Multiple Lurias. Reconstructing Alexander Romanovich's Life-Writing.

Abstract

While widely considered Alexander Luria's (1902-1977) autobiography, The Making of Mind. A Personal Account of Soviet Psychology, published posthumously in 1979, is not a true autobiography but rather an autobiography with heterobiographic elements. However, the largely overlooked Spanish book, Mirando hacia atrás. La vida de un psicólogo soviético en retrospección, published in the same year, may be regarded as an authentic autobiography written by Luria. Based on the close reading of previously unknown archival sources, including Luria's autobiographic typescripts, the central argument of the article shows that it is likely that the history of this key figure in modern Soviet neuropsychology is embodied in various instances of his life-writing. Our reconstruction of Luria's life-writing is transnational in scope and multi-language based. It aims at drawing an overall account, which may later be followed by a series of contributions dealing with details of the history of Luria's life-writing.