Genre: Personal Essays

CHRIS HE

Moldy pork The Bay Area seems like a shiny toy, but actually it is a piece of moldy pork – I do not feel prosperous living here, but rather very uneasy. Justice is treated unjustly, those who are given the power of maintaining justice don’t do it, and this needs to stop as soon as Read more…

EDWIN ZHAO

Hoaglund’s Shell The critic and editor Phillip Lopate has many insights on the personal essay – how it functions, what makes it tick, how it is attractive to readers, and its various unique aspects. In his second aspect of the personal essay (the first is “The Conversational Element”), he defines “Honesty, Confession, and Privacy” as Read more…

JONATHAN LIM

Seneca the Younger and The Art of the Personal Essay, ed. Phillip Lopate “On Noise” is an essay that reveals the musings of a man, known as a classic Stoicist, statesman, dramatist and satirist. Twelve of his essays survive, and in The Art of the Personal Essay editor, Phillip Lopate, four are collected. In this Read more…