Strategies for Writers: A Reader Book

Most chapters include “Writing Topics.”

1.On Reading an Essay: The Reader's Responsibility.

Fulfilling the Reader's Responsibility.

Brent Staples, A Brother's Murder.

2.Creating an Effective Subject.

Sherwood Anderson, Discovery of a Father.

Creating an Effective Subject.

3.Organizing the Essay.

Maya Angelou, Sister Flowers.

Organizing an Essay.

4.On Writing and Revising an Essay.

Emily Hegarty, Meanie and Me.

Emily Hegarty, How I Wrote Meanie and Me.

Revising the Essay.

5.Narration.

Writing Narration.

Frederick Douglas, Learning to Read and Write.

Maxine Hong Kingston, The Misery of Silence.

David Updike, Coloring Lessons.

George Orwell, A Hanging.

Hana Wehle, The Return.

Helen Keller, Three Days to See.

Narration—Writing Topics.

6.Description.

Writing Description.

E. B. White, Once More to the Lake.

Loren Eiseley, Sparrow Hawks.

Fae Myenne Ng, False Gold.

Plato, The Allegory of the Cave.

Richard Selzer, The Discus Thrower.

Saul Bellow, On a Kibbutz.

Description—Writing Topics.

7.Illustration and Example.

Writing with Illustration and Example.

David Gelernter, Unplugged.

Brent Staples, Black Men and Public Space.

Anna Quindlen, Homeless.

Steve Tesich, An Amateur Marriage.

Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions.

William Glaberson, Mall Rats.

Illustration and Example—Writing Topics.

8.Process Analysis.

Writing Process Analysis.

Peter Elbow, Freewriting.

Dana Wehle, We Kissed the Tomato and Then the Sky.

Jim Fusilli, Becoming American, by Degrees.

Gary Soto, Finding a Wife.

Tom Daly, Dancing in the Cracks between Worlds.

Lewis Thomas, On Transcendental Metaworry (TMW).

Process Analysis—Writing Topics.

9.Classification.

Writing Classification.

Anne Norton, The Signs of Shopping.

Anna Lisa Raya, It's Hard Enough Being Me.

Scott Russell Sanders, The Men We Carry in Our Minds.

Francis Bacon, Of Studies.

Kesaya E. Noda, Growing Up Asian in America.

Daniel Smith-Rowsey, The Terrible Twenties.

Classification—Writing Topics.

10.Definition.

Writing Extended Definition.

Bruno Bettelheim, The Holocaust.

Perri Klass, Anatomy and Destiny.

Barbara Ehrenreich, The Cult of Busyness.

Gloria Naylor, What's in a Name?

Henry David Thoreau, Simplicity.

Margaret Mead, New Superstitions for Old.

Definition—Writing Topics.

11.Comparison and Contrast.

Writing Comparison.

Arthur L. Campa, Anglo vs. Chicano: Why?

Aristotle, Youth and Old Age.

Deborah Tannen, Sex, Lies, and Conversation: Why Is It So Hard for Men and Women to Talk to Each Other?

Richard Rodriguez, from Hunger of Memory.

Bruce Catton, Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts.

Chief Seattle, My People.

Comparison and Contrast—Writing Topics.

12.Cause and Effect.

Writing Cause-and-Effect Exposition.

E.M. Forster, My Wood.

Anne Taylor Fleming, The Fear of Being Alone.

Lewis Thomas, Death in the Open.

Michael Novak, In Ethnic America.

William Severini Kowinski, Kids in the Mall: Growing Up Controlled.

Linda Hasselstrom, A Peaceful Woman Explains Why She Carries a Pistol.

Cause and Effect—writing Topics.

13.Persuasion.

Writing Persuasive Essays.

Dorothy L. Sayers, Are Women Human?

Sydney Pollack, The Way We Are.

Thomas Jefferson, The Declaration of Independence.

Martin Luther King, Jr., I Have a Dream.

Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal.

Mike Gnolfo, A View of Affirmative Action in the Workplace.

Persuasion—Writing Topics.

14.Further Reading.

Mary Wollstonecraft, from A Vindication of the Rights of Women.

Charles Darwin, Understanding Natural Selection.

John Stuart Mill, Genius and Originality.

Harriet Jacobs, from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl.

Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature.

Glossary.

Index.