Autobiography

It has always been a favorite idea of mine, that there is so much of the human in every man, that the life of any one individual, however obscure, if really and vividly perceived in all its aspirations, struggles, failures, and successes, would command the interest of all others. Besides this, every individual is part and parcel of a great picture of the society in which he lives and acts, and his life cannot be painted without reproducing the picture of the world he lived in. This is my only apology for offering my life as an open page to the reading of the public.

—Harriet Beecher Stowe, Oldtown Folks, ch1.