Twenty-Five Great Essays (Penguin Academics Series)

by DiYanni, Robert

• ISBN13: 9780321261632
• ISBN10: 0321261631
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-01-01
• Publisher: Longman

Summary

A compact collection of essays at an affordable price, Twenty-Five Great Essaysoffers readers an excellent models of good writing and springboards to student writing. Selections range from classic essayssuch as E.B. White's, "Beauty" and Frederick Douglass', "Learning to Read and Write," to contemporary essayssuch as Joan Didian's, "Marrying Absurd" and Stephen Jay Gould's, "Women's Brains." General readers.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
INTRODUCTION: READING AND WRITING ESSAYS	1	(30)
History and Context	1	(4)
Pleasures of the Essay	5	(2)
Types of Essays	7	(2)
Reading Essays	9	(6)
Reading Annie Dillard's "Living Like Weasels"	10	(5)
Writing Essays	15	(14)
The Qualities of Good Writing	15	(1)
An Overview of the Writing Process	16	(1)
Planning	16	(1)
Drafting	17	(1)
Revising	18	(1)
Writing from Reading—An Example	19	(2)
Freewriting	21	(2)
Double-Column Notebook	23	(2)
Writing a Summary	25	(2)
Going Further	27	(1)
Observing Details	27	(1)
Connecting Details	28	(1)
Making Inferences	28	(1)
Arriving at an Interpretation	29	(2)
FRANCIS BACON
Of Studies	31	(3)
JUDITH ORTIZ COFER
Casa: A Partial Remembrance of a Puerto Rican Childhood	34	(7)
JOAN DIDION
Marrying Absurd	41	(5)
ANNIE DILLARD
Living Like Weasels	46	(6)
FREDERICK DOUGLASS
Learning to Read and Write	52	(7)
GRETEL EHRLICH
About Men	59	(5)
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
Arriving at Perfection	64	(5)
HENRY LOUIS GATES, JR.
In the Kitchen	69	(8)
STEPHEN JAY GOULD
Women's Brains	77	(8)
WILLIAM HAZLITT
On the Pleasure of Hating	85	(11)
LANGSTON HUGHES
Salvation	96	(4)
JAMAICA KINCAID
On Seeing England for the First Time	100	(12)
MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Letter from Birmingham Jail	112	(18)
MAXINE HONG KINGSTON
On Discovery	130	(3)
N. SCOTT MOMADAY
The Way to Rainy Mountain	133	(7)
MICHEL DE MONTAIGNE
Of Smells	140	(4)
GEORGE ORWELL
Shooting an Elephant	144	(9)
ALEXANDER PETRUNKEVITCH
The Spider and the Wasp	153	(6)
SUSAN SONTAG
A Woman's Beauty: Put-Down or Power Source?	159	(4)
JONATHAN SWIFT
A Modest Proposal	163	(9)
AMY TAN
Mother Tongue	172	(7)
JAMES THURBER
University Days	179	(7)
ALICE WALKER
Beauty: When the Other Dancer Is the Self	186	(9)
E.B. WHITE
Once More to the Lake	195	(8)
VIRGINIA WOOLF
The Death of the Moth	203	(4)
Credits	207	(2)
Index	209