40 Model Essays: A Portable Anthology Book

Preface

Introduction: Reading and Writing
Barbara Lazear Ascher, The Box Man

1. Description
E.B. White, Once More to the Lake
Joan Didion, The Santa Ana
Judith Ortiz Cofer, Silent Dancing
M. Scott Momaday, The Way to Rainy Mountain

2. Narration
Langston Hughes, Salvation
Annie Dillard, The Chase
Maya Angelou, Champion of the World George Orwell, Shooting an Elephant

3. Example
Perry Klass, She's Your Basic L.O.L. in N.A.D.
Anna Quindlen, Homeless
David Sedaris, Remembering My Childhood on the Continent of Africa
Brent Staples, Black Men and Public Space

4. Division or Analysis
Emily Prager, Our Barbies, Ourselves
Margaret Visser, The Ritual of Fast Food
Scott Russell Sanders, The Men We Carry in Our Minds

5. Classification
Russell Baker, The Plot Against People
Deborah Tannen, But What Do You Mean?
Stephanie Ericsson, The Ways We Lie

6. Process Analysis
Lars Eighner, Dumpster Diving
Anne Lamott, The Crummy First Draft
Jessica Mitford, Embalming Mr. Jones

7. Comparison and Contrast
Suzanne Britt, Neat People vs. Sloppy People
Bruce Catton, Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts
Nancy Mairs, Disability
Richard Rodriguez, Private Language, Public Language

8. Definition
Judy Brady, I Want a Wife
Noel Perrin, The Androgynous Man
Gloria Naylor, The Meanings of a Word
Amy Tan, Mother Tongue

9. Cause and Effect Analysis
Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point
Barbara Ehrenreich, Cultural Baggage
K.C. Cole, Women and Science
Steven Jay Gould, Sex, Drugs, Disasters, and the Extinction of Dinosaurs

10. Argument and Persuasion
A Debate on Capital Punishment
Edward I. Koch, Death and Justice
David Bruck, The Death Penalty
William F. Buckley, Why Don't We Complain?
Martin Luther King Jr., I Have a Dream
Virginia Woolf, Professions for Women
Jonathan Swift, A Modest Proposal

Index of Titles and Authors