HELEN KELLER: THE TWO AUTOBIOGRAPHIES "The Story of My Life" by Helen Keller the Adult, and "My Story" by Helen Keller the Child (Age 12)

Overview

Helen Keller’s well-known autobiography, the story of her life up to age 21, portions of which were adapted for the play and movie “The Miracle Worker,” was written while she was in college and published in 1903. It is Part I of a three-part publication, with Part II containing letters written by Helen Keller and Part III containing a supplementary account of her education (from reports of her teacher, Anne Sullivan). Both the book itself and the first portion of the book were entitled “The Story of My Life.”

Much less known is the shorter autobiography, “My Story,” Helen Keller wrote at age 12 especially for a magazine called “Youth’s Companion.” As Helen Keller explained in her adult autobiography: “[Miss Sullivan] persuaded me to write for the ‘Youth’s Companion’ a brief account of my life. I was then twelve years old. As I look back on my struggle to write that little story, it seems to me that I must have had a prophetic vision of the good that would come of the undertaking, or I should surely have failed. I wrote timidly, fearfully, but resolutely, urged on by my teacher.” When “Youth’s Companion” published the four-part account, Helen Keller was not yet well known, and her story was prefaced by the explanatory remark: “Written wholly without help of any sort by Helen Keller, a deaf and blind girl, twelve years old, and printed without change.”

This Nook edition includes the complete text of both autobiographies of Helen Keller: Part I of “The Story of My Life” (Parts II and III, containing her letters and the supplemental account of her education, are not included), and the very rare autobiography of 12-year-old Helen Keller, “My Story.”

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