Beyond Biography: New Perspectives on Tibetan Life-writing
Conference report
“Beyond Biography” was the first larger collaboration between the Tibetan and Himalayan Studies Research Cluster and the Life-Writing Centre at Wolfson College.Tibet has an unusually rich tradition of biographical writing, the larger part of which is still waiting to be explored. The aim of the conference was to view Tibetan biographies and autobiographies within the broader context of life-writing across the world and to explore new avenues of interpretation and understanding, addressing for instance literary theory, cross-cultural perspectives, art history, and the pragmatics of (re-)enactment of life-stories.
The conference was opened by Hermione Lee and began with a lively dialogue on autobiography by Elleke Boehmer and Laura Marcus who addressed some of the burning questions that are specific to Tibetan and Buddhist life-writing: How does the belief in reincarnation affect the way a life is viewed and told? How is an individual life story presented in a culture whose predominant philosophy deconstructs the notion of a “self”? The other conference papers focused on Tibetan material, complemented by a paper on the autobiographies of Buddhist masters from Thailand. They analysed the literary features of Tibetan biographies (such as the interplay of prose and song), looked at different types of biographies (public and “secret” life stories), discussed Tibeto-Mongolian interactions and the notion of bio-geography (the way life stories are embedded and re-enacted in their respective locations), and even foreshadowed themes of the upcoming conference on “The Lives of Objects” (2013) by a case study of the “secret lives” of sacred objects in some villages of northern Nepal.
During the conference, participants were introduced to the “Treasury of Lives” internet resource and saw images from the photo collection of the late Michael Aris. Speakers and participants enjoyed the warm environment of Wolfson and Oxford, and the discussions continued long into the night in varying locations. The conference was a stimulating experience and led to the resolution not only to publish the conference papers, but also to plan similar follow-up conferences in the future.
