The Story of my life; with her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan

Helen Keller opens her autobiography by admitting how hard it is to recall her earliest years, when memory and imagination blur together. Rather than attempt a complete record, she offers a set of sketches focused on the episodes that seem most meaningful. She tells of her birth in 1880 in a small town in northern Alabama, and of a family whose roots reach back to a Swiss ancestor who taught deaf students. Her grandfather's land dealings and his long journeys on horseback also appear, drawn from letters that still survive in the family. Later sections, which include letters and reports from her teacher Anne Sullivan, describe the education that followed.