[HN Gopher] The Age of the Essay (2004)
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       The Age of the Essay (2004)
        
       Author : Wowfunhappy
       Score  : 30 points
       Date   : 2021-09-04 16:59 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (paulgraham.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (paulgraham.com)
        
       | jseliger wrote:
       | The most-read essay I've written describes why med school is a
       | poor choice relative to alternatives:
       | https://jakeseliger.com/2012/10/20/why-you-should-become-a-n...
        
       | phsource wrote:
       | This might as well be called the Age of the Blog Post, which
       | seems obvious today in our age of Substack, Medium, and
       | Wordpress, but back in 2004, definitely wasn't quite as clear!
       | 
       | > The Internet is changing that. Anyone can publish an essay on
       | the Web, and it gets judged, as any writing should, by what it
       | says, not who wrote it. Who are you to write about x? You are
       | whatever you wrote.
       | 
       | That being said, I think the above has contributed a bunch to
       | sensationalism. Unbundling of writing from magazines and
       | newspapers into little articles incentivizes writing individual
       | articles that stand out -- clickbait, shockers, and half-truths.
       | 
       | Good writing and crisp thinking definitely still rises to the
       | top, but so does controversy and stirring up emotions. So yes,
       | essays have won, but it's less clear the kind of essay that Paul
       | mentions ("a few topics you've thought about a lot, and some
       | ability to ferret out the unexpected") are the ones that have won
        
       | voidhorse wrote:
       | This blog post is so dumb it makes me wish pg paid more attention
       | when was taught how to write essays about symbolism in Dickens.
       | 
       | First of all, the "what's a real x" trope is pathetically lazy,
       | lame as hell, and is a really great way to look like a jerk who
       | thinks his own personal, temporally limited experience is somehow
       | inherently "more true" and "more correct" than literally
       | centuries of development and tradition. Then he goes on to try to
       | make the ridiculous point that "an essay isn't really about
       | defending an argument" as he attempts to defend the argument that
       | essays are not about defending arguments lol.
       | 
       | The arrogance and egotism of these sorts of essays always
       | overshadow their otherwise redeemable points.
        
       | Wowfunhappy wrote:
       | I will always associate this essay with my all-time favorite
       | teacher, an English professor at Skidmore College named Linda
       | Hall. The piece was assigned reading in the first of many classes
       | I took with her, and to this day, I don't know how she found it.
       | Professor Hall is generally well-read, but as far as I'm aware
       | has no background in investing or startups.
       | 
       | Professor Hall taught me how to write for pleasure. I'd known how
       | to do that as a child, but I forgot at some point in High School,
       | presumably while working on yet another paper on the symbolism of
       | a book I disliked. It's past time we stopped doing that to
       | students. I do believe that literature is good for the soul, and
       | that literary analysis is a decent way to practice critical
       | thinking, but it's a narrow slice of what writing can be.
       | 
       | In Linda Hall's classes, I wrote essays on the implications of
       | technological progress, and blurbs for a cookbook, and someone's
       | termination letter. After turning in that letter, Professor Hall
       | brought in a colleague to play the part of the woman we'd fired,
       | interviewed her about the company's hostile work environment, and
       | tasked us with writing her appeal to HR. Every assignment was
       | different, the variety was _fun_ , and I use the skills they
       | taught me every day.
       | 
       | Thank you so much Professor Hall.
        
         | zamfi wrote:
         | This is fantastic, thank you for sharing.
         | 
         | I used to wonder where my penchant for writing "Dear
         | Administrator" letters came from, and reading your post
         | reminded me that as a high schooler I was encouraged to write
         | these by basically every student club's faculty advisor,
         | anytime we needed money or supplies or other resources, or had
         | a conflict, or any number of other scenarios--which of course
         | in retrospect is great practice for life. Or at least, great
         | practice for being a lawyer--and probably not a coincidence
         | that half my high school friends chose that profession.
        
       | Algol wrote:
       | I feel like writing about surprising and humorous things can be a
       | specific kind of bias, but at least an entertaining bias.
        
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