Harold Evans' six favorite­ bio­graphies and memoirs

Harold Evans is The Week’s editor-at-large and author of The American Century. His autobiography, My Paper Chase, will be released in the coming week.

For The Week, he named his six favorite­ bio­graphies and memoirs.

One title on the list:

Journal of a Disappointed Man by W.N.P. Barbellion (Cornell, $24).

A literary sensation in 1919, this vivid memoir-diary has just been reissued. A witty and observant naturalist, its author learned on the day he was declared unfit for service in World War I’s trenches that he was already fatally ill. His diary assumes a dramatic intensity and becomes an uplifting journey.

Read about the other five books on Evans' list.

--Marshal Zeringue