Oxford Essays

The essay is one of the richest of literary forms. Its most obvious characteristics are freedom, informality, and the personal touch--though it can also find room for poetry, satire, fantasy, and sustained argument. All these qualities, and many others, are on display in The Oxford Book of Essays. The most wide-ranging collection of its kind to appear for many years, it includes 140 essays by 120 writers: classics, curiosities, meditations, diversions, old favorites, recent examples that deserve to be better known. A particularly welcome feature is the amount of space allotted to American essayists, from Benjamin Franklin to John Updike and beyond. This is an anthology that opens with wise words about the nature of truth, and closes with a consideration of the novels of Judith Krantz. Some of the other topics discussed in its pages are anger, pleasure, Gandhi, Beau Brummell, wasps, party-going, gangsters, plumbers, Beethoven, potato crisps, the importance of being the right size, and the demolition of Westminster Abbey. It contains some of the most eloquent writing in English, and some of the most entertaining.

An intriguing collection of more than 70 Latin American essays, some never before translated into English, gives us the whole spectrum of concerns that have animated some of the greatest writers of our time--from Andres Bello, Pablo Neruda, and Alfonso Reyes to Carlos Fuentes, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and Rosario Ferre--an assembly confident, ingenious, aware.

Stoic philosopher and tutor to the young emperor Nero, Seneca wrote moral essays - exercises in practical philosophy - on how to live in a troubled world. Strikingly applicable today, his thoughts on happiness and other subjects are here combined in a clear, modern translation with an introduction on Seneca's life and philosophy.

2004 is the quatercentenary of the death of Edward de Vere, 17th Earl of Oxford. This collection of 39 essays is published in celebration of his life and achievements.Oxford, a key figure of the English Renaissance, at the heart of Elizabethan court and cultural events, has a substantial claim to authorship of the works of 'Shakespeare'. There is an increasingly recognised problem in relating the life of the man from Stratford to the knowledge and cast of mind displayed in the works which now bear his name. This book is a benchmark for future disucssion and research in the Authorship debate.

Sets out in a new and authoritative way the history of the essay; explains how the essay has come to mean what it does, surveys the widely various incarnations of the form, offers new accounts of major essayists in English, and traces a wide range of significant themes.

The Essential Guide to Writing History Essays is a step-by-step guide to the typical assignments of any undergraduate or master's-level history program in North America. Effective writing is a process of discovery, achieved through the continual act of making choices--what to include or exclude, how to order elements, and which style to choose--each according to the author's goals and the intended audience. The book integrates reading and specialized vocabulary with writing and revision and addresses the evolving nature of digital media while teaching the terms and logic of traditional sources and the reasons for citation as well as the styles. This approach to writing not only helps students produce an effective final product and build from writing simple, short essays to completing a full research thesis, it also teaches students why and how an essay is effective, empowering them to approach new writing challenges with the freedom to find their own voice.