A stitch in time: an experiment in collaboration

Writing biography is rarely as straightforward as simply drawing together the threads of someone else's life. Not only must the biographer grapple with the challenge of pulling that life into a narrative shape, she must also deal with the issue of the biographical self to consider the way in which that self impacts and influences the story. Seen like this, biography becomes a collaborative experience--a mesh of self/other relations. Using the case study of the "Michael Fields "--the subjects of my biography in-progress--this paper explores the effects of the researcher/subject relationship and the way in which it affects a kind of scholarly desire both on (and off) the page.