Over the course of the semester, we will analyze and explore the potential of the essay as a constantly evolving, experimental, and borderline literary form. We will see that the essay can be a generous and unconventional form, suitable for expressing a wide variety of creative and critical impulses.

The contemporary essay often finds itself between the fields of poetry and critical thought, memoir and fiction, documentary and speculative genres. It can simultaneously incorporate poetic rhythms and images, personal stories and recollections, fiction, facts, documents, and critical analysis. We will explore autofiction, speculative, lyrical, conceptual, and visual essays, as well as other possible branches of the genre.

We will explore the origins and structures of the essayistic form, read and discuss pieces written by contemporary authors and prominent 20th-century essayists, and analyze how approaches to essay writing have changed and evolved over the past decades. We will also examine the phenomenon of the form itself as a tool for constructing radical subjectivity and a practice of free thinking, as a special strategy of attention and openness to the world, other people, and personal experience.

Throughout the course, students will write their own literary essays and discuss their work in class, as well as complete short creative writing exercises during class and as homework.

This course can help expand one’s understanding of the genre as an accessible practice of creative and interdisciplinary writing and teach how to build a dialogue with the works and thoughts of other authors beyond the strict academic boundaries, but via an artistic form.

All classes will be held in the form of seminars where we will discuss texts from the program, do creative exercises, and participate in group analysis of homework.