Summary

The narrative in “A Biography” is related through a series of interviews between a woman named Julia Pemberton and others as she writes a biography about a recently deceased history professor at Temple College, University of London, named Lavinia Talbot. Talbot recently died of cancer at age 70 and is well known—both in academic circles and mainstream circles—for her books and television programs about parenting, children, and family communication. Julia interviews several people close to Lavinia in an effort to accurately portray her in the biography she is writing.

The biographer learns that Lavinia was a very private person involved in a very cold yet convenient marriage with Gerald Plant, a professor obsessed with his own definition of high-class academia. Lavinia’s sister, cousins, and friend describe her as being the sort of person who was dedicated to her studies and maintained...