# What was the first (auto)biography titled "I, \"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** books-writing-myths\ **Created:** [November 26, 2023, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709 "2023-11-26T10:33:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2023, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/1 "2023-11-26T10:33:27Z")
Offhand I can think of three (auto)biographical works (in some cases partly fictionalized) whose title follows this pattern: - _I, Claudius_, by Robert Graves (1934) - _I, Tina_ by Tina Turner (1986) - _I, Tonya_, the 2017 film about Tonya Harding Was Graves’s book the first to use this title template? Or are there earlier examples? ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2023, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/2 "2023-11-26T11:25:18Z")
Discussed briefly on Stack Exchange: > No clear conclusion. A wiki cite supports the idea that Graves started the trend in 1934, but it’s unknown whether this is his own coining or if it’s supposed to be a classical-lit reference to something. Oh, and I’d add “I, Robot” and “I, the Jury” as titles that follow the syntax. Not biographical but clearly inspired. ---
**Author:** ![psychonaut](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/psychonaut/32/4655_2.png) [@psychonaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/psychonaut)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2023, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/3 "2023-11-26T11:41:05Z")
Graves’s title sounds like it might plausibly be the incipit of a classical autobiography. (An incipit is the first few words of a text. Since many ancient and medieval works didn’t have titles, their incipits were often used to refer to them in the same way as a title.) I wonder if there is any memoir from Ancient Rome that actually begins this way. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2023, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/4 "2023-11-26T17:30:59Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > Oh, and I’d add “I, Robot” … Not biographical but clearly inspired. Worth mentioning: Isaac Asimov later published a memoir titled _I. Asimov_ with a period rather than a comma (though some listings on Amazon give the title as _I, Asimov_). I’m sure it’s a nod to this syntax as used in _I, Robot_ as well as his first initial. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [November 26, 2023, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/5 "2023-11-26T20:11:44Z")
Wow. I’ve used the book as research a hundred times and never noticed that. Great catch. “I, Robot” doesn’t originate with Asimov, BTW, but with a 1939 story by Eando Binder. The use on Asimov’s robot stories was a blatant steal, which Asimov disliked. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2023, 12:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/6 "2023-11-27T00:31:41Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > “I, Robot” doesn’t originate with Asimov, BTW, but with a 1939 story by Eando Binder. The use on Asimov’s robot stories was a blatant steal, which Asimov disliked. IIRC, Asimov wanted to call the compilation “Mind and Iron”, which IMO is a better match for the themes of the stories therein. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [November 27, 2023, 12:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-auto-biography-titled-i-name/993709/7 "2023-11-27T00:39:55Z")
And he acknowledged that the title wasn’t his, originally: > [“I, Robot”] certainly caught my attention. Two months after I read it, I began ‘Robbie’, about a sympathetic robot, and that was the start of my positronic robot series. Eleven years later, when nine of my robot stories were collected into a book, the publisher named the collection _[I, Robot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot)_ over my objections. My book is now the more famous, but Otto’s story was there first.[[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I,_Robot_(short_story)#cite_note-1)