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The Next American Essay
In this singular collection, John D'Agata takes a literary tour of lyric essays written by the masters of the craft. Beginning with 1975 and John McPhee's ingenious piece, "The Search for Marvin Gardens," D'Agata selects an example of creative nonfiction for each subsequent year. These essays are unrestrained, elusive, explosive, mysterious—a personal lingual playground. T...more
Paperback, 488 pages
Published
February 1st 2003
by Graywolf Press
(first published February 28th 2002)
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Still in the process of reading all the essays. Unlike most collections, as I dip into this book, there's not been a bum note. There are many writers I know, some I've been introduced to, others I've seen new sides to. And D'Agata's intutive, smart, poetic intros to each essay (he's chosen an essay / year since 1978(?)) add momentum and connections with a skill which is rare in an editor, and shows really that he's a writer who loves words, truly: the sound and shape and meanings, as much as he...more
there's some incredible beauty and genius in these pages. "Total Eclipse" by Annie Dillard was so moving (and a tiny bit scary, if I remember correctly)... it made me want to write essays (and showed me how it was possible to use a lyric structure to do so). "The Search for Marvin Gardens" by John McPhee blew my mind expertly -- a social commentary by way of lyric impulse. It's definitely a great text to teach from (Graywolf sells that on the website) but only b/c it's a great book to learn from...more
My favorite NF piece out of this collection of essays? Wayne Koestenbaum's "Darling's Prick." I kind of fell in love with him after reading this.
Poetry being pornographic. A play on words. Of course I would love it.
"I don't want to write 'about' the prick. I want to write the prick.
Which doesn't mean I like pricks. In fact I am rather indifferent to them."
What ends this collection of essays is one called "Things To Do Today." Things which I should treat as writing prompts. Joe Wenderoth, appare...more
Poetry being pornographic. A play on words. Of course I would love it.
"I don't want to write 'about' the prick. I want to write the prick.
Which doesn't mean I like pricks. In fact I am rather indifferent to them."
What ends this collection of essays is one called "Things To Do Today." Things which I should treat as writing prompts. Joe Wenderoth, appare...more
A very nice collection, and Agata's connecting overviews are interesting. They sometimes become too lyrical--to use his phrase--or self-involved--to use mine--and tend toward the obscurity of his own collection, Halls of Fame.
All of which would suggest that I am maybe skeptical of the lyrical version of essays. And I am. But this collection convinced me that allthough there is some dross, there is some good.
I just could not get into Silk's Marionete Theater or Metcalf's "and nobody objected" for...more
All of which would suggest that I am maybe skeptical of the lyrical version of essays. And I am. But this collection convinced me that allthough there is some dross, there is some good.
I just could not get into Silk's Marionete Theater or Metcalf's "and nobody objected" for...more
Russian linguinist Mikhail Bakhtin would maybe call these essays a type of “heteroglossia”-----"another's speech in another's language, serving to express authorial intentions but in a refracted way." I think the writers of the essays use structure in a way that honors our need for evolution and allows for the exploration of ideas and communication in a way that does not feel counter intuitive to our current situations.
Some of the pieces I'd describe as re-purposing popular motifs, objects, ico...more
Some of the pieces I'd describe as re-purposing popular motifs, objects, ico...more
There are some wonderful essays in this collection. Joan Didion, Jamaica Kincaid, and David Foster Wallace were all selections I looked forward to, and I wasn't the least surprised at their lyrical mastery, depth of emotion, and flawless delivery.
A surprising number of the selections were (because I can think of no good way to describe this in English) pessimo [said with great disgust and Italian accent]. As a genre, the essay in particular seems to lend itself to pretension, and The Next Americ...more
A surprising number of the selections were (because I can think of no good way to describe this in English) pessimo [said with great disgust and Italian accent]. As a genre, the essay in particular seems to lend itself to pretension, and The Next Americ...more
what a weird little collection of essays. moving from essay to essay, i sometimes got the feeling that d'agata was confused about what he's trying to collect here: essays about essays, quintessential representative examples of the changing nature of postmodernism versus the changing nature of u.s. society, or just a bunch of pieces he liked? my favorites were the essays that were just good reads, without the self-conscious meta aspect or the weight of representing the mindset of all of u.s. soci...more
D'Agata selects some of the freshest essays around, essays that truly explore questions (as D'Agata points out, "essaying" in the most fundamental way) and subjects in unique ways. These essays surprise and reinvent what the essay can be and will be. I use this text to introduce students to what nonfiction can be and it always surprises and promotes wonderful discussions about the nature of the essay.
I was initially skeptical of this -assigned- reading, but as it progressed, the format of the Essay became a totally new concept for me, and I appreciate the way D'Agata frames each section with a framing paragraph or two (which could be considered essays in their own right/write). Karole Maso essay was the most memorable...for obvious reasons.
John D'Agata's collection, The Next American essay should be a good companion piece to Phillip Lopate's anthology,
The Art of the Personal Essay
.Where Lopate's collection focuses on a clear, almost historical, overview of the best essays in literature, D'Agata instead selects more experimental or often over-looked writing. You'll have the masters of the essay, Didion or McPhee, but you'll also have Maso, and Wallace in the mix. Great book, but I was quite surprised that D'Agata left out many di...more
Two rich studies in one anthology...a chronological look at essays that challenge our expectations of the genre and a progressive reflection by D'Agata on American culture between 1975 and 2003 (basically the length of his own life).
I love the diversity of essays here. I'm using this as the core text for my intermediate CNF course this spring.
Excellent resource. A whole different take on the tradition of the essay and much welcomed by me.
I used this book to teach a non-fiction class at Temple University. My lord there are some good things here, but also there are some really bulbous things that ain't so fast. It gets trying to look at exasperated student faces as they ask why they had to read some of these essays, and after a while, midway through the semester, I abandoned the syllabus and the book in favor of shorter, more engaging, less artfully wonky bits I found online. DFW, Didion, Sontag went over OK, not great. But try te...more
beyond my dictionary, the most referenced resource on my bookshelf
May 20, 2010
Jil
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
experimental essay-writers and readers
Recommended to Jil by:
Catherine Imbriglio
Shelves:
school
I like the idea of this collection, & I don't fall in the D'Agata hate-camp that thinks his idea of nonfiction is far too broad. Still, I found too many of these essays to be experimental in self-indulgent or stupid ways; it's one thing to make a point about what an essay can be, but I'd prefer more quality examples of it.
What's worth reading: the Foster Wallace, Didion, McPhee, and Goldbarth. Frankly, though, I would have read the first three anyway.
What's worth reading: the Foster Wallace, Didion, McPhee, and Goldbarth. Frankly, though, I would have read the first three anyway.
Jul 28, 2008
Matt Buchholz
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
If I taught a college level writing class, this would be the text book.
Recommended to Matt by:
The Believer, so you know its street cred is legit.
A collection of creative non-fiction essays, or 'lyric essays' as the editor dubs them, with works ranging from dazzling/inventive to pretentious/indecipherable. But the whole thing doubles as one giant personal essay collage about the editor's relationship with the form throughout his life, so take the bad with the good because it's kind of a big deal.
This is a wonderful collection of creative nonfiction from 1975 to 2003. There are a lot of incredible pieces by the likes of John McPhee, Joan Didion, Annie Dillard, etc. but there are also several clunkers--mostly, in my opinion, the newer stuff. Overall though, this is a great introduction to the genre.
It's uneven. Some incredible essays , a playful and remarkable lyric essay that John D'Agata writes to introduce each essay, and some writers that write innovative but dull pieces. I am intrigued with the versatility of the lyric essay and overall this is a remarkable collection,
There are some gems here: Barry Lopez's "The Raven" (1976), Susan Sontag's "Unguided Tour" (1977), and Sherman Alexie's Captivity (1992), but there are also some clunkers. I will admit to reading only the first couple of pages of several of them.
read. and reading again. barry lopez's essay about crows and ravens is one of my very favorites. plus, harry mathews is creepy and exquisite.
D'Agata shows the evolution of the essay over the last 50 years or so. This book definitely opened my eyes to what an essay can be, and do.
From a postmodern manifesto on buying a mattress to the differentiation of crows and ravens and so on and so forth. Damn, damn good.
It was quite the interesting read and it really expands one's understanding of an essay and all the aspects it can contain.
Some very interesting stuff here--reading it for American NonFiction Lit--proof that nonfiction writing can also be art.
Mostly fantastic selection of lyric essays.
Great stuff... just got antsy to read some novels. Will definitely re-visit sooner than later!
I wish John D'Agata was the editor for the yearly Best American Essays.
!!! Surprisingly brilliant. Don't let the awful cover fool you!
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John D'Agata is the author of About a Mountain and the editor of The Next American Essay and The Lost Origins of the Essay. He teaches creative writing at the University of Iowa.
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“What happens when an essayist starts imagining things, making things up, filling in blank spaces, or — worse yet — leaving the blanks blank?”
—
5 people liked it
“Maybe every essay automatically is in some way experimental — less an outline traveling toward a foregone conclusion than an unmapped quest that has sprung from the word 'question'.”
—
3 people liked it
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08. Februar, 18:11 Uhr