Working at B&N a while back I would use my breaks to get a book and read a bit...However, I realized that the most efficient way to use my time there was to read works written in essay form....This way I could complete a "piece" of writing before resuming work...Found this book with a great compilation of Mark Twain's essays: Among the essays I read: "Letter to Satan" "Advice to Youth" "On Patriotism" and others I cannot recall the title of...( i think I'll buy the book because Twain's style was verycompellling to read, sometimes hillarious but always focusing on a deeper meaning.)..Since BS is the great fountain of knowledge could you guys tell me what great essayists (sp.) you would recommend?
Contemporary: Michael Ventura, a columnist for the L.A. Weekly. His two collections are Letters at 3 a.m.: Reports on Endarkenment and Shadow Dancing USA. They're pretty tough to find. Easier is his collection of dialogues with psychologist James Hillman called We've Had 100 Years of Psychotherapy and the World's Getting Worse. Classic: Michel de Montaigne's Essays. Might take a while to get into, but once you do, they start to flow. Some essays are a few paragraphs, one is over 100 pages in most editions. In-between, getting closer to classic every year: George Orwell.
I second the idea of finding Ventura. Both Letters at 3am collections are priceless. Last I heard he was still a columnist for an Austin independent paper (and a teacher), and you can still find his current columns online if you look for them.
I second the idea of finding Ventura. Both Letters at 3am collections are priceless. Last I heard he was still a columnist for an Austin independent paper (and a teacher), and you can still find his current columns online if you look for them.
You don't have to look all that far for them: http://www.auschron.com/issues/dispatch/columns/lettersat3am.html Didn't know he was in the Austin weekly. Thought he was still in L.A.
Yea, he left over a decade ago at this point (I think) in a dispute with someone (probably an editor) at the LA Weekly. He saved my life when I lived in LA in 1985-86.
Thanks for the update. I knew where he was, but that was in the pre-web days, and until this thread started, it never really dawned on me to track him down. Like I said, I first came across him in that book he did with James Hillman, and only then looked for his essays. Now that I found his stuff online, it's safe to say that I will not be very productive today or tomorrow. He is one of those rare writers about whom I can imagine someone saying that they "saved my life," which is pretty high praise.
Vidal Gore Vidal is perhaps the best essayist this country has produced. For range of topic matter (literary and political and otherwise), and wit, there aren't many writers like Vidal. I like Philip Lopate also. Tony
http://www.auschron.com/issues/dispatch/2003-12-12/cols_ventura.html http://www.auschron.com/issues/dispatch/2003-12-26/cols_ventura.html Michael Ventura's two most recent essays, parts one and two of a three-part sequence on "soul." Concur with Tedwar on Vidal.
Thank you Appreciate the suggestions guys...This weekend that I get back to B&N I'll try checking some of the recommendations out
Yup, classic Ventura. Thanks for the links. Maybe you'll link the 3rd part of the series when it becomes available? The 2nd one was particularly intriguing, as what he wrote about happened around the time when I discovered Ventura and was reading him weekly. Obviously he was going through a lot in his life at the time unbeknowst to me, but so was I...
Here it is. http://www.auschron.com/issues/dispatch/2004-01-09/cols_ventura.html He brings to a close the series. In addition, and in keeping with the theme of the thread, there's a really interesting meditation on the distinction between "the essay" and "the article."