The article deals with the key concepts used in the analysis of autobiographical literature. The Russian and foreign science is acknowledged to lack the terminological precision in their application which leads to the notions and literary genres being diffused. The author analyzes the definition of the autobiography genre introduced by a French literary scholar Ph. Lejeune, as well as the polemic debate on his concept in the Western criticism of the 1950s–1970s, which revealed the fact that the real range of autobiographical works is significantly more diverse.