Between Fact and Imagination
Benjamin Franklin’s “Autobiography” is an inventive personal record of his life before the Revolution, written with a sense of wit and cheerful optimism.
Let us consider the contributions of Benjamin Franklin to American independence. The oldest of the Founding Fathers, he was possibly the most revolutionary. Of all his familiar discoveries and inventions, his “Autobiography” may well be the most original, and what he made of it paralleled the invention of America itself.
Born in Boston in 1706, he is known to us as a longtime Philadelphian, with influential diplomatic postings to England and France. He did not begin writing his autobiography until later in life, working on it intermittently—first in London in 1771, then Paris in 1784, and in Philadelphia during the months before his death in 1790. It was published over the next few years. Chronologically, its composition coincides exactly with the period of the Revolution, Confederation and Constitution.
We assume an autobiography to be an account of a person’s life written by that individual, but we soon learn that it is, in the words of Dartmouth professor James Cox, a form of writing that lies between the “literature of imagination and the literature of fact.” Franklin would embrace both.
Before him there were two main traditions of recording one’s life: the confession, from St. Augustine to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and the memoir. The first expresses the private world of emotion and spirituality, the other was an account of one’s career, both private and public. The term “autobiography” did not come into use (according to the Oxford English Dictionary) until 1809; Franklin’s narrative was first published as “Memoirs” of his private life, but was soon given the new designation. His achievement was to transform his memoir into something original, both a record and a model life for posterity.
He begins innocuously enough, using the personal form of a letter to his son: “I have ever had a Pleasure in obtaining any little Anecdotes of my Ancestors.” In the next phrases comes a hint of the transforming, as he describes “having emerg’d from the Poverty and Obscurity in which I was born, to a State of Affluence and Some Degree of Reputation in the World.” His story will not just be a passive recollection, but an active achievement “therefore fit to be imitated.”
Writing his autobiography was to create a second life, beyond the one lived. Franklin noted “the Advantage Authors have in a second Edition to correct some Faults in the First.” He recounted in Part I a sequence of his early adventures, jobs and apprenticeships, even the occasional failure, to demonstrate the value of self-improvement.
To introduce Part II he included, in an obvious gesture of self-promotion, letters written to him by colleagues, who lavished praise on Franklin and urged him to complete “a Work which would be useful and entertaining not only to a few, but to millions.” The second correspondent further drew a link to the new nation: “All that has happened to you is also connected with the detail of the manners and situation of a rising people.” There follow several diagrams, calendars and charts providing guides for self-education and productive conduct.
We can discover at least three major themes in Franklin’s narrative: a love of books, a sense of wit, and inventiveness. From his youth on he was engaged with booksellers, newspapers, the printing press, writing and reading. (We’ve all heard of “Poor Richard’s Almanack.”) Like Jefferson, he ardently believed that a literate and educated citizenry was necessary to the good functioning of democracy.
Franklin’s wry humor surfaces regularly in his quips and pithy quotes. One came in his account of creating bifocal eyeglasses. In Paris at dinner Franklin realized his difficulty in seeing his food along with the diplomatic colleague across the table in a single glance. So he instructed his glassmaker to cut apart the lenses of his distance and reading glasses, and glue one from each together in a single frame. Once accomplished, he declared, “I understand French better by the help of my spectacles.” In another instance he clearly enjoyed making a pun about his new design for a smokeless street lamp in Philadelphia, “an idea of enlightening all the City.”
These innovations were among a familiar list of discoveries and inventions we credit to his genius: electrical conduction, the Franklin stove, the glass harmonica. In addition, he could boast about his role in creating a postal system for the new country, establishing a lending library, and founding a university, hospital and the American Philosophical Society. Franklin was our first self-made American.
His writing style is cheerful and optimistic, straightforward and detached. He treats issues and incidents with a democratic evenness: Street drainage and politics get equal attention. If the contents of “The Autobiography” were imaginative, so too was the form. His written life seems so full and entertaining that we barely notice Franklin’s bold decision to carry his story just up to age 41. There is no mention of the great historical events that occupied his maturity.
Before Franklin a national literature did not exist; there was only a colonial one. For the recently invented country, Franklin created an original American self to match. His “Autobiography” marks the beginning of American literature.
—Mr. Wilmerding’s latest book, “American Masterpieces” (David R. Godine), out July 4, is a collection of his essays written for the Journal from 2006 to 2018.
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