best essays world

40 Best Essays of All Time (Including Links & Writing Tips)

I had little money (buying forty collections of essays was out of the question) so I’ve found them online instead. I’ve hacked through piles of them, and finally, I’ve found the great ones. Now I want to share the whole list with you (with the addition of my notes about writing). Each item on the list has a direct link to the essay, so please click away and indulge yourself. Also, next to each essay, there’s an image of the book that contains the original work.

About this essay list:

Reading essays is like indulging in candy; once you start, it’s hard to stop. I sought out essays that were not only well-crafted but also impactful. These pieces genuinely shifted my perspective. Whether you’re diving in for enjoyment or to hone your writing, these essays promise to leave an imprint. It’s fascinating how an essay can resonate with you, and even if details fade, its essence remains. I haven’t ranked them in any way; they’re all stellar. Skim through, explore the summaries, and pick up some writing tips along the way. For more essay gems, consider “Best American Essays” by Joyce Carol Oates or “101 Essays That Will Change The Way You Think” curated by Brianna Wiest.

40 Best Essays of All Time (With Links And Writing Tips)

1. david sedaris – laugh, kookaburra.

A great family drama takes place against the backdrop of the Australian wilderness. And the Kookaburra laughs… This is one of the top essays of the lot. It’s a great mixture of family reminiscences, travel writing, and advice on what’s most important in life. You’ll also learn an awful lot about the curious culture of the Aussies.

Writing tips from the essay:

2. charles d’ambrosio – documents, 3. e. b. white – once more to the lake, 4. zadie smith – fail better, 5. virginia woolf – death of the moth, 6. meghan daum – my misspent youth, 7. roger ebert – go gentle into that good night, 8. george orwell – shooting an elephant, 9. george orwell – a hanging, 10. christopher hitchens – assassins of the mind, 11. christopher hitchens – the new commandments, 12. phillip lopate – against joie de vivre, 13. philip larkin – the pleasure principle, 14. sigmund freud – thoughts for the times on war and death, 15. zadie smith – some notes on attunement.

“You are privy to a great becoming, but you recognize nothing” – Francis Dolarhyde. This one is about the elusiveness of change occurring within you. For Zadie, it was hard to attune to the vibes of Joni Mitchell – especially her Blue album. But eventually, she grew up to appreciate her genius, and all the other things changed as well. This top essay is all about the relationship between humans, and art. We shouldn’t like art because we’re supposed to. We should like it because it has an instantaneous, emotional effect on us. Although, according to Stansfield (Gary Oldman) in Léon, liking Beethoven is rather mandatory.

16. Annie Dillard – Total Eclipse

17. édouard levé – when i look at a strawberry, i think of a tongue, 18. gloria e. anzaldúa – how to tame a wild tongue, 19. kurt vonnegut – dispatch from a man without a country, 20. mary ruefle – on fear.

Most psychologists and gurus agree that fear is the greatest enemy of success or any creative activity. It’s programmed into our minds to keep us away from imaginary harm. Mary Ruefle takes on this basic human emotion with flair. She explores fear from so many angles (especially in the world of poetry-writing) that at the end of this personal essay, you will look at it, dissect it, untangle it, and hopefully be able to say “f**k you” the next time your brain is trying to stop you.

21. Susan Sontag – Against Interpretation

22. nora ephron – a few words about breasts, 23. carl sagan – does truth matter – science, pseudoscience, and civilization, 24. paul graham – how to do what you love, 25. john jeremiah sullivan – mister lytle, 26. joan didion – on self respect, 27. susan sontag – notes on camp, 28. ralph waldo emerson – self-reliance, 29. david foster wallace – consider the lobster, 30. david foster wallace – the nature of the fun.

The famous novelist and author of the most powerful commencement speech ever done is going to tell you about the joys and sorrows of writing a work of fiction. It’s like taking care of a mutant child that constantly oozes smelly liquids. But you love that child and you want others to love it too. It’s a very humorous account of what it means to be an author. If you ever plan to write a novel, you should read that one. And the story about the Chinese farmer is just priceless.

31. Margaret Atwood – Attitude

32. jo ann beard – the fourth state of matter, 33. terence mckenna – tryptamine hallucinogens and consciousness, 34. eudora welty – the little store, 35. john mcphee – the search for marvin gardens.

The Search for Marvin Gardens contains many layers of meaning. It’s a story about a Monopoly championship, but also, it’s the author’s search for the lost streets visible on the board of the famous board game. It also presents a historical perspective on the rise and fall of civilizations, and on Atlantic City, which once was a lively place, and then, slowly declined, the streets filled with dirt and broken windows.

36. Maxine Hong Kingston – No Name Woman

37. joan didion – on keeping a notebook, 38. joan didion – goodbye to all that, 39. george orwell – reflections on gandhi, 40. george orwell – politics and the english language, other essays you may find interesting, oliver sacks – on libraries, noam chomsky – the responsibility of intellectuals, sam harris – the riddle of the gun.

Sam Harris, now a famous philosopher and neuroscientist, takes on the problem of gun control in the United States. His thoughts are clear of prejudice. After reading this, you’ll appreciate the value of logical discourse overheated, irrational debate that more often than not has real implications on policy.

Tim Ferriss – Some Practical Thoughts on Suicide

Edward said – reflections on exile, richard feynman – it’s as simple as one, two, three…, rabindranath tagore – the religion of the forest, richard dawkins – letter to his 10-year-old daughter.

Every father should be able to articulate his philosophy of life to his children. With this letter that’s similar to what you find in the Paris Review essays , the famed atheist and defender of reason, Richard Dawkins, does exactly that. It’s beautifully written and stresses the importance of looking at evidence when we’re trying to make sense of the world.

Albert Camus – The Minotaur (or, The Stop In Oran)

Koty neelis – 21 incredible life lessons from anthony bourdain, lucius annaeus seneca – on the shortness of life, bertrand russell – in praise of idleness, james baldwin – stranger in the village.

It’s an essay on the author’s experiences as an African-American in a Swiss village, exploring race, identity, and alienation while highlighting the complexities of racial dynamics and the quest for belonging.

Bonus – More writing tips from two great books

The sense of style – by steven pinker, on writing well – by william zinsser, now immerse yourself in the world of essays, rafal reyzer.

Hey there, welcome to my blog! I'm a full-time entrepreneur building two companies, a digital marketer, and a content creator with 10+ years of experience. I started RafalReyzer.com to provide you with great tools and strategies you can use to become a proficient digital marketer and achieve freedom through online creativity. My site is a one-stop shop for digital marketers, and content enthusiasts who want to be independent, earn more money, and create beautiful things. Explore my journey here , and don't miss out on my AI Marketing Mastery online course.

• NONFICTION BOOKS
• BEST NONFICTION 2023
• BEST NONFICTION 2024
• Historical Biographies
• The Best Memoirs and Autobiographies
• Philosophical Biographies
• World War 2
• World History
• American History
• British History
• Chinese History
• Russian History
• Ancient History (up to 500)
• Medieval History (500-1400)
• Military History
• Art History
• Travel Books
• Ancient Philosophy
• Contemporary Philosophy
• Ethics & Moral Philosophy
• Great Philosophers
• Social & Political Philosophy
• Classical Studies
• New Science Books
• Maths & Statistics
• Popular Science
• Physics Books
• Climate Change Books
• How to Write
• English Grammar & Usage
• Books for Learning Languages
• Linguistics
• Political Ideologies
• Foreign Policy & International Relations
• American Politics
• British Politics
• Religious History Books
• Mental Health
• Neuroscience
• Child Psychology
• Film & Cinema
• Opera & Classical Music
• Behavioural Economics
• Development Economics
• Economic History
• Financial Crisis
• World Economies
• Investing Books
• Artificial Intelligence/AI Books
• Data Science Books
• Sex & Sexuality
• Death & Dying
• Food & Cooking
• Sports, Games & Hobbies
• FICTION BOOKS
• BEST NOVELS 2024
• BEST FICTION 2023
• New Literary Fiction
• World Literature
• Literary Criticism
• Literary Figures
• Classic English Literature
• American Literature
• Comics & Graphic Novels
• Fairy Tales & Mythology
• Historical Fiction
• Crime Novels
• Science Fiction
• Short Stories
• South Africa
• United States
• Arctic & Antarctica
• Afghanistan
• Myanmar (Formerly Burma)
• Netherlands
• Kids Recommend Books for Kids
• High School Teachers Recommendations
• Prizewinning Kids' Books
• Popular Series Books for Kids
• BEST BOOKS FOR KIDS (ALL AGES)
• Ages Baby-2
• Books for Teens and Young Adults
• THE BEST SCIENCE BOOKS FOR KIDS
• BEST KIDS' BOOKS OF 2023
• BEST BOOKS FOR TEENS OF 2023
• Best Audiobooks for Kids
• Environment
• Best Books for Teens of 2023
• Best Kids' Books of 2023
• Political Novels
• New History Books
• New Historical Fiction
• New Biography
• New Memoirs
• New World Literature
• New Economics Books
• New Climate Books
• New Math Books
• New Philosophy Books
• New Psychology Books
• New Physics Books
• THE BEST AUDIOBOOKS
• Actors Read Great Books
• Books Narrated by Their Authors
• Best Audiobook Thrillers
• Best History Audiobooks
• Nobel Literature Prize
• Booker Prize (fiction)
• Baillie Gifford Prize (nonfiction)
• Financial Times (nonfiction)
• Wolfson Prize (history)
• Royal Society (science)
• Pushkin House Prize (Russia)
• Walter Scott Prize (historical fiction)
• Arthur C Clarke Prize (sci fi)
• The Hugos (sci fi & fantasy)
• Audie Awards (audiobooks)

Make Your Own List

Nonfiction Books » Essays

The best essays: the 2021 pen/diamonstein-spielvogel award, recommended by adam gopnik.

WINNER OF the 2021 PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay

Had I Known: Collected Essays by Barbara Ehrenreich

Every year, the judges of the PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay search out the best book of essays written in the past year and draw attention to the author's entire body of work. Here, Adam Gopnik , writer, journalist and PEN essay prize judge, emphasizes the role of the essay in bearing witness and explains why the five collections that reached the 2021 shortlist are, in their different ways, so important.

Interview by Benedict King

Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader by Vivian Gornick

Nature Matrix: New and Selected Essays by Robert Michael Pyle

Terroir: Love, Out of Place by Natasha Sajé

Maybe the People Would be the Times by Luc Sante

1 Had I Known: Collected Essays by Barbara Ehrenreich

2 unfinished business: notes of a chronic re-reader by vivian gornick, 3 nature matrix: new and selected essays by robert michael pyle, 4 terroir: love, out of place by natasha sajé, 5 maybe the people would be the times by luc sante.

W e’re talking about the books shortlisted for the 2021 PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay . As an essayist yourself, or as a reader of essays, what are you looking for? What’s the key to a good essay ?

Let’s turn to the books that made the shortlist of the 2021 PEN Award for the Art of the Essay. The winning book was Had I Known: Collected Essays by Barbara Ehrenreich , whose books have been recommended a number of times on Five Books. Tell me more. 

One of the criteria for this particular prize is that it should be not just for a single book, but for a body of work. One of the things we wanted to honour about Barbara Ehrenreich is that she has produced a remarkable body of work. Although it’s offered in a more specifically political register than some essayists, or that a great many past prize winners have practised, the quiddity of her work is that it remains rooted in personal experience, in the act of bearing witness. She has a passionate political point to make, certainly, a series of them, many seeming all the more relevant now than when she began writing. Nonetheless, her writing still always depends on the intimacy of first-hand knowledge, what people in post-incarceration work call ‘lived experience’ (a term with a distinguished philosophical history). Her book Nickel and Dimed is the classic example of that. She never writes from a distance about working-class life in America. She bears witness to the nature and real texture of working-class life in America.

“One point of giving awards…is to keep passing the small torches of literary tradition”

Next up of the books on the 2021 PEN essay prize shortlist is Unfinished Business: Notes of a Chronic Re-Reader by Vivian Gornick.

Vivian Gornick is a writer who’s been around for a very long time. Although longevity is not in itself a criterion for excellence—or for this prize, or in the writing life generally—persistence and perseverance are. Writers who keep coming back at us, again and again, with a consistent vision, are surely to be saluted. For her admirers, her appetite to re-read things already read is one of the most attractive parts of her oeuvre , if I can call it that; her appetite not just to read but to read deeply and personally. One of the things that people who love her work love about it is that her readings are never academic, or touched by scholarly hobbyhorsing. They’re readings that involve the fullness of her experience, then applied to literature. Although she reads as a critic, she reads as an essayist reads, rather than as a reviewer reads. And I think that was one of the things that was there to honour in her body of work, as well.

Is she a novelist or journalist, as well?

Let’s move on to the next book which made the 2021 PEN essay shortlist. This is Nature Matrix: New and Selected Essays by Robert Michael Pyle.

I have a special reason for liking this book in particular, and that is that it corresponds to one of the richest and oldest of American genres, now often overlooked, and that’s the naturalist essay. You can track it back to Henry David Thoreau , if not to Ralph Waldo Emerson , this American engagement with nature , the wilderness, not from a narrowly scientific point of view, nor from a purely ecological or environmental point of view—though those things are part of it—but again, from the point of view of lived experience, of personal testimony.

Let’s look at the next book on the shortlist of the 2021 PEN Awards, which is Terroir: Love, Out of Place by Natasha Sajé. Why did these essays appeal?

One of the things that was appealing about this book is that’s it very much about, in every sense, the issues of the day: the idea of place, of where we are, how we are located on any map as individuals by ethnic identity, class, gender—all of those things. But rather than being carried forward in a narrowly argumentative way, again, in the classic manner of the essay, Sajé’s work is ruminative. It walks around these issues from the point of view of someone who’s an expatriate, someone who’s an émigré, someone who’s a world citizen, but who’s also concerned with the idea of ‘terroir’, the one place in the world where we belong. And I think the dialogue in her work between a kind of cosmopolitanism that she has along with her self-critical examination of the problem of localism and where we sit on the world, was inspiring to us.

Get the weekly Five Books newsletter

Last of the books on the shortlist for the 2021 Pen essay award is Maybe the People Would Be the Times by Luc Sante.

Again, here’s a writer who’s had a distinguished generalised career, writing about lots of places and about lots of subjects. In the past, he’s made his special preoccupation what he calls ‘low life’, but I think more broadly can be called the marginalized or the repressed and abject. He’s also written acute introductions to the literature of ‘low life’, the works of Asbury and David Maurer, for instance.

But I think one of the things that was appealing about what he’s done is the sheer range of his enterprise. He writes about countless subjects. He can write about A-sides and B-sides of popular records—singles—then go on to write about Jacques Rivette’s cinema. He writes from a kind of private inspection of public experience. He has a lovely piece about tabloid headlines and their evolution. And I think that omnivorous range of enthusiasms and passions is a stirring reminder in a time of specialization and compartmentalization of the essayist’s freedom to roam. If Pyle is in the tradition of Thoreau, I suspect Luc Sante would be proud to be put in the tradition of Baudelaire—the flaneur who walks the streets, sees everything, broods on it all and writes about it well.

One point of giving awards, with all their built-in absurdity and inevitable injustice, is to keep alive, or at least to keep passing, the small torches of literary tradition. And just as much as we’re honoring the great tradition of the naturalist essay in the one case, I think we’re honoring the tradition of the Baudelairean flaneur in this one.

April 18, 2021

Five Books aims to keep its book recommendations and interviews up to date. If you are the interviewee and would like to update your choice of books (or even just what you say about them) please email us at [email protected]

Support Five Books

Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you've enjoyed this interview, please support us by donating a small amount .

©Brigitte Lacombe

Adam Gopnik

Adam Gopnik has been a staff writer at the New Yorker since 1986. His many books include A Thousand Small Sanities: The Moral Adventure of Liberalism . He is a three time winner of the National Magazine Award for Essays & Criticism, and in 2021 was made a chevalier of the Legion d'Honneur by the French Republic.

We ask experts to recommend the five best books in their subject and explain their selection in an interview.

This site has an archive of more than one thousand seven hundred interviews, or eight thousand book recommendations. We publish at least two new interviews per week.

Five Books participates in the Amazon Associate program and earns money from qualifying purchases.

© Five Books 2024

Longreads : The best longform stories on the web

Longreads Best of 2020: Essays

Share this:.

• Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)
• Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Mastodon (Opens in new window)

All through December, we’re featuring Longreads’ Best of 2020. This year, our editors picked and featured hundreds of beautifully written and poignant essays published on the web. Because of the wide range of writing across many topics and themes, it was a challenge to sift through them all over the past several weeks to compile a definitive Best of Essays list. As I shortlisted stories, I realized there could be many different versions of this list, but, in the end, these eight reads really spoke to me.

If you like these, you can  sign up to receive our weekly email every Friday .

Mississippi: A Poem, in Days (Kiese Makeba Laymon, Vanity Fair )

Kiese Makeba Laymon was on a book tour when the pandemic hit in the U.S. In this stunner of a piece that unfolds over 14 days, the author writes on fear, racism, death, and home amid a moment of awakening. We follow along on the journey, from event to event in Ohio and West Virginia, with Laymon’s observations and thoughts interspersed with daily COVID-19 death counts and the latest words or orders from Donald Trump and Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves. It’s a powerful meditation, one that will stop you in your tracks.

We are awakened, I want to believe. 75 miles from the armed confederate statue in Oxford, Emmett Till’s childish body was destroyed. 70 miles from that armed confederate statue, Fannie Lou Hamer was nearly beaten to death. 160 miles from that armed confederate statue, Medgar Evers was murdered as he enters his home. 80 miles from that armed confederate statue, Martin Luther King was murdered in Memphis. It took way too much Black death to get here. I am wandering around the spiritual consequences of materially progressing at the expense of Black death. I want to be courageous. I wonder, though, when courage becomes contagious—when courage is credentialized, subsidized, and incentivized—if it is still courage at all. Today, as I prepare to push send, and I lather my hands in sanitizer, it feels a bit too much like cowardice. Maybe I’ll wait to send tomorrow. Maybe I won’t send at all. The Lafayette County Board of Supervisors, a group of white men, unanimously vote to keep the armed confederate monument in the middle of Oxford, the town where I live, teach, and write. Humiliation, agony, and death, are what I feel. It could all be so much worse, is what the worst of white folks want us to recite.

Molly (Blake Butler, The Volta )

December’s special issue of The Volta is dedicated to the late poet Molly Brodak, and Brodak’s husband, Blake Butler, writes an incredibly moving essay to remember and honor her. In “Molly,” he weaves an intimate portrait of his late wife — and the details, textures, and expanse of their relationship –with so much love and care. Grab a tissue before sitting down to read it.

Making her laugh made me feel alive, like I’d really accomplished something. She wanted to laugh, I think, despite a widening parcel in her telling her that laughter in a world like ours was for fools. When I think the sound of it now, it reminds me of a bird trapped in a ballroom, looking for anywhere to land.

But there was always something still there underneath that, shredding its pasture—parts of her so dark and displaced I cannot find them anywhere touching the rest of how she was. The story, like all stories, holds no true shape. And that’s exactly what it wants—the pain—it wants more blank to feed the pain with, to fill the space up. It wants us all.

Then, in her poem, “Horse and Cart,” one of the last she ever wrote: “I can’t even imagine a horse / anymore. / That we sat on their spines / and yanked their mouths around.” The gears of her mind, as she grew tired, wore down even these good times, seeking further ways to break them up, send her away.

I Cry for the Mountains: A Legacy Lost (Dave Daley, Chico Enterprise-Record )

California experienced another unprecedented wildfire season this year; a number of fire complexes burned throughout the state, including the massive North Complex Fire that started in August and burned in Northern California’s Plumas and Butte counties. Rancher Dave Daley offers a devastating account of the destruction of his family’s cattle range in Plumas National Forest, and a passionate plea to legislators and regulators to ultimately listen to the land and the locals when it comes to forest management. Daley originally posted this account on Facebook; his followers recommended that the Chico Enterprise-Record  reprint it for a wider audience.

I cry for the forest, the trees and streams, and the horrible deaths suffered by the wildlife and our cattle. The suffering was unimaginable. When you find groups of cows and their baby calves tumbled in a ravine trying to escape, burned almost beyond recognition or a fawn and small calf side by side as if hoping to protect one another, you try not to wretch. You only pray death was swift. Worse, in searing memory, cows with their hooves, udder and even legs burned off still alive who had to be euthanized. A doe lying in the ashes with three fawns, not all hers I bet. And you are glad they can stand and move, even with a limp, because you really cannot imagine any more death today.

For those of you on the right blaming the left and California, these are National Forest lands that are “managed” by the feds. They have failed miserably over the past 50 years. Smokey the Bear was the cruelest joke ever played on the western landscape, a decades long campaign to prevent forest fires has resulted in mega-fires of a scope we’ve never seen. Thanks, Smokey.

I get frustrated with experts and consultants who drive by and “know just what to do.” For 35 years I have attended conferences, given presentations and listened. What I have learned is solutions are local and specific. What happens in one watershed in Plumas or Butte County may be entirely different in the Lassen National Forest just next door. But experts of all kinds are glad to tell you how to do it. “Let’s prescribe graze, use virtual fences, change your timing, change your genetics.” Prescribe graze the forest and canyons? Yea. Right. They don’t know what they don’t know but they will take the honorarium anyway and have a great dinner on your dime. The locals and land rarely benefit.

How My Mother and I Became Chinese Propaganda (Jiayang Fa n , The New Yorker )

Jiayang Fan pens a masterful piece of personal history, on her mother and their relationship, identity, family, propaganda and social media, and chronic illness (her mother has amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS) . Fan recounts her struggle to help her mother get hospital care during New York’s COVID-19 crisis, all while going viral and facing threats on social media, calling her a criminal and a traitor to China. She tells a complicated and very personal story, one of loyalty and love, with strength and eloquence.

My mother has always knelt at the altar of  mianzi , an aspiration of which A.L.S. makes a spectacular mockery. You may think it’s embarrassing to slur your speech and limp, but wait until you are being spoon-fed and pushed around in a wheelchair—all of which will seem trivial once you can no longer wash or wipe yourself. The progress of the disease is a forced march toward the vanishing point of  mianzi . When my mother was first given her diagnosis, she became obsessed with the idea of why—why her, why now, and, above all, why an illness that would subject her to the kind of public humiliation she feared more than death itself. When she could still operate her first-generation iPad, my mother gave me a contact list of everyone she was still in touch with in China, and told me that, except for her siblings, no one must know of her affliction. Such self-imposed isolation seemed like madness to me, but she preferred to cut friends out of her life rather than admit to the indignity of her compromised state. Her body’s insurrection, my mother believes, is her punishment for her prideful strivings in America.

At the beginning of the pandemic, I had read that a virus is neither dead nor alive, and replicates only in the shelter of a host organism. I began to think of “Jiayang Fan” as viral not in a social-media sense but in a biological one; the calamitous state of the world and certain random mutations in the story had made it unexpectedly contagious. My original posts had served their purpose; now they were serving the purposes of others. I had unwittingly bred a potent piece of propaganda.

The Promise That Tested My Parents Until the End (Christopher Solomon, GQ )

Don’t you ever put me in one of those places,  she said. Don’t put  me  in one of those places,  my father replied.

Christopher Solomon’s parents made a pledge to one another. But what did that actually look like over time, especially when his father became sick? What does unconditional love and devotion look like in our own lives? Solomon writes an honest and heartbreaking essay on love, aging, and marriage — in sickness and in health.

In time what was imperceptible in him became noticeable, and then what was noticeable became something worse. The landscape of my father changed, the coastline eroded. There was less of him, until the old map of my father no longer fit the man before us. It has been 20 years now since he was diagnosed, and sometimes it is hard to remember a time that he was not sick. His speech became a gargle of consonants. The dementia took most of his mind. His body curled in on itself—shrinking, reducing, as if he were becoming an infant again. Despite this, for years he still played the piano, every day, and nearly as well as ever—the mysteryland of the brain permitting this freedom even as body, and mind, crumbled around him. My mother would sing along from the kitchen, as she always had. And then one day, after I arrive home, my mother sounds more concerned than usual.  He has stopped playing the piano,  she says. This seems to worry her more than anything else.

Finally, exhausted, she relents. She drives to visit a nearby nursing home. Afterward she cries in the parking lot. She cries for what she sees there. She cries at the prospect of breaking the Promise. She cries because even though almost nothing remains of her husband—even though he is the cause of her sleepless nights and her tendinitis and her bruises and her anger—in 55 years she rarely has been apart from him. She loves even the scrap of him that remains. He is half of the story they share, of the red VW Beetle and the sunstruck Italian patios and the singalongs and the three towheaded children. As long as he is here, their story, however unlikely, is not yet over. She cries because the end of him is the end of a possibility. And I think, not for the first time, how little I still know about love.

Kamala Harris, Mass Incarceration and Me (Reginald Dwayne Betts, The New York Times Magazine )

“The prosecutor’s job, unlike the defense attorney’s or judge’s, is to do justice. What does that mean when you are asked by some to dole out retribution measured in years served, but blamed by others for the damage incarceration can do?” In this nuanced reported essay about mass incarceration in the U.S., Reginald Dwayne Betts reveals “our contradictory impulses” around crime, punishment, and the justice system. And he knows these impulses well, as both a felon and a son to a woman who was raped by a Black man.

But I know that on the other end of our prison sentences was always someone weeping. During the middle of Harris’s presidential campaign, a friend referred me to a woman with a story about Senator Harris that she felt I needed to hear. Years ago, this woman’s sister had been missing for days, and the police had done little. Happenstance gave this woman an audience with then-Attorney General Harris. A coordinated multicity search followed. The sister had been murdered; her body was found in a ravine. The woman told me that “Kamala understands the politics of victimization as well as anyone who has been in the system, which is that this kind of case — a 50-year-old Black woman gone missing or found dead — ordinarily does not get any resources put toward it.” They caught the man who murdered her sister, and he was sentenced to 131 years. I think about the man who assaulted my mother, a serial rapist, because his case makes me struggle with questions of violence and vengeance and justice. And I stop thinking about it. I am inconsistent. I want my friends out, but I know there is no one who can convince me that this man shouldn’t spend the rest of his life in prison.

Safe at Home in Los Angeles (Lynell George, High Country News )

Lynell George’s beautiful read exemplifies what I love about writing on place and home. A native of Los Angeles, George builds and shapes a complex L.A. in her piece: a “city of contradictions,” an elusive, ever-shifting place “built on either impermanence or illusion.” It’s a sensory and richly textured portrait of a vast place, looking at Los Angeles through a sort of kaleidoscope lens of gentrification, nature, and the pandemic lockdown.

Los Angeles has long been a contested domain — both as territory (from the Indigenous Tongva onward) and as emblem. Boosters, speculators and swindlers have had their way not just with the land but with the very image of Los Angeles. The city grew, like an opportunistic vine. It couldn’t just  be . It had to be bigger than life, better than perfect. Even within my lifetime, popular culture has conjured a vision of Los Angeles that is sleight-of-hand, a trick of light, brutally at odds with the lived experience. Los Angeles, by its sprawling nature, absolutely resists oversimplification. This, despite its frustrations, irritants and absurdities, is precisely why I remain here.

Those stories of place, the Los Angeles of my childhood and adolescence and young adulthood — the ’60s, ’70s, ’80s, ’90s — couldn’t be told until we began to tell them. Until we steadied and raised our voices. Until we made our way through gatekeepers, and most significantly until we were of age and of mind to turn our attention to a shifting definition of the West (or  El Norte ), one that included stories of migration and immigration, of protest, of underemployment, of struggle, and of love and resilience despite disappointment, and in the ways in which we tend to the physical environment, to conserve against drought or be mindful of energy use and emissions. We must tend to the region’s various topographies in narrative. It’s imperative. Or they will be lost. As a chronicler, my responsibility is to try and tell an honest story. True to its roots. Even now, even in this quiet moment in the city, we must remember its cacophony, its music.

My Mustache, My Self (Wesley Morris, The New York Times Magazine )

This essay from Wesley Morris on growing a mustache during the pandemic is about so much more than quarantine-grown facial hair — it’s a brilliant and vulnerable piece on masculinity and race, one in which Morris reflects on becoming himself and considers and celebrates his Blackness.

The mustache had certainly conjoined me to a past I was flattered to be associated with, however superficially. But there were implications. During the later stages of the movement, a mustached man opened himself up to charges of white appeasement and Uncle Tom-ism. Not because of the mustache, obviously, but because of the approach of the sort of person who would choose to wear one. Such a person might not have been considered radical enough, down enough, Black enough. The civil rights mustache was strategically tolerant. It didn’t advocate burning anything down. It ran for office — and sometimes it won. It was establishmentarian, compromising and eventually, come the infernos at the close of the 1960s, it fell out of fashion, in part because it felt out of step with the urgency of the moment.

The Black-power salute is not a casual gesture. It’s weaponry. You aim that arm and fire. I aimed mine in solidarity — with white people instead of at a system they personify. And that didn’t feel quite right. But how would I know? I had never done a Black-power salute. It always seemed like more Blackness than I’ve needed, maybe more than I had. I’m not Black-power Black. I’ve always been milder, more apprehensive than that. I was practically born with a mustache.

Cheri Lucas Rowlands

Cheri has been an editor at Longreads since 2014. She's currently based in the San Francisco Bay Area. More by Cheri Lucas Rowlands

Support Longreads

By clicking submit, you agree to share your email address with the site owner and Mailchimp to receive marketing, updates, and other emails from the site owner. Use the unsubscribe link in those emails to opt out at any time.

• The Top Writers of All Time
• Short Story Writers
• History's Most Controversial Writers
• The Very Best Living Writers
• The Greatest Novelists of All Time
• American Writers
• Crime Writers
• The Greatest Science Fiction Authors
• Greatest Poets
• Suspense Authors
• The Best Selling Fiction Authors
• The Very Best Fantasy Authors
• History's Greatest Female Authors
• Famous Authors Who Used Pen Names
• The Greatest Living Novelists
• Bars Where Famous Writers Hung Out
• Mystery Authors
• Young Adult Authors
• Alcoholic Writers
• Writers Who Should Have Biopics
• The Lamest Authors of All Time
• Horror Writers
• Strange Stories of How They Passed
• Writers Who Were Drug Addicts
• Celebs Who Wrote Children's Books

The 75+ Best Essayists Of All Time, Ranked

Vote up the absolute greatest essayists.

Michel de Montaigne

George Orwell

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Francis Bacon

James Baldwin

Samuel Johnson

click here to read it now

Read this week's magazine

The Top 10 Essays Since 1950

Robert Atwan, the founder of The Best American Essays series, picks the 10 best essays of the postwar period. Links to the essays are provided when available.

Fortunately, when I worked with Joyce Carol Oates on The Best American Essays of the Century (that’s the last century, by the way), we weren’t restricted to ten selections. So to make my list of the top ten essays since 1950 less impossible, I decided to exclude all the great examples of New Journalism--Tom Wolfe, Gay Talese, Michael Herr, and many others can be reserved for another list. I also decided to include only American writers, so such outstanding English-language essayists as Chris Arthur and Tim Robinson are missing, though they have appeared in The Best American Essays series. And I selected essays , not essayists . A list of the top ten essayists since 1950 would feature some different writers.

To my mind, the best essays are deeply personal (that doesn’t necessarily mean autobiographical) and deeply engaged with issues and ideas. And the best essays show that the name of the genre is also a verb, so they demonstrate a mind in process--reflecting, trying-out, essaying.

James Baldwin, "Notes of a Native Son" (originally appeared in Harper’s , 1955)

“I had never thought of myself as an essayist,” wrote James Baldwin, who was finishing his novel Giovanni’s Room while he worked on what would become one of the great American essays. Against a violent historical background, Baldwin recalls his deeply troubled relationship with his father and explores his growing awareness of himself as a black American. Some today may question the relevance of the essay in our brave new “post-racial” world, though Baldwin considered the essay still relevant in 1984 and, had he lived to see it, the election of Barak Obama may not have changed his mind. However you view the racial politics, the prose is undeniably hypnotic, beautifully modulated and yet full of urgency. Langston Hughes nailed it when he described Baldwin’s “illuminating intensity.” The essay was collected in Notes of a Native Son courageously (at the time) published by Beacon Press in 1955.

Norman Mailer, "The White Negro" (originally appeared in Dissent , 1957)

An essay that packed an enormous wallop at the time may make some of us cringe today with its hyperbolic dialectics and hyperventilated metaphysics. But Mailer’s attempt to define the “hipster”–in what reads in part like a prose version of Ginsberg’s “Howl”–is suddenly relevant again, as new essays keep appearing with a similar definitional purpose, though no one would mistake Mailer’s hipster (“a philosophical psychopath”) for the ones we now find in Mailer’s old Brooklyn neighborhoods. Odd, how terms can bounce back into life with an entirely different set of connotations. What might Mailer call the new hipsters? Squares?

Read the essay here .

Susan Sontag, "Notes on 'Camp'" (originally appeared in Partisan Review , 1964)

Like Mailer’s “White Negro,” Sontag’s groundbreaking essay was an ambitious attempt to define a modern sensibility, in this case “camp,” a word that was then almost exclusively associated with the gay world. I was familiar with it as an undergraduate, hearing it used often by a set of friends, department store window decorators in Manhattan. Before I heard Sontag—thirty-one, glamorous, dressed entirely in black-- read the essay on publication at a Partisan Review gathering, I had simply interpreted “campy” as an exaggerated style or over-the-top behavior. But after Sontag unpacked the concept, with the help of Oscar Wilde, I began to see the cultural world in a different light. “The whole point of camp,” she writes, “is to dethrone the serious.” Her essay, collected in Against Interpretation (1966), is not in itself an example of camp.

John McPhee, "The Search for Marvin Gardens" (originally appeared in The New Yorker , 1972)

“Go. I roll the dice—a six and a two. Through the air I move my token, the flatiron, to Vermont Avenue, where dog packs range.” And so we move, in this brilliantly conceived essay, from a series of Monopoly games to a decaying Atlantic City, the once renowned resort town that inspired America’s most popular board game. As the games progress and as properties are rapidly snapped up, McPhee juxtaposes the well-known sites on the board—Atlantic Avenue, Park Place—with actual visits to their crumbling locations. He goes to jail, not just in the game but in fact, portraying what life has now become in a city that in better days was a Boardwalk Empire. At essay’s end, he finds the elusive Marvin Gardens. The essay was collected in Pieces of the Frame (1975).

Read the essay here (subscription required).

Joan Didion, "The White Album" (originally appeared in New West , 1979)

Huey Newton, Eldridge Cleaver, and the Black Panthers, a recording session with Jim Morrison and the Doors, the San Francisco State riots, the Manson murders—all of these, and much more, figure prominently in Didion’s brilliant mosaic distillation (or phantasmagoric album) of California life in the late 1960s. Yet despite a cast of characters larger than most Hollywood epics, “The White Album” is a highly personal essay, right down to Didion’s report of her psychiatric tests as an outpatient in a Santa Monica hospital in the summer of 1968. “We tell ourselves stories in order to live,” the essay famously begins, and as it progresses nervously through cuts and flashes of reportage, with transcripts, interviews, and testimonies, we realize that all of our stories are questionable, “the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images.” Portions of the essay appeared in installments in 1968-69 but it wasn’t until 1979 that Didion published the complete essay in New West magazine; it then became the lead essay of her book, The White Album (1979).

Annie Dillard, "Total Eclipse" (originally appeared in Antaeus , 1982)

In her introduction to The Best American Essays 1988 , Annie Dillard claims that “The essay can do everything a poem can do, and everything a short story can do—everything but fake it.” Her essay “Total Eclipse” easily makes her case for the imaginative power of a genre that is still undervalued as a branch of imaginative literature. “Total Eclipse” has it all—the climactic intensity of short fiction, the interwoven imagery of poetry, and the meditative dynamics of the personal essay: “This was the universe about which we have read so much and never before felt: the universe as a clockwork of loose spheres flung at stupefying, unauthorized speeds.” The essay, which first appeared in Antaeus in 1982 was collected in Teaching a Stone to Talk (1982), a slim volume that ranks among the best essay collections of the past fifty years.

Phillip Lopate, "Against Joie de Vivre" (originally appeared in Ploughshares , 1986)

This is an essay that made me glad I’d started The Best American Essays the year before. I’d been looking for essays that grew out of a vibrant Montaignean spirit—personal essays that were witty, conversational, reflective, confessional, and yet always about something worth discussing. And here was exactly what I’d been looking for. I might have found such writing several decades earlier but in the 80s it was relatively rare; Lopate had found a creative way to insert the old familiar essay into the contemporary world: “Over the years,” Lopate begins, “I have developed a distaste for the spectacle of joie de vivre , the knack of knowing how to live.” He goes on to dissect in comic yet astute detail the rituals of the modern dinner party. The essay was selected by Gay Talese for The Best American Essays 1987 and collected in Against Joie de Vivre in 1989 .

Edward Hoagland, "Heaven and Nature" (originally appeared in Harper’s, 1988)

“The best essayist of my generation,” is how John Updike described Edward Hoagland, who must be one of the most prolific essayists of our time as well. “Essays,” Hoagland wrote, “are how we speak to one another in print—caroming thoughts not merely in order to convey a certain packet of information, but with a special edge or bounce of personal character in a kind of public letter.” I could easily have selected many other Hoagland essays for this list (such as “The Courage of Turtles”), but I’m especially fond of “Heaven and Nature,” which shows Hoagland at his best, balancing the public and private, the well-crafted general observation with the clinching vivid example. The essay, selected by Geoffrey Wolff for The Best American Essays 1989 and collected in Heart’s Desire (1988), is an unforgettable meditation not so much on suicide as on how we remarkably manage to stay alive.

Jo Ann Beard, "The Fourth State of Matter" (originally appeared in The New Yorker , 1996)

A question for nonfiction writing students: When writing a true story based on actual events, how does the narrator create dramatic tension when most readers can be expected to know what happens in the end? To see how skillfully this can be done turn to Jo Ann Beard’s astonishing personal story about a graduate student’s murderous rampage on the University of Iowa campus in 1991. “Plasma is the fourth state of matter,” writes Beard, who worked in the U of I’s physics department at the time of the incident, “You’ve got your solid, your liquid, your gas, and there’s your plasma. In outer space there’s the plasmasphere and the plasmapause.” Besides plasma, in this emotion-packed essay you will find entangled in all the tension a lovable, dying collie, invasive squirrels, an estranged husband, the seriously disturbed gunman, and his victims, one of them among the author’s dearest friends. Selected by Ian Frazier for The Best American Essays 1997 , the essay was collected in Beard’s award-winning volume, The Boys of My Youth (1998).

David Foster Wallace, "Consider the Lobster" (originally appeared in Gourmet , 2004)

They may at first look like magazine articles—those factually-driven, expansive pieces on the Illinois State Fair, a luxury cruise ship, the adult video awards, or John McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign—but once you uncover the disguise and get inside them you are in the midst of essayistic genius. One of David Foster Wallace’s shortest and most essayistic is his “coverage” of the annual Maine Lobster Festival, “Consider the Lobster.” The Festival becomes much more than an occasion to observe “the World’s Largest Lobster Cooker” in action as Wallace poses an uncomfortable question to readers of the upscale food magazine: “Is it all right to boil a sentient creature alive just for our gustatory pleasure?” Don’t gloss over the footnotes. Susan Orlean selected the essay for The Best American Essays 2004 and Wallace collected it in Consider the Lobster and Other Essays (2005).

Read the essay here . (Note: the electronic version from Gourmet magazine’s archives differs from the essay that appears in The Best American Essays and in his book, Consider the Lobster. )

I wish I could include twenty more essays but these ten in themselves comprise a wonderful and wide-ranging mini-anthology, one that showcases some of the most outstanding literary voices of our time. Readers who’d like to see more of the best essays since 1950 should take a look at The Best American Essays of the Century (2000).

• You are a subscriber but you have not yet set up your account for premium online access. Contact customer service (see details below) to add your preferred email address and password to your account.
• You forgot your password and you need to retrieve it. Click here to retrieve reset your password.
• Your company has a site license, use our easy login. Enter your work email address in the Site License Portal.

Choose Your Test

• Search Blogs By Category
• College Admissions
• AP and IB Exams
• GPA and Coursework

177 College Essay Examples for 11 Schools + Expert Analysis

College Admissions , College Essays

The personal statement might just be the hardest part of your college application. Mostly this is because it has the least guidance and is the most open-ended. One way to understand what colleges are looking for when they ask you to write an essay is to check out the essays of students who already got in—college essays that actually worked. After all, they must be among the most successful of this weird literary genre.

In this article, I'll go through general guidelines for what makes great college essays great. I've also compiled an enormous list of 100+ actual sample college essays from 11 different schools. Finally, I'll break down two of these published college essay examples and explain why and how they work. With links to 177 full essays and essay excerpts , this article is a great resource for learning how to craft your own personal college admissions essay!

What Excellent College Essays Have in Common

Even though in many ways these sample college essays are very different from one other, they do share some traits you should try to emulate as you write your own essay.

Visible Signs of Planning

Building out from a narrow, concrete focus. You'll see a similar structure in many of the essays. The author starts with a very detailed story of an event or description of a person or place. After this sense-heavy imagery, the essay expands out to make a broader point about the author, and connects this very memorable experience to the author's present situation, state of mind, newfound understanding, or maturity level.

Knowing how to tell a story. Some of the experiences in these essays are one-of-a-kind. But most deal with the stuff of everyday life. What sets them apart is the way the author approaches the topic: analyzing it for drama and humor, for its moving qualities, for what it says about the author's world, and for how it connects to the author's emotional life.

Stellar Execution

A killer first sentence. You've heard it before, and you'll hear it again: you have to suck the reader in, and the best place to do that is the first sentence. Great first sentences are punchy. They are like cliffhangers, setting up an exciting scene or an unusual situation with an unclear conclusion, in order to make the reader want to know more. Don't take my word for it—check out these 22 first sentences from Stanford applicants and tell me you don't want to read the rest of those essays to find out what happens!

A lively, individual voice. Writing is for readers. In this case, your reader is an admissions officer who has read thousands of essays before yours and will read thousands after. Your goal? Don't bore your reader. Use interesting descriptions, stay away from clichés, include your own offbeat observations—anything that makes this essay sounds like you and not like anyone else.

Technical correctness. No spelling mistakes, no grammar weirdness, no syntax issues, no punctuation snafus—each of these sample college essays has been formatted and proofread perfectly. If this kind of exactness is not your strong suit, you're in luck! All colleges advise applicants to have their essays looked over several times by parents, teachers, mentors, and anyone else who can spot a comma splice. Your essay must be your own work, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with getting help polishing it.

And if you need more guidance, connect with PrepScholar's expert admissions consultants . These expert writers know exactly what college admissions committees look for in an admissions essay and chan help you craft an essay that boosts your chances of getting into your dream school.

Check out PrepScholar's Essay Editing and Coaching progra m for more details!

Links to Full College Essay Examples

Some colleges publish a selection of their favorite accepted college essays that worked, and I've put together a selection of over 100 of these.

Common App Essay Samples

Please note that some of these college essay examples may be responding to prompts that are no longer in use. The current Common App prompts are as follows:

1. Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story. 2. The lessons we take from obstacles we encounter can be fundamental to later success. Recount a time when you faced a challenge, setback, or failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience? 3. Reflect on a time when you questioned or challenged a belief or idea. What prompted your thinking? What was the outcome? 4. Reflect on something that someone has done for you that has made you happy or thankful in a surprising way. How has this gratitude affected or motivated you? 5. Discuss an accomplishment, event, or realization that sparked a period of personal growth and a new understanding of yourself or others. 6. Describe a topic, idea, or concept you find so engaging that it makes you lose all track of time. Why does it captivate you? What or who do you turn to when you want to learn more?

7. Share an essay on any topic of your choice. It can be one you've already written, one that responds to a different prompt, or one of your own design.

Now, let's get to the good stuff: the list of 177 college essay examples responding to current and past Common App essay prompts. 

Connecticut college.

• 12 Common Application essays from the classes of 2022-2025

Hamilton College

• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2026
• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2022
• 7 Common Application essays from the class of 2018
• 8 Common Application essays from the class of 2012
• 8 Common Application essays from the class of 2007

Johns Hopkins

These essays are answers to past prompts from either the Common Application or the Coalition Application (which Johns Hopkins used to accept).

• 1 Common Application or Coalition Application essay from the class of 2026
• 6 Common Application or Coalition Application essays from the class of 2025
• 6 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2024
• 6 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2023
• 7 Common Application of Universal Application essays from the class of 2022
• 5 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2021
• 7 Common Application or Universal Application essays from the class of 2020

Essay Examples Published by Other Websites

• 2 Common Application essays ( 1st essay , 2nd essay ) from applicants admitted to Columbia

Other Sample College Essays

Here is a collection of essays that are college-specific.

Babson College

• 4 essays (and 1 video response) on "Why Babson" from the class of 2020

Emory University

• 5 essay examples ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 ) from the class of 2020 along with analysis from Emory admissions staff on why the essays were exceptional
• 5 more recent essay examples ( 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 ) along with analysis from Emory admissions staff on what made these essays stand out

University of Georgia

• 1 “strong essay” sample from 2019
• 1 “strong essay” sample from 2018
• 10 Harvard essays from 2023
• 10 Harvard essays from 2022
• 10 Harvard essays from 2021
• 10 Harvard essays from 2020
• 10 Harvard essays from 2019
• 10 Harvard essays from 2018
• 6 essays from admitted MIT students

Smith College

• 6 "best gift" essays from the class of 2018

Books of College Essays

If you're looking for even more sample college essays, consider purchasing a college essay book. The best of these include dozens of essays that worked and feedback from real admissions officers.

College Essays That Made a Difference —This detailed guide from Princeton Review includes not only successful essays, but also interviews with admissions officers and full student profiles.

50 Successful Harvard Application Essays by the Staff of the Harvard Crimson—A must for anyone aspiring to Harvard .

50 Successful Ivy League Application Essays and 50 Successful Stanford Application Essays by Gen and Kelly Tanabe—For essays from other top schools, check out this venerated series, which is regularly updated with new essays.

Heavenly Essays by Janine W. Robinson—This collection from the popular blogger behind Essay Hell includes a wider range of schools, as well as helpful tips on honing your own essay.

Analyzing Great Common App Essays That Worked

I've picked two essays from the examples collected above to examine in more depth so that you can see exactly what makes a successful college essay work. Full credit for these essays goes to the original authors and the schools that published them.

Example 1: "Breaking Into Cars," by Stephen, Johns Hopkins Class of '19 (Common App Essay, 636 words long)

I had never broken into a car before.

We were in Laredo, having just finished our first day at a Habitat for Humanity work site. The Hotchkiss volunteers had already left, off to enjoy some Texas BBQ, leaving me behind with the college kids to clean up. Not until we were stranded did we realize we were locked out of the van.

Someone picked a coat hanger out of the dumpster, handed it to me, and took a few steps back.

"Can you do that thing with a coat hanger to unlock it?"

"Why me?" I thought.

More out of amusement than optimism, I gave it a try. I slid the hanger into the window's seal like I'd seen on crime shows, and spent a few minutes jiggling the apparatus around the inside of the frame. Suddenly, two things simultaneously clicked. One was the lock on the door. (I actually succeeded in springing it.) The other was the realization that I'd been in this type of situation before. In fact, I'd been born into this type of situation.

My upbringing has numbed me to unpredictability and chaos. With a family of seven, my home was loud, messy, and spottily supervised. My siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing—all meant my house was functioning normally. My Dad, a retired Navy pilot, was away half the time. When he was home, he had a parenting style something like a drill sergeant. At the age of nine, I learned how to clear burning oil from the surface of water. My Dad considered this a critical life skill—you know, in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed. "The water's on fire! Clear a hole!" he shouted, tossing me in the lake without warning. While I'm still unconvinced about that particular lesson's practicality, my Dad's overarching message is unequivocally true: much of life is unexpected, and you have to deal with the twists and turns.

Living in my family, days rarely unfolded as planned. A bit overlooked, a little pushed around, I learned to roll with reality, negotiate a quick deal, and give the improbable a try. I don't sweat the small stuff, and I definitely don't expect perfect fairness. So what if our dining room table only has six chairs for seven people? Someone learns the importance of punctuality every night.

But more than punctuality and a special affinity for musical chairs, my family life has taught me to thrive in situations over which I have no power. Growing up, I never controlled my older siblings, but I learned how to thwart their attempts to control me. I forged alliances, and realigned them as necessary. Sometimes, I was the poor, defenseless little brother; sometimes I was the omniscient elder. Different things to different people, as the situation demanded. I learned to adapt.

Back then, these techniques were merely reactions undertaken to ensure my survival. But one day this fall, Dr. Hicks, our Head of School, asked me a question that he hoped all seniors would reflect on throughout the year: "How can I participate in a thing I do not govern, in the company of people I did not choose?"

The question caught me off guard, much like the question posed to me in Laredo. Then, I realized I knew the answer. I knew why the coat hanger had been handed to me.

Growing up as the middle child in my family, I was a vital participant in a thing I did not govern, in the company of people I did not choose. It's family. It's society. And often, it's chaos. You participate by letting go of the small stuff, not expecting order and perfection, and facing the unexpected with confidence, optimism, and preparedness. My family experience taught me to face a serendipitous world with confidence.

What Makes This Essay Tick?

It's very helpful to take writing apart in order to see just how it accomplishes its objectives. Stephen's essay is very effective. Let's find out why!

An Opening Line That Draws You In

In just eight words, we get: scene-setting (he is standing next to a car about to break in), the idea of crossing a boundary (he is maybe about to do an illegal thing for the first time), and a cliffhanger (we are thinking: is he going to get caught? Is he headed for a life of crime? Is he about to be scared straight?).

Great, Detailed Opening Story

More out of amusement than optimism, I gave it a try. I slid the hanger into the window's seal like I'd seen on crime shows, and spent a few minutes jiggling the apparatus around the inside of the frame.

It's the details that really make this small experience come alive. Notice how whenever he can, Stephen uses a more specific, descriptive word in place of a more generic one. The volunteers aren't going to get food or dinner; they're going for "Texas BBQ." The coat hanger comes from "a dumpster." Stephen doesn't just move the coat hanger—he "jiggles" it.

Details also help us visualize the emotions of the people in the scene. The person who hands Stephen the coat hanger isn't just uncomfortable or nervous; he "takes a few steps back"—a description of movement that conveys feelings. Finally, the detail of actual speech makes the scene pop. Instead of writing that the other guy asked him to unlock the van, Stephen has the guy actually say his own words in a way that sounds like a teenager talking.

Turning a Specific Incident Into a Deeper Insight

Suddenly, two things simultaneously clicked. One was the lock on the door. (I actually succeeded in springing it.) The other was the realization that I'd been in this type of situation before. In fact, I'd been born into this type of situation.

Stephen makes the locked car experience a meaningful illustration of how he has learned to be resourceful and ready for anything, and he also makes this turn from the specific to the broad through an elegant play on the two meanings of the word "click."

Using Concrete Examples When Making Abstract Claims

My upbringing has numbed me to unpredictability and chaos. With a family of seven, my home was loud, messy, and spottily supervised. My siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing—all meant my house was functioning normally.

"Unpredictability and chaos" are very abstract, not easily visualized concepts. They could also mean any number of things—violence, abandonment, poverty, mental instability. By instantly following up with highly finite and unambiguous illustrations like "family of seven" and "siblings arguing, the dog barking, the phone ringing," Stephen grounds the abstraction in something that is easy to picture: a large, noisy family.

Using Small Bits of Humor and Casual Word Choice

My Dad, a retired Navy pilot, was away half the time. When he was home, he had a parenting style something like a drill sergeant. At the age of nine, I learned how to clear burning oil from the surface of water. My Dad considered this a critical life skill—you know, in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed.

Obviously, knowing how to clean burning oil is not high on the list of things every 9-year-old needs to know. To emphasize this, Stephen uses sarcasm by bringing up a situation that is clearly over-the-top: "in case my aircraft carrier should ever get torpedoed."

The humor also feels relaxed. Part of this is because he introduces it with the colloquial phrase "you know," so it sounds like he is talking to us in person. This approach also diffuses the potential discomfort of the reader with his father's strictness—since he is making jokes about it, clearly he is OK. Notice, though, that this doesn't occur very much in the essay. This helps keep the tone meaningful and serious rather than flippant.

An Ending That Stretches the Insight Into the Future

But one day this fall, Dr. Hicks, our Head of School, asked me a question that he hoped all seniors would reflect on throughout the year: "How can I participate in a thing I do not govern, in the company of people I did not choose?"

The ending of the essay reveals that Stephen's life has been one long preparation for the future. He has emerged from chaos and his dad's approach to parenting as a person who can thrive in a world that he can't control.

This connection of past experience to current maturity and self-knowledge is a key element in all successful personal essays. Colleges are very much looking for mature, self-aware applicants. These are the qualities of successful college students, who will be able to navigate the independence college classes require and the responsibility and quasi-adulthood of college life.

What Could This Essay Do Even Better?

Even the best essays aren't perfect, and even the world's greatest writers will tell you that writing is never "finished"—just "due." So what would we tweak in this essay if we could?

Replace some of the clichéd language. Stephen uses handy phrases like "twists and turns" and "don't sweat the small stuff" as a kind of shorthand for explaining his relationship to chaos and unpredictability. But using too many of these ready-made expressions runs the risk of clouding out your own voice and replacing it with something expected and boring.

Use another example from recent life. Stephen's first example (breaking into the van in Laredo) is a great illustration of being resourceful in an unexpected situation. But his essay also emphasizes that he "learned to adapt" by being "different things to different people." It would be great to see how this plays out outside his family, either in the situation in Laredo or another context.

Example 2: By Renner Kwittken, Tufts Class of '23 (Common App Essay, 645 words long)

My first dream job was to be a pickle truck driver. I saw it in my favorite book, Richard Scarry's "Cars and Trucks and Things That Go," and for some reason, I was absolutely obsessed with the idea of driving a giant pickle. Much to the discontent of my younger sister, I insisted that my parents read us that book as many nights as possible so we could find goldbug, a small little golden bug, on every page. I would imagine the wonderful life I would have: being a pig driving a giant pickle truck across the country, chasing and finding goldbug. I then moved on to wanting to be a Lego Master. Then an architect. Then a surgeon.

Then I discovered a real goldbug: gold nanoparticles that can reprogram macrophages to assist in killing tumors, produce clear images of them without sacrificing the subject, and heat them to obliteration.

Suddenly the destination of my pickle was clear.

I quickly became enveloped by the world of nanomedicine; I scoured articles about liposomes, polymeric micelles, dendrimers, targeting ligands, and self-assembling nanoparticles, all conquering cancer in some exotic way. Completely absorbed, I set out to find a mentor to dive even deeper into these topics. After several rejections, I was immensely grateful to receive an invitation to work alongside Dr. Sangeeta Ray at Johns Hopkins.

In the lab, Dr. Ray encouraged a great amount of autonomy to design and implement my own procedures. I chose to attack a problem that affects the entire field of nanomedicine: nanoparticles consistently fail to translate from animal studies into clinical trials. Jumping off recent literature, I set out to see if a pre-dose of a common chemotherapeutic could enhance nanoparticle delivery in aggressive prostate cancer, creating three novel constructs based on three different linear polymers, each using fluorescent dye (although no gold, sorry goldbug!). Though using radioactive isotopes like Gallium and Yttrium would have been incredible, as a 17-year-old, I unfortunately wasn't allowed in the same room as these radioactive materials (even though I took a Geiger counter to a pair of shoes and found them to be slightly dangerous).

I hadn't expected my hypothesis to work, as the research project would have ideally been led across two full years. Yet while there are still many optimizations and revisions to be done, I was thrilled to find -- with completely new nanoparticles that may one day mean future trials will use particles with the initials "RK-1" -- thatcyclophosphamide did indeed increase nanoparticle delivery to the tumor in a statistically significant way.

A secondary, unexpected research project was living alone in Baltimore, a new city to me, surrounded by people much older than I. Even with moving frequently between hotels, AirBnB's, and students' apartments, I strangely reveled in the freedom I had to enjoy my surroundings and form new friendships with graduate school students from the lab. We explored The Inner Harbor at night, attended a concert together one weekend, and even got to watch the Orioles lose (to nobody's surprise). Ironically, it's through these new friendships I discovered something unexpected: what I truly love is sharing research. Whether in a presentation or in a casual conversation, making others interested in science is perhaps more exciting to me than the research itself. This solidified a new pursuit to angle my love for writing towards illuminating science in ways people can understand, adding value to a society that can certainly benefit from more scientific literacy.

It seems fitting that my goals are still transforming: in Scarry's book, there is not just one goldbug, there is one on every page. With each new experience, I'm learning that it isn't the goldbug itself, but rather the act of searching for the goldbugs that will encourage, shape, and refine my ever-evolving passions. Regardless of the goldbug I seek -- I know my pickle truck has just begun its journey.

Renner takes a somewhat different approach than Stephen, but their essay is just as detailed and engaging. Let's go through some of the strengths of this essay.

One Clear Governing Metaphor

This essay is ultimately about two things: Renner’s dreams and future career goals, and Renner’s philosophy on goal-setting and achieving one’s dreams.

But instead of listing off all the amazing things they’ve done to pursue their dream of working in nanomedicine, Renner tells a powerful, unique story instead. To set up the narrative, Renner opens the essay by connecting their experiences with goal-setting and dream-chasing all the way back to a memorable childhood experience:

This lighthearted–but relevant!--story about the moment when Renner first developed a passion for a specific career (“finding the goldbug”) provides an anchor point for the rest of the essay. As Renner pivots to describing their current dreams and goals–working in nanomedicine–the metaphor of “finding the goldbug” is reflected in Renner’s experiments, rejections, and new discoveries.

Though Renner tells multiple stories about their quest to “find the goldbug,” or, in other words, pursue their passion, each story is connected by a unifying theme; namely, that as we search and grow over time, our goals will transform…and that’s okay! By the end of the essay, Renner uses the metaphor of “finding the goldbug” to reiterate the relevance of the opening story:

While the earlier parts of the essay convey Renner’s core message by showing, the final, concluding paragraph sums up Renner’s insights by telling. By briefly and clearly stating the relevance of the goldbug metaphor to their own philosophy on goals and dreams, Renner demonstrates their creativity, insight, and eagerness to grow and evolve as the journey continues into college.

An Engaging, Individual Voice

This essay uses many techniques that make Renner sound genuine and make the reader feel like we already know them.

Technique #1: humor. Notice Renner's gentle and relaxed humor that lightly mocks their younger self's grand ambitions (this is different from the more sarcastic kind of humor used by Stephen in the first essay—you could never mistake one writer for the other).

My first dream job was to be a pickle truck driver.

I would imagine the wonderful life I would have: being a pig driving a giant pickle truck across the country, chasing and finding goldbug. I then moved on to wanting to be a Lego Master. Then an architect. Then a surgeon.

Renner gives a great example of how to use humor to your advantage in college essays. You don’t want to come off as too self-deprecating or sarcastic, but telling a lightheartedly humorous story about your younger self that also showcases how you’ve grown and changed over time can set the right tone for your entire essay.

Technique #2: intentional, eye-catching structure. The second technique is the way Renner uses a unique structure to bolster the tone and themes of their essay . The structure of your essay can have a major impact on how your ideas come across…so it’s important to give it just as much thought as the content of your essay!

For instance, Renner does a great job of using one-line paragraphs to create dramatic emphasis and to make clear transitions from one phase of the story to the next:

Suddenly the destination of my pickle car was clear.

Not only does the one-liner above signal that Renner is moving into a new phase of the narrative (their nanoparticle research experiences), it also tells the reader that this is a big moment in Renner’s story. It’s clear that Renner made a major discovery that changed the course of their goal pursuit and dream-chasing. Through structure, Renner conveys excitement and entices the reader to keep pushing forward to the next part of the story.

Technique #3: playing with syntax. The third technique is to use sentences of varying length, syntax, and structure. Most of the essay's written in standard English and uses grammatically correct sentences. However, at key moments, Renner emphasizes that the reader needs to sit up and pay attention by switching to short, colloquial, differently punctuated, and sometimes fragmented sentences.

Even with moving frequently between hotels, AirBnB's, and students' apartments, I strangely reveled in the freedom I had to enjoy my surroundings and form new friendships with graduate school students from the lab. We explored The Inner Harbor at night, attended a concert together one weekend, and even got to watch the Orioles lose (to nobody's surprise). Ironically, it's through these new friendships I discovered something unexpected: what I truly love is sharing research.

In the examples above, Renner switches adeptly between long, flowing sentences and quippy, telegraphic ones. At the same time, Renner uses these different sentence lengths intentionally. As they describe their experiences in new places, they use longer sentences to immerse the reader in the sights, smells, and sounds of those experiences. And when it’s time to get a big, key idea across, Renner switches to a short, punchy sentence to stop the reader in their tracks.

The varying syntax and sentence lengths pull the reader into the narrative and set up crucial “aha” moments when it’s most important…which is a surefire way to make any college essay stand out.

Renner's essay is very strong, but there are still a few little things that could be improved.

Connecting the research experiences to the theme of “finding the goldbug.”  The essay begins and ends with Renner’s connection to the idea of “finding the goldbug.” And while this metaphor is deftly tied into the essay’s intro and conclusion, it isn’t entirely clear what Renner’s big findings were during the research experiences that are described in the middle of the essay. It would be great to add a sentence or two stating what Renner’s big takeaways (or “goldbugs”) were from these experiences, which add more cohesion to the essay as a whole.

Give more details about discovering the world of nanomedicine. It makes sense that Renner wants to get into the details of their big research experiences as quickly as possible. After all, these are the details that show Renner’s dedication to nanomedicine! But a smoother transition from the opening pickle car/goldbug story to Renner’s “real goldbug” of nanoparticles would help the reader understand why nanoparticles became Renner’s goldbug. Finding out why Renner is so motivated to study nanomedicine–and perhaps what put them on to this field of study–would help readers fully understand why Renner chose this path in the first place.

4 Essential Tips for Writing Your Own Essay

How can you use this discussion to better your own college essay? Here are some suggestions for ways to use this resource effectively.

#1: Get Help From the Experts

Getting your college applications together takes a lot of work and can be pretty intimidatin g. Essays are even more important than ever now that admissions processes are changing and schools are going test-optional and removing diversity standards thanks to new Supreme Court rulings .  If you want certified expert help that really makes a difference, get started with  PrepScholar’s Essay Editing and Coaching program. Our program can help you put together an incredible essay from idea to completion so that your application stands out from the crowd. We've helped students get into the best colleges in the United States, including Harvard, Stanford, and Yale.  If you're ready to take the next step and boost your odds of getting into your dream school, connect with our experts today .

#2: Read Other Essays to Get Ideas for Your Own

As you go through the essays we've compiled for you above, ask yourself the following questions:

• Can you explain to yourself (or someone else!) why the opening sentence works well?
• Look for the essay's detailed personal anecdote. What senses is the author describing? Can you easily picture the scene in your mind's eye?
• Find the place where this anecdote bridges into a larger insight about the author. How does the essay connect the two? How does the anecdote work as an example of the author's characteristic, trait, or skill?
• Check out the essay's tone. If it's funny, can you find the places where the humor comes from? If it's sad and moving, can you find the imagery and description of feelings that make you moved? If it's serious, can you see how word choice adds to this tone?

Make a note whenever you find an essay or part of an essay that you think was particularly well-written, and think about what you like about it . Is it funny? Does it help you really get to know the writer? Does it show what makes the writer unique? Once you have your list, keep it next to you while writing your essay to remind yourself to try and use those same techniques in your own essay.

#3: Find Your "A-Ha!" Moment

All of these essays rely on connecting with the reader through a heartfelt, highly descriptive scene from the author's life. It can either be very dramatic (did you survive a plane crash?) or it can be completely mundane (did you finally beat your dad at Scrabble?). Either way, it should be personal and revealing about you, your personality, and the way you are now that you are entering the adult world.

Check out essays by authors like John Jeremiah Sullivan , Leslie Jamison , Hanif Abdurraqib , and Esmé Weijun Wang to get more examples of how to craft a compelling personal narrative.

#4: Start Early, Revise Often

Let me level with you: the best writing isn't writing at all. It's rewriting. And in order to have time to rewrite, you have to start way before the application deadline. My advice is to write your first draft at least two months before your applications are due.

Let it sit for a few days untouched. Then come back to it with fresh eyes and think critically about what you've written. What's extra? What's missing? What is in the wrong place? What doesn't make sense? Don't be afraid to take it apart and rearrange sections. Do this several times over, and your essay will be much better for it!

For more editing tips, check out a style guide like Dreyer's English or Eats, Shoots & Leaves .

What's Next?

Still not sure which colleges you want to apply to? Our experts will show you how to make a college list that will help you choose a college that's right for you.

Interested in learning more about college essays? Check out our detailed breakdown of exactly how personal statements work in an application , some suggestions on what to avoid when writing your essay , and our guide to writing about your extracurricular activities .

Working on the rest of your application? Read what admissions officers wish applicants knew before applying .

The recommendations in this post are based solely on our knowledge and experience. If you purchase an item through one of our links PrepScholar may receive a commission.

Trending Now

How to Get Into Harvard and the Ivy League

How to Get a Perfect 4.0 GPA

How to Write an Amazing College Essay

What Exactly Are Colleges Looking For?

ACT vs. SAT: Which Test Should You Take?

When should you take the SAT or ACT?

Get Your Free

Find Your Target SAT Score

Free Complete Official SAT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect SAT Score, by an Expert Full Scorer

Score 800 on SAT Math

Score 800 on SAT Reading and Writing

How to Improve Your Low SAT Score

Score 600 on SAT Math

Score 600 on SAT Reading and Writing

Find Your Target ACT Score

Complete Official Free ACT Practice Tests

How to Get a Perfect ACT Score, by a 36 Full Scorer

Get a 36 on ACT English

Get a 36 on ACT Math

Get a 36 on ACT Reading

Get a 36 on ACT Science

How to Improve Your Low ACT Score

Get a 24 on ACT English

Get a 24 on ACT Math

Get a 24 on ACT Reading

Get a 24 on ACT Science

Stay Informed

Get the latest articles and test prep tips!

Anna scored in the 99th percentile on her SATs in high school, and went on to major in English at Princeton and to get her doctorate in English Literature at Columbia. She is passionate about improving student access to higher education.

Ask a Question Below

Have any questions about this article or other topics? Ask below and we'll reply!

Subscribe to our newsletter

150 great articles & essays: interesting articles to read online, life & death, attitude by margaret atwood, this is water by david foster wallace, why go out by sheila heti, after life by joan didion, when things go missing by kathryn schulz, 50 more great articles about life, 25 more great articles about death.

Travel & Adventure

The book by patrick symmes, shipping out by david foster wallace, death of an innocent by jon krakauer, the place to disappear by susan orlean, trapped by aron ralston, 75 more great travel articles, words and writing, on keeping a notebook by joan didion, autobiographical notes by james baldwin, how to talk about books you haven't read by pierre bayard, where do you get your ideas by neil gaiman, everything you need to know about writing by stephen king, 20 more great essays about writing, short memoirs, goodbye to all that by joan didion, seeing by annie dillard, explicit violence by lidia yuknavitch, these precious days by ann patchett, 100 more short memoirs, tennis, trigonometry, tornadoes by david foster wallace, losing religion and finding ecstasy in houston by jia tolentino, a brief history of forever by tavi gevinson, 50 more great articles about growing up, the female body by margaret atwood, the tyranny of the ideal woman by jia tolentino, grand unified theory of female pain by leslie jamison, 50 more great articles about women, revelations about sex by alain de botton, safe-sex lies by meghan daum, my life as a sex object by jessica valenti, sex is a coping mechanism by jill neimark, 50 more great articles about sex.

The Women's Movement by Joan Didion

Bad feminist by roxane gay, what the hell am i (and who the hell cares) by neko case, 10 more great articles about feminism, men explain things to me by rebecca solnit, the end of men by hanna rosin, 10 more great articles about men, linguistics/language, who decides what words mean by lane greene, the world’s most efficient languages by john mcwhorter, tense present by david foster wallace, 40 more great articles about linguistics, pigeon wars by jon mooallem, violence of the lambs by john j. sullivan, 25 more great articles about animals, quitting the paint factory by mark slouka, nickel and dimed by barbara ehrenreich, shop class as soul craft by matthew b. crawford, 40 more great articles about work, to have is to owe by david graeber, why does it feel like everyone has more money than you by jen doll, the austerity delusion by paul krugman, the blind side by michael lewis, 25 more great articles about money, science & technology, how life (and death) spring from disorder by philip ball, a compassionate substance by philip ball, your handy postcard-sized guide to statistics by tim harford, on being the right size by j. b. s. haldane, 100 more great science & tech. articles, the environment, the fate of earth by elizabeth kolbert, state of the species by charles c. mann, the real reason humans are the dominant species by justin rowlatt and laurence knight, 30 more great reads about the environment, climate change, losing earth by nathaniel rich, sixty years of climate change warnings by alice bell, beyond catastrophe by david wallace wells, we should fix climate change — but we should not regret it by thomas r. wells, 35 more great climate change articles, the tinkering of robert noyce by tom wolfe, creation myth by malcolm gladwell, mother earth mother board by neal stephenson, i saw the face of god in a semiconductor factory by virginia heffernan, 50 more great articles about computers, the internet, forty years of the internet by oliver burkeman, escape the matrix by virginia heffernan, you are the product by john lanchester, a nation of echo chambers by will leitch, the long tail by chris anderson, 50 more articles about the internet.

Social Media

The machine always wins by richard seymour, my instagram by dayna tortorici, why the past 10 years of american life have been uniquely stupid by jonathan haidt, 15 more articles about social media, m by john sack, blackhawk down by mark bowden, hiroshima by john hersey, the ai-powered, totally autonomous future of war is here by will knight, 35 more great articles about war, the hinge of history by joan didion, how america lost its mind by kurt andersen, the problem with facts by tim harford, constant anxiety won't save the world by julie beck, 75 more great articles about politics, crime & punishment, the caging of america by adam gopnik, the crooked ladder by malcolm gladwell, cruel and unusual punishment by matt taibbi, 20 more great articles about crime, the body in room 348 by mark bowden, the art of the steal by joshua bearman, true crime by david grann, the crypto trap by andy greenberg, 35 more great true crime stories, does it help to know history by adam gopnik, 1491 by charles c. mann, a history of violence by steven pinker, the worst mistake in history by j. diamond, 25 more great articles about history, notes of a native son by james baldwin, how to slowly kill yourself and others in america by kiese laymon, magic actions by tobi haslett, 30 more great essays about race, cities and ambition by paul graham, here is new york by e. b. white, 25 more great articles about cities, we are all confident idiots by david dunning, fantastic beasts and how to rank them by kathryn schulz, the problem with p-values by david colquhoun, what is the monkeysphere by david wong, 100 more great psychology articles, love & relationships, love by lauren slater, masters of love by emily esfahani smith, this is emo by chuck klosterman, 50 more great articles about relationships, what makes us happy by joshua shenk, social connection makes a better brain by emily esfahani smith, the real roots of midlife crisis by jonathan rauch, 20 more great articles about happiness, success & failure, you can do it, baby by leslie garrett, what drives success by amy chua and jed rubenfeld, the fringe benefits of failure, and the importance of imagination by j.k. rowling, 10 more great articles about success, health & medicine, somewhere worse by jia tolentino, race to the vaccine by david heath and gus garcia-roberts, an epidemic of fear by amy wallace the score by atul gawande, 50 more great articles about health, mental health, darkness visible by william styron, the epidemic of mental illness by marcia angell, surviving anxiety by scott stossel, 50 more great articles about mental health, the moral instinct by steven pinker, not nothing by stephen cave, the greatest good by derek thompson, 15 more great articles about ethics, getting in by malcolm gladwell, learning by degrees by rebecca mead, the end of the english major by nathan heller, 20 more great articles about education, the string theory by david foster wallace, the istanbul derby by spencer hall, the kentucky derby is decadent and depraved by hunter s. thompson, 50 more great sports articles, why does music make us feel good by philip ball, one more time by elizabeth margulis, how to be a rock critic by lester bangs, 50 more great music articles, the arts & culture, inhaling the spore by lawrence weschler, death by harry potter by chuck klosterman, a one-man art market by bryan aappleyard, welcome to airspace by kyle chayka, 35 more great articles about the arts, fx porn by david foster wallace, flick chicks by mindy kaling, the movie set that ate itself by michael idov, 15 more great articles about movies, the last meal by michael paterniti, if you knew sushi by nick tosches, consider the lobster by david foster wallace, 50 more great articles about food.

15 Essays To Read Again in 2022

A list of our staff’s favorite essays from the past year that they did not commission themselves, or that they think cover a topic that deserves a second look.

As we prepare for 2022, we wanted to share with you a list of our staff’s favorite essays from the past year that they did NOT commission themselves or that they think cover a topic that deserves a second look.

Why I Stopped Writing About Syria, by Asser Khattab

Riada Asimovic Akyol, Contributing Editor

Among so many informative, eloquent pieces published in New Lines this year, this one I think I will actually never forget. It hit so many buttons and allowed so many people to be seen like never before. I caught myself nodding so many times while reading it, and I know a lot of people from the Balkans could understand what Asser was sharing. Others could learn with humility. The way he wrote about growing up “surrounded by people who have never experienced the joy of peaceful tranquility,” thinking that was the normal , and both the vulnerability and confidence with which he wrote about different challenges, as well as his human and professional yearnings and aspirations, were powerful and inspiring. Many conversations in open, and behind closed doors, will from now on be held, with employers, between employees, among friends, across the borders thanks to Asser’s piece. I am thankful for New Lines for publishing it.

How Arabs Have Failed Their Language, by Hossam Abouzahr

Kevin Blankinship, Contributing Editor

After the requisite boilerplate about how hard it is to choose favorites, about how every essay adds something to knowledge, etc., let me say that his is the piece I liked most from 2021. The reason is that it surprised me. It surprised me not because it was new to me: As an Arabic professor, I’ve heard who knows how many catfights about “diglossia,” namely high versus low (colloquial) varieties of Greek, Chinese, Serbian and other languages. What surprised me was how fresh the wounds are. For a quarrel looping back a thousand years, when Arab linguists tried to check “pollution” from non-native speakers, especially Persians, by setting up rules of grammar, I was stunned to see how much it agitates today. Abouzahr’s essay came out and so did the partisans. Formal Arabic is the Arabic of Islam, some said: the Arabic of the Qur’an, of classical poetry. But, said others, colloquial Arabic is the Arabic of hearth and home, of jokes and secrets, of friendship. Could it not, I thought as I watched the skirmish, be both? In the spirit of Christmas, isn’t there room for all the Arabics at the inn? A naïve thought that softens the majesty, the Whitman-like container of multitudes and, what’s more, one that misses how real language is used by real people and how it can’t be everything to everyone. Oh, well, let the fight go on, then.

The ISIS War Crime Iraqi Turkmen Won’t Talk About, by Hollie McKay

Courtney Dobson, Senior Editor

In this essay, Hollie McKay reports on women in Iraq who have been “disappeared” by the Islamic State group, the group’s use of rape as a weapon of war and how minority communities struggle to heal and come to terms with the stigma associated with sexual violence. It is a haunting piece, but McKay masterfully conveys the anguish and pain that comes with sexual violence, not just for the victim, but also for their loved ones trying to help. “Through the gap in the door flap,” McKay writes, “I noticed that scores of men and boys had lined up outside, maintaining a respectful distance from the distraught women but with curiosity etched into their sun-kissed faces. They wanted to be involved somehow, to be part of the healing process, to remind us that men were not the enemy — twisted men were the enemy. These were the fathers and brothers and sons, the nephews and neighbors.” McKay’s essay resonates for communicating the universal need for support, connection and justice, while also laying bare why these don’t come easily. Published a few months after New Lines launched, this essay left a deep impression on me.

How I Escaped China’s War on Uyghurs, by Tahir Hamut Izgil

Rasha Elass, Editorial Director

When we launched New Lines we wanted to cover themes and stories from beyond the geographic Middle East. The oppression of the Uyghurs in China struck me as an underreported story in mainstream media because it hardly featured first-person voices from the Uyghur community. So I got to work and found Tahir Hamut Izgil, a Uyghur poet who tells a story with moving prose and nuance. His essay about the chilling effect of a document that the Chinese authorities require members of the Uyghur community to fill out is both simple and profound, capturing a Kafkaesque reality that is often lost in the daily coverage of foreign affairs. Months after we translated and published Izgil’s essay, other media outlets followed suit. To us this is a triumph, evidence that we are already creating new lines in international reporting.

F ull essay

A Castle in the Air: Trekking the Secret Mountain Paths of Yemen, by Tim Mackintosh-Smith

Anthony Elghossain, Contributing Editor

Mountain men tell their stories. In Yemen, some folks speak of “an ancient city” atop a mountain. “What,” asks Tim Mackintosh-Smith after hearing them, “is really at the top of Jabal Balq?” To answer this question, he quests through myth, memory and the mind for a “castle in the air.” Is it a place? Maybe. Is it a journey? Yes. Having always gotten along with and been fascinated by folks in the mountains and hills, I was interested in reading this piece as soon as it was in our pipeline. And I loved how our writer came back for some “unfinished business.” Writing is about the quest. So, too, is life. Our writer captured those truths in this piece.

After America: Inside the Taliban’s New Emirate, by Fazelminallah Qazizai

Hassan Hassan, Editor in Chief

My choice of a favorite essay is to illustrate part of why we established  New Lines  in the first place. It was a dispatch by Fazelminallah Qazizai from a Taliban-held area, published four months before the Taliban would take over the country as fast as their trucks could drive through towns and provinces. If you read that story, nothing about what happened in the summer would come as a shock to you. After the Taliban’s takeover, it was easy for journalists to go through their old notes and write compelling stories about what they had witnessed in the months and years before, to make sense of what unfolded. It is harder to do that before the event, and Qazazai did just that. He also did it really well. The piece should be a template in how dispatches should be done. Qazazai was not parachuted into the country to come back with a piece from there. He is an Afghan journalist who actually knows the terrain, the society and history, and who goes to a Taliban area and eloquently captures and reconstructs the situation there.

The Key to Understanding Iran Is Poetry, by Muhammad Ali Mojaradi

Tam Hussein, Contributing Editor

Muhammad Ali Mojaradi in his essay is right: The key to understanding Iran is poetry. In Shiraz and Isfahan you see beggars recite Hafez and children hawking for money with birds picking couplets from small envelopes trying to tell your fortune. Perhaps it’s just Frank Miller’s “300” or the politics of the region that makes its peoples appear to have a culture built on hate and cruelty. But that is far from the truth. It has ambiguity built in, abundant variations on love, mysticism and much, much more. It just gave me an appreciation as to how all-encompassing Persianate culture is, including Iran, central Asia, Afghanistan and the subcontinent.

The Wandering Alawite, by Adnan Younes

Faysal Itani, Associate Editor

This was, as far as I’m aware, the best if not the only piece by a constituent of Syria’s mass murderer about his and his coreligionists’ implication in Bashar al-Assad’s crimes. I think it took tremendous intellectual courage to reflect on what drew Syria’s Alawites to support this regime, but it also posed an uncomfortable challenge to readers who understandably deplore any and all support for the war criminal Assad. It was difficult to write and difficult to read, because of its ability to humanize and contextualize horrible choices by Assad’s supporters and detractors alike. It was a tragic story in the most literal and compelling way.

A Multigenerational American Story of Immigration and Return, by Rasha Elass

Ola Salem, Managing Editor

A topic we often visit at New Lines is identity. Over the past year, we’ve run a number of first-person pieces looking at how environment and ancestry have shaped writers’ identity and how the answer is usually far more complex than a quick answer to the question, “Where are you from?” One story I found to be particularly fascinating was Rasha Elass’s piece in which she wrote about her Syrian great-grandfather who moved to America, carved a life for himself and later created a family of his own, only later to uproot his children and move back to Syria and face an attack from the French.

Gone to Waste: the ‘CVE’ Industry After 9/11, by Lydia Wilson

Chris Sands, South Asia Editor

The legacy of 9/11 has dominated my life and career. As a journalist for local newspapers in the U.K. in the weeks and months after the attacks, I saw and heard the racist backlash against British Muslims. Later, as a young reporter in the Middle East, I witnessed the daily indignities Palestinians suffer under Israeli occupation. But it was while living in Afghanistan for almost a decade that I came to understand the true folly of the countering violent extremism industry — a money-making enterprise perpetuated by governments, international NGOs and private companies in the guise of curbing Islamic militancy. Lydia Wilson’s article brilliantly details how this house of cards was built to ignore the social ills and legitimate political grievances that lie at the root of what was once called the “war on terror.”

The Bandit Warlords of Nigeria, by James Barnett

Kareem Shaheen, Middle East and Newsletters Editor

One of the things I was looking forward to the most when we started New Lines was giving the space to writers to explore stories that haven’t been told in the mainstream media. Too often, the rich tapestry of our lives and societies are obscured rather than illuminated. This piece is a fascinating investigation into an untold story that has long been neglected in favor of the “sexier” stories of Boko Haram extremists in Nigeria. It is about the farmer-herder conflict that has cost tens of thousands of lives, has been exacerbated by climate change and is destabilizing important parts of Africa’s most populous country. The color and fascinating exchanges in the piece, chronicled through Barnett’s exclusive access to the bandit warlords, make this unique investigation shine.

Where the Russian Gulag Once Thrived, Life Remains Isolated, by Owen Matthews

Michael Weiss, News Director

Believe it or not, one of our best essays this year grew out of the field research journal for a forthcoming spy novel. Owen Mathews spent 10 days touring the remains of the Gulag Archipelago — the slave-labor camps Stalin built to punish to send his enemies (and quite a lot of his friends) in the Russian Arctic. Whole communities and cities sprung up around these grim “colonies” of the 20th century, which helped industrialize the Soviet Union at the price of around 6 million souls. As one might expect, this architecture of atrocity has been left to rot or freeze or be swallowed up by the taiga. Matthews, an accomplished historian and biographer, travels to parts unknown and unremembered with an eye for detail and — no small trick given the circumstances — a sense of humor.

How an Email Sting Operation Unearthed a Pro-Assad Conspiracy—and Russia’s Role in It, by Michael Weiss and Jett Goldsmith

Brian Whitaker, Contributing Editor

A moment of light relief in the weird world of conspiracy theorists. Paul McKeigue is a university professor who denies the Assad regime’s chemical attacks in Syria and claims that those who died in them were executed by rebel fighters in a gas chamber. He got the gas chamber idea from an American who had a dream about it after eating anchovy pizza shortly before going to bed. McKeigue considers himself a smart guy, so when a mysterious emailer contacted him using the name “Ivan,” he assumed “Ivan” was working for Russian intelligence and began passing him information – mainly about people who disagreed with his conspiracy theories. But “Ivan” was neither Russian nor an intelligence agent – the professor had been caught in a sting.

An Elegy for Afghanistan, by Habib Zahori

Lydia Wilson, Contributing Editor

The piece is everything I want an essay to be: personal, informative and visceral, communicating a raw experience while simultaneously expressing far bigger themes about humanity and war. We published it at a time when all eyes were on Afghanistan, after the Taliban took control once coalition forces had withdrawn. For me it’s pieces like this that really cut through the immense amount that was being published at that time on this subject; it was so well written and based on so much personal and intimate knowledge. And his love for Afghanistan – and the heartbreak of that love — came through powerfully.

In Search of African Arabic, by Vaughn Rasberry

Faisal Al Yafai, Executive Editor

It was always going to be difficult to choose one essay over the others, and many of the choices of the team could easily have been my first picks. But Vaughn Rasberry’s essay on the influence of the Arabic language in Africa stands out for me because it explores such a rarely considered subject.

Rasberry believes, as I do, that African histories cannot be told without understanding the role of Arabic in shaping the political, social and literary environments of many of the countries and civilisations of the continent. The flip side is also true: that the Arab world cannot understand itself without reference to the African continent.

As Rasberry points out, there is a vast corpus of literature in African countries written in Arabic, much of it under-explored – some, no doubt, still undiscovered. Hidden histories of the African continent and the Arab world are in those texts, waiting to be sought out. Without it, both regions will only know half of their own stories.

Harris Has Momentum as the Convention Starts but Some Progressives Remain Skeptical

A war on universities in the netherlands, inside america’s foreign policy machine — with jasmine el-gamal, edward said’s cultural universalism and love of opera, ‘a round of applause’ finds the funny side of despondency, indian films are showing the realities of life for the country’s housewives, sign up to our newsletter.

Will be used in accordance with our Privacy Policy

10 of the Greatest Essays on Writing Ever Written

If there’s one topic that writers can be counted on to tackle at least once in their working lives, it’s writing itself. A good thing too, especially for all those aspiring writers out there looking for a little bit of guidance. For some winter inspiration and honing of your craft, here you’ll find ten great essays on writing, from the classic to the contemporary, from the specific to the all-encompassing. Note: there are many, many, many great essays on writing. Bias has been extended here to personal favorites and those available to read online. Also of note but not included: full books on the subject like Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird , Stephen King’s On Writing , and Ron Carlson’s Ron Carlson Writes a Story , or, in a somewhat different sense, David Shields’ Reality Hunger , for those looking for a longer commitment. Read on, and add your own favorite essays on writing to the list in the comments.

“Not-Knowing,” Donald Barthelme, from Not Knowing: the Essays and Interviews of Donald Barthelme . Read it here .

In which Barthelme, a personal favorite and king of strange and wonderful stories, muses on not-knowing, style, our ability to “quarrel with the world, constructively,” messiness, Mallarmé, and a thief named Zeno passed out wearing a chastity belt.

“The not-knowing is crucial to art, is what permits art to be made. Without the scanning process engendered by not-knowing, without the possibility of having the mind move in unanticipated directions, there would be no invention.”

“Fairy Tale Is Form, Form Is Fairy Tale,” Kate Bernheimer, from The Writer’s Notebook: Craft Essays From Tin House . Read it here .

Bernheimer is a constant champion of the fairy tale and its influence on literature at large (not least as editor of The Fairy Tale Review ), and a writer we couldn’t do without. This essay unpacks the formal elements of fairy tales, and does a fair bit more than hint at their essentialness to writers of all kinds.

“Fairy tales hold a key to the door fiercely locked between so-called realism and nonrealism, convention and experimentalism, psychology and abstraction. A key for those who see these as binaries, that is… Every writer is like a topsy- turvy doll that on one side is Red Riding Hood and on the other side the Wolf, or on the one side is a Boy and on the other, a Raven and Coffin. The traditional techniques of fairy tales—identifiable, named—are reborn in the different ways we all tell stories.”

“Reflections on Writing,” Henry Miller, from The Wisdom of the Heart . Read a few excerpts here .

A characteristically wonderful exploration of Miller’s own emotional, psychological, and technical struggles with writing.

“I had to grow foul with knowledge, realize the futility of everything; smash everything, grow desperate, then humble, then sponge myself off the slate, as it were, in order to recover my authenticity. I had to arrive at the brink and then take a leap in the dark.”

“The Figure a Poem Makes,” Robert Frost, from Collected Poems . Read it here .

A gorgeous mini-essay from an American giant that is equally relevant to writers of poetry or prose, and is almost a poem itself.

“No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise for the writer, no surprise for the reader.”

“On Style,” Susan Sontag, from Against Interpretation . Read it here .

As much about criticism as it is about writing (and perhaps more), Sontag dissects style versus form versus content versus the conceptions of all these things that we have in our heads.

“In other words, what is inevitable in a work of art is the style. To the extent that a work seems right, just, unimaginable otherwise (without loss or damage) , what we are responding to is a quality of its style. The most attractive works of art are those which give us the illusion that the artist had no alternatives, so wholly centered is he in his style. Compare that which is forced, labored, synthetic in the construction of Madame Bovary and of Ulysses with the ease and harmony of such equally ambitious works as Les Liaisons Dangereuses and Kafka’s Metamorphosis . The first two books I have mentioned are great indeed. But the greatest art seems secreted, not constructed.”

“Tradition and the Individual Talent,” T.S. Eliot, from The Sacred Wood . Read it here .

Whether or not you subscribe to Eliot’s “impersonal theory” of poetry, or his conception of the artist’s inevitable “self-sacrifice” to the past, there’s no arguing that this essay is a barn-burner.

“If you compare several representative passages of the greatest poetry you see how great is the variety of types of combination, and also how completely any semi-ethical criterion of “sublimity” misses the mark. For it is not the “greatness,” the intensity, of the emotions, the components, but the intensity of the artistic process, the pressure, so to speak, under which the fusion takes place, that counts.”

“The Ecstasy of Influence,” Jonathan Lethem, from The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, etc. . Read it here .

Here, Lethem discusses not just the shifty concept of plagiarism in fiction, but the anxiety of appropriating pop culture, copyright, Disney, the power of a gift economy, the idea of a “commons of cultural materials,” art of all forms. A must-read for any contemporary creator, especially if you’ve ever nicked a line from a favorite book.

“Most artists are brought to their vocation when their own nascent gifts are awakened by the work of a master. That is to say, most artists are converted to art by art itself. Finding one’s voice isn’t just an emptying and purifying oneself of the words of others but an adopting and embracing of filiations, communities, and discourses. Inspiration could be called inhaling the memory of an act never experienced. Invention, it must be humbly admitted, does not consist in creating out of void but out of chaos. Any artist knows these truths, no matter how deeply he or she submerges that knowing.”

“How to Write with Style,” Kurt Vonnegut, from How to Use the Power of the Written Word . Read it here .

Vonnegut is an enduring treasure trove of literary advice — everyone you know has seen this excellent video of the man explaining the shapes of stories — and this little essay is no different: clever, whip-smart, and told with joy.

“Why should you examine your writing style with the idea of improving it? Do so as a mark of respect for your readers, whatever you’re writing. If you scribble your thoughts any which way, your reader will surely feel that you care nothing about them. They will mark you down as an ego maniac or a chowderhead — or, worse, they will stop reading you.”

“Why I Write,” George Orwell. Read it here .

It’s hard to put together a list of great essays without including something from Orwell. So why not this one, forever quoted by anyone who has ever tried to write a novel, or wanted to?

“All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand. For all one knows that demon is simply the same instinct that makes a baby squall for attention. And yet it is also true that one can write nothing readable unless one constantly struggles to efface one’s own personality. Good prose is like a windowpane. I cannot say with certainty which of my motives are the strongest, but I know which of them deserve to be followed. And looking back through my work, I see that it is invariably where I lacked a political purpose that I wrote lifeless books and was betrayed into purple passages, sentences without meaning, decorative adjectives and humbug generally.”

“On Keeping a Notebook,” Joan Didion, from Slouching Towards Bethlehem . Read it here .

But of course: the essay that has launched a thousand notebook-keepers.

“Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores. The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss.”

While We’re On the Subject: 10 of the Best Essay Collections

Liberty Hardy

Liberty Hardy is an unrepentant velocireader, writer, bitey mad lady, and tattoo canvas. Turn-ons include books, books and books. Her favorite exclamation is “Holy cats!” Liberty reads more than should be legal, sleeps very little, frequently writes on her belly with Sharpie markers, and when she dies, she’s leaving her body to library science. Until then, she lives with her three cats, Millay, Farrokh, and Zevon, in Maine. She is also right behind you. Just kidding! She’s too busy reading. Twitter: @MissLiberty

View All posts by Liberty Hardy

One of the great things about being adult is that you only have to read the books you want to read now. No more assigned reading (unless you’re pursuing more education)! And while the word “essay” can conjure up images of homework, it’s actually just another really fun form of writing as a way to get information into your brain. An essay is a short piece of writing about a specific subject. That’s all. And just like all other writing, the subject possibilities are endless! There are so many amazing collections of essays to choose from. That’s why we’re helping you find a few great ones with this list of ten of the best essay collections.

These books cover a variety of topics, such as music, nature, race, and writing. Each of these are written by one particular author, but you can find essay collections with multiple contributors. The Best American Essays are a great place to start — the most recent one was guest edited by Alexander Chee, who has a book also listed below. He knows essays! I also highly recommend A Twenty Minute Silence Followed by Applause by Shawn Wen. I had no idea how much I would love a small collection of essays about the famous mime Marcel Marceau until I picked it up. What a gem!

They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Hanif Abdurraqib

Poet, essayist, and critic Abdurraqib’s first collection is an amazing jumping-off point if you’ve not read many essays. These are smart and thoughtful pieces, some about life as viewed through the lens of culture, such as his experience at a Carly Rae Jepsen show and his thoughts on attending concerts in the wake of the shootings in Paris. And some are about his experience as a Black man living in America. This collection was so successful, it got a new five-year anniversary cover, so you might also find this with a blue cover with a wolf in a red track suit.

Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin

Baldwin’s famous essay collection about racism and the lives of Black people in America was written in the 1940s and early 1950s, at the start of the Civil Rights movement. A powerful writer and activist, Baldwin was one of the early writers discussing the violence and murder perpetrated against Black people. His essays exposed readers to police violence and racial injustice in a time before it was being discussed publicly and nationally.

How To Write An Autobiographical Novel: Essays by Alexander Chee

Chee, who is a brilliant teacher as well as a published writer, discusses how the life of the writer is entangled in work in various ways. While explaining the importance of art and how it gives meaning to our lives, he revisits his own experiences, including the death of his father, the AIDS crisis, and writing his first novel Edinburgh .

Thank you for signing up! Keep an eye on your inbox. By signing up you agree to our terms of use

Loitering: New and Collected Essays by Charles D’Ambrosio

D’Ambrosio tackles very different subjects in this collection of things that loiter in his brain, while weaving very personal, heartbreaking information into each one. There’s a discussion of the trial of jailed teacher Mary Kay Letourneau, the work of J.D. Salinger, a haunted house, weather, and more. It is also an examination of mental illness and suicide in his family.

Slouching Towards Bethlehem: Essays by Joan Didion

Like Baldwin, Didion is one of the most famous essayists in the American literary canon. This memorable book includes her sharp, original takes on John Wayne and Howard Hughes, as well as a look at her life growing up in California, and other memorable takes on places around the state.

We Are Never Meeting in Real Life by Samantha Irby

And if you want a collection that will make you laugh out loud, pick up this (or any of Irby’s other books.) These are screamingly funny, honest essays about relationships, health and bodies, sex, pet ownership, family, and more. (A few more funny essayists to check out: Jenny Lawson, Helen Ellis, Phoebe Robinson, and Mary Laura Philpott.)

Small Wonder: Essays by Barbara Kingsolver

Kingsolver is one of the finest novelists of the last few decades, but did you know she also writes smart, touching nonfiction? Using nature as the underlying them in each one, Kingsolver probes our world, from mountains and trees, to the dangers of genetically modified foods, to what we owe the children of the world. It’s a collection about growth, literally and metaphorically.

Upstream: Selected Essays by Mary Oliver

Mary Oliver was an award-winning poet, and her immense, gorgeous talent for writing poetry is apparent in these beautiful, thoughtful essays. They examine her interest in nature and the world at large from a young age, and how the beauty she found around her influence her life and her work. Get ready to underline pretty much everything.

Let Me Clear My Throat: Essays by Elena Passarello

This is a fascinating collection about voices throughout popular culture, from an 18th century opera singer to Spaceballs to A Streetcar Named Desire . Passarello examines the sound and shape of the sounds that have contributed to the soundtracks of human lives. Equally fascinating is Animals Strike Curious Poses , her essay collection about famous animals throughout history.

Pulphead: Essays by John Jeremiah Sullivan

And last but not least, another lesser-known gem. Pulphead is like a road trip in a book that covers pop culture, and events around America. Sullivan investigates a Christian rock festival, Real World alumni, the BP oil spill, Hurricane Katrina, and more. It’s an absorbing collection that belongs on the shelf of every essay lover.

For more essays to enrich your life, be sure to check out 100 Must-Read Essay Collections and Essay Collections That Make You Necessarily Uncomfortable .

You Might Also Like

Find anything you save across the site in your account

What Susan Sontag Wanted for Women

Literature’s Most Controversial Nobel Laureate

Dear [School], Here’s My Soul in Six Hundred Words or Less

Holiday Stories from the Archive

Modernism’s Forgotten Mystic

Thanksgiving Tales from the Archive

A Fearless Experimentalist’s Stealth Reputation

Laurie Colwin’s Recipe for Being Yourself in the Kitchen

A Pandemic College Essay That Probably Won’t Get You Into Brown

What We Get Wrong About Joan Didion

Sunday Reading: Winter Stories

Thanksgiving Classics from the Archive

First Lines of Rejected “Modern Love” Essays

Cazzie David’s Existential Dread

The Bridge Dog

The D. H. Lawrence We Forgot

A House Is Not a Home

The Chinese Diarist Who Saw Into the World’s Pandemic Future

The Scholar Starting Brawls with the Enlightenment

My Father’s Voice from Paris

More From Forbes

The world’s best whiskey—according to the san francisco world spirits competition.

• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to Linkedin

Heaven Hill is the most awarded American whiskey maker at the San Francisco World Spirits ... [+] Competition

We spend a lot of time talking about the San Francisco World Spirits Competition . And for good reason. Since it was founded in 2000, the annual judging has grown in stature and prominence to become one of the premiere industry events of the calendar year. The producers and brands that collect “Best In Show” hardware there often see their sales soar as a result.

Although it convened back in April, we’re just now able to exclusively report on a key winner from the 2024 competition: Heaven Hill out of Bardstown, Kentucky is the most awarded US whiskey maker of the year. The legendary producer of bourbon and rye took home a total of 29 medals across 13 of its marquee labels. That’s enough to make it not only the most lauded whiskey maker, but the most successful American distillery, full stop, among all categories of spirit.

It’s not even close when you also factor in the additional 35 medals that Heaven Hill collected for some of its subsidiaries. Remember that in 2022, the company acquired Samson & Surrey —a portfolio which includes FEW as well as Widow Jane. Those two popular whiskey brands accrued a respectable count of 12 medals between them this year at SFWSC.

Evan Williams and Elijah Craig were the two most awarded brands from the Heaven Hill Distillery, itself. They took home 7 and 6 medals, respectively. With the highest distinction of Double Gold going to Bottled-In-Bond along with two separate Barrel Proof expressions.

All-in-all it’s been another banner year for the family-owned operation. Beyond the success at San Francisco, Heaven Hill unveiled three new expressions as part of its Grain To Glass series and Elijah Craig most recently debuted a Toasted Rye. Each of the new releases have been met with widespread critical acclaim.

‘Inside Out 2’ Debuts On Digital Streaming This Week

Acclaimed horror thriller oddity debuts on digital streaming this week, nyt ‘strands’ hints, spangram and answers for sunday, august 18th.

The steady, expert hand of master distiller Conor O’Driscoll has a lot to do with the consistent praise. Along with an unwavering commitment to quality maturation. It’s been a hallmark of the brand since it was founded by the Shapira family all the way back in 1935. And the practice is applied today to a stock that includes more than 2 million barrels.

But what we admire most about Heaven Hill in 2024 is the fact that it delivers such a stellar product across such a wide range of price points. To wit, that aforementioned bottle of Double Gold-winning Evan Williams Bottled-In-Bond?...It retails for around $18. Earlier this March, the distillery released the latest entry in its vaunted Heritage Collection. It’s a masterful 18-year-old bourbon that relies on the very same high-corn mashbill that gives Evan Williams its caramel-laden sweetness. Yet this one has no trouble flying off shelves at a suggest retail price of $300 a bottle.

And that’s to say nothing of the Old Fitzgerald label, a brand flaunting semi-annual releases which can often fetch four figures on secondary markets. A fall 2023 offering of the liquid—brandishing an 8 year age statement—was among the select few bourbons to take home that all-important Double Gold certification this year in San Francisco. It’s currently selling for just north of $400 a bottle. Fingers crossed it remains relatively close to that after this most recent news.

If you want to stay ahead of the inflated pricing, keep it parked here as we always endeavor to give you the latest, exclusive intel from the wondrous world of spirits .

Our Bourbon Trail adventure ended back where it started, in Louisville, but this time at the Evan ... [+] Williams Bourbon Experience on the city's Whiskey Row. (Robert Annis/Chicago Tribune/Tribune News Service via Getty Images)

• Editorial Standards
• Reprints & Permissions

Join The Conversation

One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. 

Forbes Community Guidelines

Our community is about connecting people through open and thoughtful conversations. We want our readers to share their views and exchange ideas and facts in a safe space.

In order to do so, please follow the posting rules in our site's  Terms of Service.   We've summarized some of those key rules below. Simply put, keep it civil.

Your post will be rejected if we notice that it seems to contain:

• False or intentionally out-of-context or misleading information
• Insults, profanity, incoherent, obscene or inflammatory language or threats of any kind
• Attacks on the identity of other commenters or the article's author
• Content that otherwise violates our site's  terms.

User accounts will be blocked if we notice or believe that users are engaged in:

• Continuous attempts to re-post comments that have been previously moderated/rejected
• Racist, sexist, homophobic or other discriminatory comments
• Attempts or tactics that put the site security at risk
• Actions that otherwise violate our site's  terms.

So, how can you be a power user?

• Stay on topic and share your insights
• Feel free to be clear and thoughtful to get your point across
• ‘Like’ or ‘Dislike’ to show your point of view.
• Protect your community.
• Use the report tool to alert us when someone breaks the rules.

Thanks for reading our community guidelines. Please read the full list of posting rules found in our site's  Terms of Service.

• Share full article

Advertisement

Supported by

Guest Essay

The China Hangover Is Here

By Michael Beckley

Mr. Beckley is the author of “Danger Zone: The Coming Conflict With China.”

In the 2000s, former President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela bet his country’s economic future on a rising China, securing tens of billions of dollars in investments and loans-for-oil deals. It paid off at first. China voraciously consumed Venezuelan oil and financed infrastructure projects from a high-speed railway to power plants.

The 2010s brought a reckoning. Oil prices fell, and growth in Chinese oil demand slowed along with its economy. Venezuela’s oil export revenues plummeted, from more than $73 billion in 2011 to $22 billion in 2016 . Misrule by Mr. Chavez and his handpicked successor, Nicolás Maduro, and myriad other domestic problems already had Venezuela on the brink; the gamble on China helped push it over the edge. In 2014, Venezuela’s economy collapsed. People scavenged for food in garbage dumps, hospitals were short of essential medicines and crime surged. Since then, nearly eight million people have fled the country. China largely cut Venezuela off from new credit and loans , leaving behind a slew of unfinished projects .

Venezuela’s over-dependence on China was an early warning that the world ignored. Dozens of other countries that rode China’s rise are now at serious risk of financial distress and debt default as the Chinese economy stagnates. Yet China refuses to offer meaningful foreign debt relief and is doubling down at home on its protectionist trade practices when it should be undertaking reforms to free up and restart its economy, the world’s second-largest and a crucial engine of global growth.

This is the flip side of China’s “miracle.” After the 2008 global financial crisis, the world needed an economic savior, and China filled that role. Starting in 2008, it pumped $29 trillion into its economy over nine years — equivalent to about one-third of global G.D.P. — to keep it going. The positive ripple effects were felt worldwide: From 2008 to 2021 China accounted for more than 40 percent of global growth . Developing countries eagerly attached themselves to what seemed like an unstoppable economic juggernaut, and China became the top trading partner for most of the world’s nations. Like Venezuela, many discovered that the booming Chinese economy was a lucrative new market for their commodity exports, and they leaned heavily into that, allowing other sectors of their economies to languish.

China also lent more than $1 trillion abroad, largely for infrastructure projects to be built by Chinese companies under its Belt and Road Initiative. Over the past two decades, one in three infrastructure projects in Africa was built by Chinese entities. The long-term debt risks for fragile developing economies were often ignored.

Chinese lending has slowed to a trickle

Annual foreign lending

$90 billion

$87 billion

Source: Boston University Global Development Policy Center

China’s economic growth has slowed sharply over the last few decades

China has consistently reported higher economic growth than outside sources estimate. While The Conference Board in recent years estimated numbers close to China’s, Rhodium Group estimated much smaller growth.

15% annual growth of G.D.P.

Reported by China

Estimated by

The Conference Board

Estimated by Rhodium Group

Sources: National Bureau of Statistics of China; The Conference Board; Rhodium Group

China is a major trading partner across the world

Share of total trade with China

10 percent or less

more than 10 percent

No recent data availabe

No recent data available

More than 10 percent

Source: United Nations Comtrade

Note: Trade data as of 2023. For countries where 2023 data is not available, the most recent year is used.

China has been one of the world’s largest lenders to emerging markets

Aggregate external public debt owed by developing and emerging markets

$400 billion

International

Monetary Fund

Sources: Horn et al. (2021) “ China's O verseas L ending ,” Journal of International Economics; World Bank; Paris Club; International Monetary Fund

Note: Chart shows debt owed by developing and emerging markets included in the World Bank International Debt Statistics. Data on public debt owed to China is incomplete after 2017.

We are having trouble retrieving the article content.

Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and  log into  your Times account, or  subscribe  for all of The Times.

Thank you for your patience while we verify access.

Already a subscriber?  Log in .

Want all of The Times?  Subscribe .

• Craft and Criticism
• Fiction and Poetry
• News and Culture
• Lit Hub Radio
• Reading Lists

• Literary Criticism
• Craft and Advice
• In Conversation
• On Translation
• Short Story
• From the Novel
• Bookstores and Libraries
• Film and TV
• Art and Photography
• Freeman’s
• The Virtual Book Channel
• Behind the Mic
• Beyond the Page
• The Cosmic Library
• The Critic and Her Publics
• Emergence Magazine
• Fiction/Non/Fiction
• First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing
• The History of Literature
• I’m a Writer But
• Lit Century
• Tor Presents: Voyage Into Genre
• Windham-Campbell Prizes Podcast
• Write-minded
• The Best of the Decade
• Best Reviewed Books
• BookMarks Daily Giveaway
• The Daily Thrill
• CrimeReads Daily Giveaway

The Best Reviewed Essay Collections of 2020

Featuring zadie smith, helen macdonald, claudia rankine, samantha irby, and more.

Zadie Smith’s Intimations , Helen Macdonald’s Vesper Flights , Claudia Rankine’s Just Us , and Samantha Irby’s Wow, No Thank You all feature among the Best Reviewed Essay Collections of 2020.

Brought to you by Book Marks , Lit Hub’s “Rotten Tomatoes for books.”

1. Vesper Flights by Helen Macdonald (Grove)

18 Rave • 3 Positive • 1 Mixed

Read Helen Macdonald on Sherlock Holmes, Ursula Le Guin, and hating On the Road  here

“A former historian of science, Macdonald is as captivated by the everyday (ants, bird’s nests) as she is by the extraordinary (glowworms, total solar eclipses), and her writing often closes the distance between the two … Always, the author pushes through the gloom to look beyond herself, beyond all people, to ‘rejoice in the complexity of things’ and to see what science has to show us: ‘that we are living in an exquisitely complicated world that is not all about us’ … The climate crisis shadows these essays. Macdonald is not, however, given to sounding dire, all-caps warnings … For all its elegiac sentences and gray moods, Vesper Flights  is a book of tremendous purpose. Throughout these essays, Macdonald revisits the idea that as a writer it is her responsibility to take stock of what’s happening to the natural world and to convey the value of the living things within it.”

–Jake Cline  ( The Washington Post )

2. Intimations by Zadie Smith (Penguin)

13 Rave • 7 Positive • 3 Mixed

Listen to Zadie Smith read from Intimations here

“Smith…is a spectacular essayist—even better, I’d say, than as a novelist … Smith…get[s] at something universal, the suspicion that has infiltrated our interactions even with those we want to think we know. This is the essential job of the essayist: to explore not our innocence but our complicity. I want to say this works because Smith doesn’t take herself too seriously, but that’s not accurate. More to the point, she is willing to expose the tangle of feelings the pandemic has provoked. And this may seem a small thing, but it’s essential: I never doubt her voice on the page … Her offhandedness, at first, feels out of step with a moment in which we are desperate to feel that whatever something we are trying to do matters. But it also describes that moment perfectly … Here we see the kind of devastating self-exposure that the essay, as a form, requires—the realization of how limited we are even in the best of times, and how bereft in the worst.”

–David L. Ulin  ( The Los Angeles Times )

3. Just Us: An American Conversation by Claudia Rankine (Graywolf)

11 Rave • 6 Positive • 5 Mixed

Read an excerpt from Just Us here

“ Just Us  is about intimacy. Rankine is making an appeal for real closeness. She’s advocating for candor as the pathway to achieving universal humanity and authentic love … Rankine is vulnerable, too. In ‘lemonade,’ an essay about how race and racism affect her interracial marriage, Rankine models the openness she hopes to inspire. ‘lemonade’ is hard to handle. It’s naked and confessional, deeply moving and, ultimately, inspirational … Just Us , as a book, is inventive … Claudia Rankine may be the most human human I’ve ever encountered. Her inner machinations and relentless questioning would exhaust most people. Her labor should be less necessary, of course.”

–Michael Kleber-Diggs  ( The Star Tribune )

4. Minor Feelings: An Asian American Reckoning by Cathy Park Hong (One World)

7 Rave • 10 Positive • 2 Mixed

Listen to an interview with Cathy Park Hong here

“Hong’s metaphors are crafted with stinging care. To be Asian-American, she suggests, is to be tasked with making an injury inaccessible to the body that has been injured … I read Minor Feelings  in a fugue of enveloping recognition and distancing flinch … The question of lovability, and desirability, is freighted for Asian men and Asian women in very different ways—and Minor Feelings  serves as a case study in how a feminist point of view can both deepen an inquiry and widen its resonances to something like universality … Hong reframes the quandary of negotiating dominance and submission—of desiring dominance, of hating the terms of that dominance, of submitting in the hopes of achieving some facsimile of dominance anyway—as a capitalist dilemma … Hong is writing in agonized pursuit of a liberation that doesn’t look white—a new sound, a new affect, a new consciousness—and the result feels like what she was waiting for. Her book is a reminder that we can be, and maybe have to be, what others are waiting for, too.”

–Jia Tolentino  ( The New Yorker )

5. World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments by Aimee Nezhukumatathil (Milkweed Editions)

11 Rave • 3 Positive

Read an excerpt from World of Wonders here

“In beautifully illustrated essays, poet Aimee Nezhukumatathil writes of exotic flora and fauna and her family, and why they are all of one piece … In days of old, books about nature were often as treasured for their illustrations as they were for their words. World of Wonders,  American poet and teacher Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s prose ode to her muses in the natural world, is a throwback that way. Its words are beautiful, but its cover and interior illustrations by Fumi Mini Nakamura may well be what first moves you to pick it up in a bookstore or online … The book’s magic lies in Nezhukumatathil’s ability to blend personal and natural history, to compress into each brief essay the relationship between a biographical passage from her own family and the life trajectory of a particular plant or animal … Her kaleidoscopic observations pay off in these thoughtful, nuanced, surprise-filled essays.”

–Pamela Miller  ( The Star Tribune )

6. Wow, No Thank You by Samantha Irby (Vintage)

10 Rave • 3 Positive • 1 Mixed

Watch an interview with Samantha Irby here

“Haphazard and aimless as she claims to be, Samantha Irby’s Wow, No Thank You  is purposefully hilarious, real, and full of medicine for living with our culture’s contradictory messages. From relationship advice she wasn’t asked for to surrendering her cell phone as dinner etiquette, Irby is wholly unpretentious as she opines about the unspoken expectations of adulting. Her essays poke holes and luxuriate in the weirdness of modern society … If anyone whose life is being made into a television show could continue to keep it real for her blog reading fans, it’s Irby. She proves we can still trust her authenticity not just through her questionable taste in music and descriptions of incredibly bloody periods, but through her willingness to demystify what happens in any privileged room she finds herself in … Irby defines professional lingo and describes the mundane details of exclusive industries in anecdotes that are not only entertaining but powerfully demystifying. Irby’s closeness to financial and physical precariousness combined with her willingness to enter situations she feels unprepared for make us loyal to her—she again proves herself to be a trustworthy and admirable narrator who readers will hold fast to through anything at all.”

–Molly Thornton  ( Lambda Literary )

7. Funny Weather: Art in an Emergency by Olivia Laing (W. W. Norton & Company)

5 Rave • 10 Positive • 3 Mixed • 1 Pan

“Yes, you’re in for a treat … There are few voices that we can reliably read widely these days, but I would read Laing writing about proverbial paint drying (the collection is in fact quite paint-heavy), just as soon as I would read her write about the Grenfell Tower fire, The Fire This Time , or a refugee’s experience in England, The Abandoned Person’s Tale , all of which are included in Funny Weather … Laing’s knowledge of her subjects is encyclopaedic, her awe is infectious, and her critical eye is reminiscent of the critic and author James Wood … She is to the art world what David Attenborough is to nature: a worthy guide with both a macro and micro vision, fluent in her chosen tongue and always full of empathy and awe.”

–Mia Colleran  ( The Irish Times )

8. Conditional Citizens: On Belonging in America by Laila Lalami (Pantheon)

6 Rave • 7 Positive • 1 Mixed • 2 Pan

“A] searing look at the struggle for all Americans to achieve liberty and equality. Lalami eloquently tacks between her experiences as an immigrant to this country and the history of U.S. attempts to exclude different categories of people from the full benefits of citizenship … Lalami offers a fresh perspective on the double consciousness of the immigrant … Conditional citizenship is still conferred on people of color, women, immigrants, religious minorities, even those living in poverty, and Lalami’s insight in showing the subtle and overt ways discrimination operates in so many facets of life is one of this book’s major strengths.”

–Rachel Newcomb  ( The Washington Post )

9. This is One Way to Dance by Sejal Shah (University of Georgia Press)

7 Rave • 2 Positive 

Watch an interview with Sejal Shah here

“Shah brings important, refreshing, and depressing observations about what it means to have dark skin and an ‘exotic’ name, when the only country you’ve ever lived in is America … The essays in this slim volume are engaging and thought-provoking … The essays are well-crafted with varying forms that should inspire and enlighten other essayists … A particularly delightful chapter is the last, called ‘Voice Texting with My Mother,’ which is, in fact, written in texts … Shah’s thoughts on heritage and belonging are important and interesting.”

–Martha Anne Toll  ( NPR )

10. Having and Being Had by Eula Biss (Riverhead)

5 Rave • 4 Positive • 4 Mixed

Read Eula Biss on the anticapitalist origins of Monopoly here

“… enthralling … Her allusive blend of autobiography and criticism may remind some of The Argonauts  by Maggie Nelson, a friend whose name pops up in the text alongside those of other artists and intellectuals who have influenced her work. And yet, line for line, her epigrammatic style perhaps most recalls that of Emily Dickinson in its radical compression of images and ideas into a few chiseled lines … Biss wears her erudition lightly … she’s really funny, with a barbed but understated wit … Keenly aware of her privilege as a white, well-educated woman who has benefited from a wide network of family and friends, Biss has written a book that is, in effect, the opposite of capitalism in its willingness to acknowledge that everything she’s accomplished rests on the labor of others.”

–Ann Levin  ( Associated Press )

The Book Marks System: RAVE = 5 points • POSITIVE = 3 points • MIXED = 1 point • PAN = -5 points

• Share on Facebook (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Google+ (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Tumblr (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window)
• Click to share on Pocket (Opens in new window)

Previous Article

Next article, support lit hub..

Join our community of readers.

to the Lithub Daily

Popular posts.

Follow us on Twitter

Michelle Buteau on Translating Her Comedy Into a (Mostly) PG-13 Book

• RSS - Posts

Literary Hub

Created by Grove Atlantic and Electric Literature

Sign Up For Our Newsletters

How to Pitch Lit Hub

Advertisers: Contact Us

Privacy Policy

Support Lit Hub - Become A Member

Become a Lit Hub Supporting Member : Because Books Matter

For the past decade, Literary Hub has brought you the best of the book world for free—no paywall. But our future relies on you. In return for a donation, you’ll get an ad-free reading experience , exclusive editors’ picks, book giveaways, and our coveted Joan Didion Lit Hub tote bag . Most importantly, you’ll keep independent book coverage alive and thriving on the internet.

Become a member for as low as $5/month