Ages back, when I was studying printmaking—seriously, such an old school art, and so tactile, using fat slabs of smooth, pale lithography stones brought over from specialized quarries in Europe, stone formed in ancient lagoons where the climate was once, by chance, a perfect mix of saline and low oxygen, the right climate to form that smooth rock instead of fossils, instead of something more variegated or stratified, allowing for slabs to be cut and milled; then working with fantastically heavy and archaic printing presses also brought over from Europe, each press so heavy it seemed more than one onboard an ocean liner might sink a ship; cranking a massive iron wheel by hand, using a sharp tool to etch fine lines into metal plates, rubbing stones and plates with chemical acids and adhesives, then spreading and lifting ink full of who knows what nerve agents and carcinogens—…
Anyway.
Back then, my professor, Jim Hibbard, assigned us the job of studying widely known and well received works of art to consider composition. He’d ask us what we saw. How did a master divide space on a two-dimensional plane? How did a new movement change things?
We’d use our own content while reproducing the composition established by an artist who had made it into the ranks of art history, museums, the terrain of masters. We’d draw anything that caught our eye, but we’d divide the page and use lines, angles and form the way we saw the same occurring in a Degas, or a Cezanne, or whichever artist’s work was put in front of us.
These days, I’ve been considering essays and the question of how to convey the range, form and magic of building an essay out of ideas, urges and values. What do we want to say, to whom and why and how?
When I teach freshman writing courses, they’re generally called Comp 101, or Composition.
We can compose an essay the way we compose a visual image, or a dance that uses the performance space, or anything else. But how to learn the art of composition?
It’s great to write ideas down, to follow one’s impulses, tell a joke, set a scene, point out problems, suggest a solution, remember a moment, snag dialogue from memory, dream a little…
But if you’re new to writing or new to the essay as a literary form, I think it’s also great to look at essays that have done well. As you read, ask yourself what the writer brought to the page.
You can take any essay and annotate it. By that I mean scribble on a page—make notes. Read an essay, and read it again, and make a note to yourself about what the author is doing in each section, each sentence or paragraph. It can help to find one’s footing.
Is the work entirely built out of the author’s personal experience? Is there any research incorporated? Is the delivery entirely in scenes, complete with setting, sensory details and the other techniques often used in fiction? Are there moments when the author steps in to make a bold statement or raise a question? Do you ever laugh out loud, as you read the work? Why or why not? Circle and annotate: personal experience, dialogue, research, hahaha!
If the author has made strong, “big voice” or generalizing claims, you might write, Is this True? Or Does this work? Ask yourself how you feel about the delivery. Do you believe the author? Does the author have authority on the page? If so, how is that authority built and conveyed? Where does it come through? It must be somewhere on the page, in the words or behind the words…If the author has little or no authority…well, maybe find another essay…! Ha! Unless there’s something else you like about it.
You can learn a lot by looking twice (or three times) at published work.
Maybe you know this already. Maybe you’ve been writing your whole life, or even in past lives, forever…I’ll accept that! (This round.) But if you’re asking yourself what an essay can do, how the form works, read as many essays as you can, and return to the examples that really call to you.
I’ll be hosting my essay discussion group this evening. I believe in the power of telling important stories built of experience, ideas and sometimes research. If we do it well, and do it consistently, voices can change the world.
xo
Ps—I still have a short stack of this limited edition essay I self published as a labor of love….Come Closer: Two Essays (A Slim, Limited Edition Book) | monicadrake
And you can find my work online, many places, including….
Life Was a Roving Party Until I Grew Up - The New York Times (nytimes.com)
Shuffle-Tap-Stepping My Way Back to Life - by Monica Drake (substack.com)
The Paris Review - The Clown Continuum - The Paris Review
And more….