphia, and it is best known for his plan to reach moral perfection by practising thirteen virtues, one at a time, and recording his failures on a chart. The book established the American model of the self-made man and a long tradition of self-improvement writing, and it remains an unusually practical text about habit formation.

Context

Franklin was born in Boston in 1706, the son of a candle and soap maker, and made his career in Philadelphia as a printer, writer, civic organiser and scientist. He later served as a colonial agent and diplomat, including in France during the American Revolution. The first part was written as a letter to his son in 1771; later parts were composed in France and Philadelphia. Because he never completed the work, its structure reflects the stages of composition.