"For me, the ideal essay is not an assignment, to be dispatched efficiently and intelligently, but an exploration, a questioning, an introspection. I want to see a piece of the essayist. I want to see a mind at work, imagining, spinning, struggling to understand." (Atwan 22)I chose this quote from Lightman in part because it is along the same lines as the ideas that we’ve seen throughout these readings on what an essay is. Furthermore, I like the approach Lightman gives of an ideal essay. An exploration, I think, is a great way to describe the essay because it encourages depth and not simply facts and figures. The essay shouldn’t be a flat discussion where you, and the readers, know exactly where you are going from the very beginning. Instead, we should be exploring the topic throughout the discussion. We need to question our own and others content, thoughts and opinions that we are dealing with in the essay. This gives much more depth to writing than the monotonous telling of facts about an issue.
Voice is another aspect of the writing that I’ve always thought, and been taught, is just as important to writing as the content. To “see a piece of the essayist” is to know that it is their words being read and not just anyone else’s. As we’ve discussed, the essay should be personal and unique in the writer’s own way: personal thoughts and style should be evident in the writing. I think Lightman puts these ideas together when he says he wants to see a mind at work. The imagination and struggling to understand gives way to the exploration in the essay and demands personal style. Without the essayist’s own imagination, the essay would have neither depth nor voice. Today more than ever, with the ever-changing classifications of writings and new technology that gives such advancements, it is so important to keep personality to our writings.
Lightman’s quote sums up how I feel an essay should be: a discovery. That’s what writing should be about – understanding through exploration of the topic at hand, and coming out with a discovery or explanation at the conclusion instead of knowing from the beginning exactly where the essay is going.
