A collection of essays on translation, foreign languages, Proust, and one French city, from the master short-fiction writer and acclaimed translator Lydia Davis. In Essays One, Lydia Davis, who has been called "a magician of self-consciousness" by Jonathan Franzen and "the best prose stylist in America" by Rick Moody, gathered a generous selection of her essays about best writing practices, representations of Jesus, early tourist photographs, and...

A writer for The New York Times and creator of a popular comic strip explores his relationships with women in a collection of essays that ruminate on his troubles finding lasting love, his commitment issues and his valued female friendships.

"From women cowboys to arctic villages, Mary Odden's linked essays transport the reader along light-filled paths at the top of a shrinking world. In Mostly Water, essays form a linked memoir that explores the American outback from eastern Oregon horse trails to the arctic and subarctic river towns of Alaska. In these landscapes, Native people and later-comers are entwined in histories as loopy as northern rivers. Odden invites the reader to a vivid...

"One of the most acclaimed artists of the Harlem Renaissance, Zora Neale Hurston was a gifted novelist, playwright, and essayist. Drawn from three decades of her work, this anthology showcases her development as a writer, from her early pieces expounding on the beauty and precision of African American art to some of her final published works, covering the sensational trial of Ruby McCollum, a wealthy Black woman convicted in 1952 for killing a white...

Essays that document the author's rural adventures as she, her husband, and two sons continue to transform their 3-acre Iowa farmstead into a haven for plants, animals, and a rural family of four.

"In these nine essays, [the author] provides insight into his life as a writer, teacher, friend, and reader"--Amazon.com.

"One of Granta's Best of Young American Novelists, Joshua Cohen arrives with his first collection of nonfiction, the culmination of two decades of writing and thought about life in the digital age. In essays, memoir, criticism, diary entries, and letters--many appearing here for the first time--Cohen covers the full depth and breadth of modern life: politics, literature, art, music, travel, the media, and psychology, and subjects as diverse as Google,...

"A resource for high school students and parents on how to apply to selective colleges. Covers strategies on college selection, college applications, essays, interviews, standardized tests and scholarships and financial aid. Outlines what selective colleges look for in applicants. Includes more than 20 essay examples"-- "Based on the real-life experiences of students who were admitted to the United States' most prestigious universities, this guide...

"Including significant previously uncollected material, My Generation is the definitive gathering of the fruits of this beloved writer's five decades of public life. Here is the William Styron unafraid to peer into the darkest corners of the 20th centuryor to take on the complex racial legacy of the United States. But here too is Styron writing about his daily walk with his dog, musing on the Modern Library's "100 Greatest Books," and offering personal...

In his highly anticipated debut essay collection, Impossible Owls, Brian Phillips demonstrates why he's one of the most iconoclastic journalists of the digital age, beloved for his ambitious, off-kilter, meticulously reported essays that read like novels. The eight essays assembled here--five from Phillips's Grantland and MTV days, and three new pieces--go beyond simply chronicling some of the modern world's most uncanny, unbelievable, and spectacular...