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It seems to me - & I was discussing this elsewhere - that while the first part of Niggle may be seen as 'autobiographical', the second part (after he leaves on his 'journey') cannot be. It strikes me that it is more 'hope', or 'wishful thinking'. In other words its what he hopes his work will become - that it will be 'accepted' by the Voices, taken up & made something 'more', made 'Real'.
Yet he couldn't know that it would be. Part One is where he is, Part Two is where he hopes to be. Hence it could be argued that the least important part of LbN is the autobiographical part & the most important part the one that follows. And yet, the First Part would be simply 'bland', merely a resetting of his own life (or his perception of it), & tell us not very much. It is the 'dream' (or Dream) of what it will become that is significant - not the (allegorised) reality, but the Reality he hopes for. Hence it is not really 'autobiographical' at all. If Part To is an 'allegory' at all it is an allegory of his hope, of something that does not (or cannot be proved to) exist. One could almost call it a plea to the voices (& yet the Voices too are a Dream).
This calls into question his motivation, because for all he claims that his work has no 'meaning' or purpose beyond itself, it clearly does (in hope if not in actual fact). He desires that his work may be taken up & made into a Way beyond, in to & beyond the Mountains.
And yet, that being the case, was this little story the only way he could express that desire? He (it seems) could not state that his Legendarium would open a door to something greater, that it could open the gates of Heaven. That would be too much, too presumptious. But he could write a story about a little man, a painter, who painted a picture of a tree which proved to be a real Tree in a little land at the foot of the Mountains.
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