LISTS

There are a number of the essays we're looking at in our Creative Writing class whose forms share certain characteristics with lists. For example, "Door No. Five" presents what sound like chapters from a book (or, perhaps numerous books): the first paragraph is composed of concepts/objects/places/sentient beings whose names begin with the letter "M". The next paragraph concerns ideas that begin with the letter "N", then "O", and, finally, a section of "P" groupings. The author of "NOTES TOWARD THE MAKING OF A WHOLE HUMAN BEING" also organizes the information within the essay into one long list of actions, events, and places (in the form of a complete sentence). "Things To Do Today" is also literally a list of actions, some of which are more abstract than others. As I mentioned in a previous post, the versatility of the essay is, for me, one of the most attractive qualities of this form: it can take many different shapes, the list being only of them.