Helen Keller’s famous autobiography ‘The Story of My Life’ explores the challenges she faced as a deaf and dumb child and her struggles of communicating with the world. The autobiography was dedicated to Alexander Graham Bell. He had taken a personal interest in Helen’s blindness and deafness. Helen Keller also shows her gratitude to her wonderful teacher Miss Sullivan. Helen Keller was born on a plantation in Tuscumbia, Alabama, on June 27, 1880 to Captain Keller. She contracted an illness which left her deaf and blind. By the age of seven, Helen had over sixty home signs to communicate with her family. In 1886, Helen Keller’s mother sent her to Dr. Chisolm and Graham Bell. Bell advised her parents to contact Perkins Institute for the Blind. The advent of Miss Sullivan was the most important event in her life. Anne Sullivan arrived in Keller’s house in March, 1887. She immediately began to teach Helen to communicate by spelling words into her hand. Gradually, she learnt from Miss Sullivan the names of all the familiar objects in her world.
The autobiography describes graphically Helen’s herculean efforts to get an education. She entered The Cambridge School for Young Ladies before gaining admittance to Radcliffe College in 1990. She graduated from Radcliffe at the age of 24, in 1904. She was the first person to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree. One of Keller’s earliest pieces of writing was ‘The Frost King’ (1891) at the age of eleven. There were allegations that the story had been plagiarised from Margaret Canby’s ‘The Frost Fairies’. At the age of 22, Keller published ‘The Story of My Life (1903), written during her time in college. Keller depended on books for pleasure and wisdom. She started with ‘Little Lord Fauntleroy’. She went on to read ‘‘Greek Heroes’’, La Fontaine’s ‘‘Fables’’, Howthorne’s ‘‘Wonder Book’’, ‘‘Bible Stories’’, Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare, ‘‘The Arabian Nights’’ and ‘‘Robinson Crusoe. In ‘The Story of My Life’ Helen also writes about her pleasures and amusements. Swimming, rowing, canoeing on moonlight nights and sailing were her favourite amusements. Helen Keller had a sixth sense - ‘a soul sense’ which could see, hear, feel all in one. She loved to visit museums and art stores. Music and theatre thrilled her. In the end, the autobiography describes the important persons whom she valued more than anything else in life. They were Bishop Brooks, Henry Drummond, Dr. Everett Hale, Dr. Alexander Graham Bell, Mrs. Hutton, Dean Howell’s and of course, Mark Twain. These were the persons and friends who had made the story of her life. They turned her limitations into beautiful privileges and achievements.
