Choose the correct one-word substitute for: 'A record of one's own life written by oneself'.

Correct — D. The phrase has two parts: one's own life, and written by oneself.

Autobiography is built from exactly those parts: auto (self) + bio (life) + graphy (writing). It is the account of a life written by the person who lived it.

Biography has the life but not the self-authorship, so it fails the second part → option (d).

Why the others are wrong

• (a)
  Biography — Biography is the story of a person's life written by someone else. It fits 'a record of one's life' but fails 'written by oneself'.
• (b)
  Memorandum — Memorandum is a written note or message recording something for future reference, as in office or diplomatic use. It is not an account of anyone's life.
• (c)
  Memoir — Memoir is the nearest miss: it is written from the author's own experience, often of particular events or people. The standard substitute for a life story written by its subject is autobiography.

One-word substitution rewards splitting the definition into parts and finding the word whose roots carry every part.

Here the parts are life + self + writing. Autobiography holds all three: auto (self), bio (life), graphy (writing). Biography drops auto, so someone else is the writer.

The same Greek roots build autograph (a person's own signature) and graphology (the study of handwriting).

Key facts

• Autobiography: the story of a person's life written by that person.
• Biography: the story of a person's life written by someone else.
• Greek roots: auto = self, bio = life, graphy = writing.
• Memorandum: a written note or message recording something for future reference.

Common traps

• Picking Biography because it is the more familiar word, and missing 'written by oneself'.
• Picking Memoir because it is also first-person, without checking which word's parts match every part of the phrase.

No directly related past PYQ was found.