Introduction To Reading and Writing Essays

Virginia Woolf

"Common Readers" (essay volumes), "Death of a Moth"

Thomas Paine

"Common Sense", The Crisis

MLK Jr.

"I Have a Dream" , essay "Letter from Birmingham Jail"

Joan Didion

"Marrying Absurd"- Las Vegas Weddings, wrote about social issues in the 60's

Sei Shonagon

Japanese court lady (from the 10th century), wrote pillow books: private journals

Maxine Hong Kingston

Power and place of gender in the traditional China, No Name Woman: woman becomes pregnant while unmarried.

Essaie/Essayer

to try or attempt

Pico Lyer

"No Where Man", loungers

Henry David Thoreau

"On the Duty of Civil Disobedience", Walden: Book of Essays

William Hazlitt

"On the Pleasure of Hating," English literary critic: essays should have more "gusto" and stressed the importance of feeling in writing

Tom Wolfe

"One life: Culture in the 60's", The Electric Kool-aid acid test (nonfiction)

George Orwell

Animal Farm, "Shooting and Elephant", wrote about imperialism

E.B. White

Charlotte's Web, Wrote columns for Harpers in The New Yorker.

Yoshida Kenko

Japanese poet and Buddhist monk, "Essays in Idleness", wrote fragmentary essays that echoed the brush strokes of zen painting, essays lamented the passing of customs

James Thurber

Drew satirical cartoons, short story "The Secret Life of Walter Mitty", "Is sex necessary?"

Judith Ortiz Cofer

Dual culture and linguistic identity, A Partial Remembrance of a Puerto Rican Childhood

Samuel Johnson

English essayist, committed tory, famous for satirical tone, published in his periodicals The Rambler, Idler, and Adventurer.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Essays came from public lecture, delivered encouraging speeches to inspire people to be self-reliant and sufficient. (Ex. Hitch your wagon to a star, trust thyself, and give all to love.)

Charles Lamb

Essays of Elia (personal, conversational), life-long bachelor, "A Bachelor's Complaint"

Francis Bacon

Father of the English Essay, essays were less personal and gave advice on how to live

Michel de Montaigne

French essayist who named the genre "essais" meaning attempts, Father of the Modern Essay, personal tone (casual annecdotes)

Jonathan Swift

Gulliver's Travels, the satire "A Modest Proposal"

Plutarch

Parallel Lives: noble deeds of Greek and Roman leaders and soldiers, Influenced the art of the biography.

Ben Franklin

Poor Richard's Almanac, famous for his aphorisms (Ex. Fish and visitors stink after three days.)

Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

Teamed together to publish in periodicals on manners, "The Tatler" and "The Speculator" (British Journals), new way of journalism

Aphorism

The expression of general truth. (Ex. Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.)

N. Scott Momaday

Writes about native american tradition in grandmother's pov reflecting on cultural values of the Kiowa tribe, "The Way to Rainy Mountain"

Gretel Ehrlich

Writes about what real cowboys and the truth about their lives in the west, collection of essays in Islands, The Universe, Home

Frederick Douglas

Wrote about his struggle for literacy as a black slave, "Learning to Read and Write"

James Baldwin

Wrote about race in America and his position as a black writer, Notes from a Native Son: essays about his father and race in Europe and America.

Seneca

Wrote essays in classic oratory on topics like "Asthma": Described an attack and his reaction, and "Noise"