The Biographies collection brings together the great life stories of the public domain — memoirs, autobiographies, and biographies of the statesmen, writers, explorers, and reformers who shaped the modern world. From Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography and Frederick Douglass’s slave narrative to the lives of monarchs, generals, and artists, these are first-hand and definitive accounts of remarkable lives.
Every title is a free EPUB download, cleanly reformatted with a fresh cover and ready to read on any device. Ranked by popularity, these are the biographies and memoirs readers return to most.
- My Life — Volume 1Richard Wagner
- MeditationsMarcus Aurelius
- The Love Letters of Mary Wollstonecraft to Gilbert ImlayMary Wollstonecraft
- Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison: Fifteen Years in SolitudeAustin Bidwell
- The Confessions of St. AugustineAugustine of Hippo
- Modern English Biography, Volume 2 (of 4), I-QFrederic Boase
- Life on the MississippiMark Twain
- Autobiography of Benjamin FranklinBenjamin Franklin
- Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American SlaveFrederick Douglass
- The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, CompleteSuetonius
- Ecce Homo / Complete Works, Volume SeventeenFriedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
- The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African / Written By HimselfOlaudah Equiano
- The Anabasis of AlexanderArrian
- De ProfundisOscar Wilde
- Emily BrontëA. Mary F. Robinson
- Autobiography of a YogiParamahansa Yogananda
- Napoleon's Letters to Josephine, 1796-1812 / For the First Time Collected and Translated, with Notes Social, Historical, and Chronological, from Contemporary SourcesEmperor of the French Napoleon I
- The Germany and the Agricola of TacitusCornelius Tacitus
- The Diary of Samuel Pepys — CompleteSamuel Pepys
- The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Vol 1 (of 2) / Written by Himself Containing a True and Full Account of the Discovery and Conquest of Mexico and New Spain.Bernal Díaz del Castillo
- A Pickle for the Knowing OnesTimothy Dexter
- Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by HerselfHarriet Jacobs
- Reminiscences of a Stock OperatorEdwin Lefevre
- The Roll of Honour, Volume 1marquis de Melville Henry Massue Ruvigny et Raineval
- Rizal's own story of his lifeJosé Rizal
- The Waterloo Roll Call / With Biographical Notes and AnecdotesCharles Dalton
- Anarchism and Other EssaysEmma Goldman
- Biographia LiterariaSamuel Taylor Coleridge
- Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary RowlandsonMary White Rowlandson
- Modern English Biography, Volume 1 (of 4), A-HFrederic Boase
- Some Jewish Witnesses For ChristAaron Bernstein
- Life and Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 1Charles Darwin
- Shakespeare's familyC. C. Stopes
- The Life of Florence Nightingale, vol. 2 of 2Sir Edward Tyas Cook
- The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, CompleteJohn Forster
- Eighty Years and More; Reminiscences 1815-1897Elizabeth Cady Stanton
- More Letters of Charles Darwin — Volume 1 / A Record of His Work in a Series of Hitherto Unpublished LettersCharles Darwin
- Selected Works of Voltairine de CleyreVoltairine De Cleyre
- A Little English GalleryLouise Imogen Guiney
- Harriet MartineauFlorence Fenwick Miller
- Pen-portraits of literary women
- The Lives and Opinions of Eminent PhilosophersDiogenes Laertius
- Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant, CompleteUlysses S. Grant
- Susan B. Anthony / Rebel, Crusader, HumanitarianAlma Lutz
- My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4)Frank Harris
- Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 01 (of 10) / Cimabue to Agnolo GaddiGiorgio Vasari
- Plutarch: Lives of the noble Grecians and RomansPlutarch
- 灵历集光Shangjie Song
- The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci — Completeda Vinci Leonardo
- Lives of Fair and Gallant Ladies. Vol 1Pierre de Bourdeille Brantôme
- Society as I Have Found ItWard McAllister
- My own storyEmmeline Pankhurst
- The Romance of Biography (Vol 1 of 2) / or Memoirs of Women Loved and Celebrated by Poets, from the Days of the Troubadours to the Present Age. 3rd ed. 2 Vols.Mrs. Jameson
- Der Marquis de Sade und seine ZeitIwan Bloch
- Scenes in the Life of Harriet TubmanSarah H. Bradford
- Memoirs of the Author of a Vindication of the Rights of WomanWilliam Godwin
- Up from Slavery: An AutobiographyBooker T. Washington
- A Cyclopaedia of Canadian Biography: Being Chiefly Men of the Time / A Collection of Persons Distinguished in Professional and Political Life, Leaders in the Commerce and Industry of Canada, and Successful Pioneers
- The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau — CompleteJean-Jacques Rousseau
- Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius AntoninusEmperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius
- My Bondage and My FreedomFrederick Douglass
- Apologia pro vita suaJohn Henry Newman
- Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte — CompleteLouis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne
- Twelve Years a Slave / Narrative of Solomon Northup, a Citizen of New-York, Kidnapped in Washington City in 1841, and Rescued in 1853, from a Cotton Plantation near the Red River in LouisianaSolomon Northup
- The Story of My Life / With her letters (1887–1901) and a supplementary account of her educationHelen Keller
- The Book-Hunter / A New Edition, with a Memoir of the AuthorJohn Hill Burton
- The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — Volume 01Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806Meriwether Lewis
- Plutarch's Lives, Volume 3 (of 4)Plutarch
- Confessions of an English Opium-EaterThomas De Quincey
- Fifty Years In The Northwest / With An Introduction And Appendix Containing Reminiscences, Incidents And NotesWilliam H. C. Folsom
- Complete Prose Works / Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My FancyWalt Whitman
- Memoirs of the Court of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, CompleteMadame Campan
- Boswell's Life of Johnson / Abridged and edited, with an introduction by Charles Grosvenor OsgoodJames Boswell
- Memoirs of Louis XIV and His Court and of the Regency — Completeduc de Louis de Rouvroy Saint-Simon
- A Cyclopædia of Canadian Biography / Brief biographies of persons distinguished in the professional, military and political life, and the commerce and industry of Canada, in the twentieth century
- Old Times on the Upper Mississippi / The Recollections of a Steamboat Pilot from 1854 to 1863George Byron Merrick
- The Bābur-nāma in English (Memoirs of Bābur)Emperor of Hindustan Babur
- The letters of Queen Victoria, vol. 1, 1837-1843Queen of Great Britain Victoria
- The Journal of Sir Walter Scott / From the Original Manuscript at AbbotsfordWalter Scott
- Lineage, Life and Labors of José Rizal, Philippine PatriotAustin Craig
- Darkwater: Voices from Within the VeilW. E. B. Du Bois
- My Recollections of Lord Byroncontessa di Teresa Guiccioli
- Montreal from 1535 to 1914. Vol. 3. BiographicalWilliam H. Atherton
- Fifty years in Wall StreetHenry Clews
- Sword and Pen / Ventures and Adventures of Willard GlazierJohn Algernon Owens
- A Japanese BoyShigemi Shiukichi
- The Memoirs of Admiral Lord BeresfordBaron Charles William De la Poer Beresford Beresford
- Audubon the Naturalist: A History of His Life and Time. Vol. 2 (of 2)Francis Hobart Herrick
- Memoirs of the Duchesse de Dino (Afterwards Duchesse de Talleyrand et de Sagan), 1836-1840duchesse de Dorothée Dino
- The Canadian Portrait Gallery – Volume 3 (of 4)John Charles Dent
- As I Remember / Recollections of American Society during the Nineteenth CenturyMarian Gouverneur
- Life of St. Francis of AssisiPaul Sabatier
- Sketches of Successful New Hampshire MenVarious
- All in the Day's Work: An AutobiographyIda M. Tarbell
- Cornish Characters and Strange EventsS. Baring-Gould
- English Eccentrics and EccentricitiesJohn Timbs
- Letters of Asa Gray; Vol. 2Asa Gray
- Anzeiger für Kunde der deutschen Vorzeit (Jg. 26, 1879) / Neue FolgeVarious