The best American essays
Preface -- Introduction: Encountering the essay -- Prologue: Essayists on the essay -- What is an essay? / Resisting definitions / essay as object / essay as action / Essays and the real world / No standard essay / essay's diversity / memorable essay / author's gumption / Essays and the imagination / Essays versus articles / Essays versus stories / Essays versus poems / Essays are not scientific documents / essayist's defensiveness / On being an essayist / Essayists must tell the truth / essayist's voice / demands of the first person singular / "who cares" factor / How the essayist acquires authority / conversational style / attractions of autobiography / essayist's audience / Essays start out in magazines / On certain magazine interviews / Listening to people think / On the subjects of essays / essay's unlimited possibilities
personal voice : identity, diversity, self-discovery -- telephone / Hair / Silent dancing / In the kitchen / Victoria / Mirrorings / Kubota / Ring leader / Silk parachute / break / inheritance of tools / Mother tongue / attentive mind : observation, reflection, insight -- stunt pilot / Spring / lovely sort of lower purpose / week in the word / Heaven and nature / No wonder they call me a bitch / Salt / stone horse / They all just went away / All in Havana / Crickets, bats, cats, & chaos / disposable rocket / public sphere : advocacy, argument, controversy -- Yes, Oswald alone killed Kennedy / Think about it / Shouting "Fire!" / Who shot Johnny? / Debra Dickerson -- Understanding Afrocentrism : why blacks dream of a world without whites / creation myths of Cooperstown / What's wrong with animal rights / On seeing England for the first time / case for human beings / century of cinema / On being black and middle class / killing game
Alternative arrangements -- Rhetorical modes -- Some literary and journalistic techniques -- Contemporary issues -- Index of authors.
Atwan, Robert.
Justin Kaplan -- Jamaica Kincaid -- Ian Frazier -- Ian Frazier -- Annie Dillard -- Joseph Epstein -- Susan Sontag -- Joyce Carol Oates -- Justin Kaplan -- Cynthia Ozick -- Cynthia Ozick -- Annie Dillard - Annie Dillard -- Edward Hoagland -- Susan Sontag -- Joseph Epstein -- Geoffrey Wolff -- Susan Sontag -- Tracy Kidder -- Geoffrey Wolff -- Edward Hoagland -- Joseph Epstein -- Tracy Kidder -- Elizabeth Hardwick -- Susan Sontag -- Gay Talese -- Gay Talese -- Elizabeth Hardwick -- Annie Dillard.
Anwar F. Accawi -- Marcia Aldrich -- Judith Ortiz Cofer -- Henry Louis Gates, Jr. -- Dagoberto Gilb -- Lucy Grealy -- Garrett Hongo -- Natalie Kusz -- John McPhee -- Cynthia Ozick -- Scott Russell Sanders -- Amy Tan -- Annie Dillard -- Gretel Ehrlich -- Ian Frazier -- Patricia Hampl -- Edward Hoagland -- Ann Hodgman -- Diana Kappel-Smith -- Barry Lopez -- Joyce Carol Oates -- Gay Talese -- Lewis Thomas -- John Updike -- Jacob Cohen -- Frank Conroy -- Alan M. Dershowitz -- Gerald Early -- Stephen Jay Gould -- Vicki Hearne -- Jamaica Kincaid -- Thomas Palmer -- Susan Sontag -- Shelby Seele --
Joy Williams --
edited and with an introduction by Robert Atwan.
