Can you recommend some really good, long essays?
June 12, 2019 7:21 PM Subscribe
I would like to read some long essays that merit their length. Topic and style don’t matter — just that the piece is 1) an essay (meaning that the author is exploring ideas, which is a little different than straight reporting or straight memoir, though obviously those lines can be blurry), 2) not short, and 3) you thought it was great.
Seconding John McPhee and adding, anything by Janet Malcolm.
posted by sallybrown at 7:34 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by sallybrown at 7:34 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
Perry Anderson has written many long and excellent essays for the London Review of Books over the years. His range is remarkable: the Brazilian elections; the historical novel; the post-Soviet states, as analyzed by a major Russian sociologist (pt. 1); (pt. 2).
posted by a certain Sysoi Pafnut'evich at 7:50 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by a certain Sysoi Pafnut'evich at 7:50 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
Thirding anything by John McPhee; seconding anything by Janet Malcolm; adding anything by Lawrence Weschler, Susan Orlean or Jon Mooallem.
posted by neroli at 8:15 PM on June 12, 2019
posted by neroli at 8:15 PM on June 12, 2019
"On Dumpster Diving", by Lars Eighner, is one of my favorite essays.
Also, the following piece is really a book review, but I think it can stand on its own as an essay: "Gould on God: Can religion and science be happily reconciled?", H. Allen Orr.
Finally, just about anything by Tim Kreider is excellent.
posted by alex1965 at 8:16 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
Also, the following piece is really a book review, but I think it can stand on its own as an essay: "Gould on God: Can religion and science be happily reconciled?", H. Allen Orr.
Finally, just about anything by Tim Kreider is excellent.
posted by alex1965 at 8:16 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
And maybe this goes without saying, but every bit of non-fiction by James Baldwin, who beats Emerson as the greatest American essayist ever. And Claudia Rankine's "Citizen," a book of poetry that is actually the greatest American essay of the 21st century. (And also George W.S. Trow's "Within the Context of No Context," which is really, really weird, and seems like it might be particularly relevant now.)
posted by neroli at 8:25 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by neroli at 8:25 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
If you're into cishet white dudes, I quite like David Foster Wallace's book Consider the Lobster (containing the essay of the same name), and also Jonathan Franzen's books of essays How to be Alone and Farther Away.
posted by number9dream at 9:19 PM on June 12, 2019
posted by number9dream at 9:19 PM on June 12, 2019
Flexner's The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge (PDF) seems right up this alley.
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 10:17 PM on June 12, 2019
posted by BlackLeotardFront at 10:17 PM on June 12, 2019
John Jeremiah Sullivan, e.g., Longform.org.
posted by she's not there at 10:42 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by she's not there at 10:42 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]
Here are a couple of essays about chess I found thanks to MeFi posters. I'm not much of a player, but that's not required to enjoy these:
The Departed Queen, by Dana Mackenzie. (This updates the link from the OP in 2015.)
An Art Without an Artwork, by Tom Russell.
posted by bryon at 10:47 PM on June 12, 2019
The Departed Queen, by Dana Mackenzie. (This updates the link from the OP in 2015.)
An Art Without an Artwork, by Tom Russell.
posted by bryon at 10:47 PM on June 12, 2019
Even If You Beat Me by Sally Rooney
The Man in the Mirror by Allison Kinney
A Journey to the Medical Netherworld by Alison Motluk
posted by Violet Hour at 2:54 AM on June 13, 2019
The Man in the Mirror by Allison Kinney
A Journey to the Medical Netherworld by Alison Motluk
posted by Violet Hour at 2:54 AM on June 13, 2019
William Langewiesche (at longform), particularly his essays on flight, such as "The Devil at 37,000 Feet" and "The Crash of EgyptAir 990."
posted by whistle pig at 4:16 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by whistle pig at 4:16 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
The Case for Reparations by Ta-Nehisi Coates
posted by General Malaise at 4:54 AM on June 13, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by General Malaise at 4:54 AM on June 13, 2019 [2 favorites]
Two for your consideration:
posted by ubiquity at 5:10 AM on June 13, 2019
- George Miller's seminal "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on our Capacity for Processing Information" (16 pages) — a technical but totally readable essay about an important cognitive limitation.
- Nagel and Newman's "Goedel's Proof"* (28 pages) — an explanation for lay-people of the most important result in 20th century mathematics. N&N later expanded this into a 129-page book, which is freely available on-line, but as it has chapters I ruled it out as an "essay." Anyway, the shorter version appears in Newman's four-volume The World of Mathematics, which contains dozens of other essays, many of them also great.
posted by ubiquity at 5:10 AM on June 13, 2019
David Foster Wallace's "Authority and American Usage" in Consider the Lobster. (Originally published as "Tense Present" in Harper's, but that version was shortened, and it is worth the entire 62 pages.)
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 7:20 AM on June 13, 2019
posted by Mr.Know-it-some at 7:20 AM on June 13, 2019
This one has stuck with me throughout the years: Losing the War, by Lee Sandlin.
posted by miltthetank at 9:40 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
posted by miltthetank at 9:40 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
How to Do Nothing by Jenny Odell is a wonderful long meditation on solitude, places that encourage contemplation, birds, labyrinths, and her own creativity.
See also Frank Chimero's The Good Room, a talk he gave on the necessity of non-commercial spaces both in the real world and on the Web we thought we were building, with some loving examples like the New York Public Library.
posted by brism at 10:32 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
See also Frank Chimero's The Good Room, a talk he gave on the necessity of non-commercial spaces both in the real world and on the Web we thought we were building, with some loving examples like the New York Public Library.
posted by brism at 10:32 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
Response by poster: I am eagerly collecting these -- thank you everybody for all these great suggestions.
One note, I am particularly interested in essays where the author is "visible" and is a meaningful character in the essay, and grappling with an emotional or philosophical issue -- like Julian Barnes writing about grief (but not exactly writing memoir) in Levels of Life, or Michael Chabon personally reckoning with the shadow of the Holocaust in Say It In Yiddish, or Ngugi wa Thiong'o exploring the potentially revolutionary impact of African languages in Decolonizing the Mind. (I'm sure many of the essays you guys linked are of this type -- I just would have mentioned this part in the original post if I had thought of it)
posted by hungrytiger at 11:28 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
One note, I am particularly interested in essays where the author is "visible" and is a meaningful character in the essay, and grappling with an emotional or philosophical issue -- like Julian Barnes writing about grief (but not exactly writing memoir) in Levels of Life, or Michael Chabon personally reckoning with the shadow of the Holocaust in Say It In Yiddish, or Ngugi wa Thiong'o exploring the potentially revolutionary impact of African languages in Decolonizing the Mind. (I'm sure many of the essays you guys linked are of this type -- I just would have mentioned this part in the original post if I had thought of it)
posted by hungrytiger at 11:28 AM on June 13, 2019 [1 favorite]
I would recommend The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin.
Eula Biss' "On Immunity" is a book, but is short and otherwise meets your criteria. And it is very good.
I think Joan Didion's "After Henry" essay collection is overlooked.
I would really recommend Ariel Levy's New Yorker essay on long distance swimmer Diana Nyad. It's straight reporting, but as you say, lines are blurry, and it is great.
posted by kensington314 at 2:51 PM on June 13, 2019
Eula Biss' "On Immunity" is a book, but is short and otherwise meets your criteria. And it is very good.
I think Joan Didion's "After Henry" essay collection is overlooked.
I would really recommend Ariel Levy's New Yorker essay on long distance swimmer Diana Nyad. It's straight reporting, but as you say, lines are blurry, and it is great.
posted by kensington314 at 2:51 PM on June 13, 2019
I am particularly interested in essays where the author is "visible" and is a meaningful character in the essay,
Ooh you will really like Janet Malcolm then. I would actually look up her books, because they’re very small—basically her long essays that she’s published in book form. She likes to play with the reader’s trust or lack of trust in her as an interlocutor.
posted by sallybrown at 2:53 PM on June 13, 2019
Ooh you will really like Janet Malcolm then. I would actually look up her books, because they’re very small—basically her long essays that she’s published in book form. She likes to play with the reader’s trust or lack of trust in her as an interlocutor.
posted by sallybrown at 2:53 PM on June 13, 2019
On your way to Considering the Lobster, you might want to ponder "A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again," also by David Foster Wallace, originally published in Harper's as "Shipping Out" (PDF).
posted by baseballpajamas at 4:05 PM on June 13, 2019
posted by baseballpajamas at 4:05 PM on June 13, 2019
Why not read the father of the modern essay, Michel de Montaigne? I'd start with "Of Cannibals" and "Of Experience."
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 9:41 AM on June 19, 2019
posted by ultraviolet catastrophe at 9:41 AM on June 19, 2019
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posted by lazuli at 7:24 PM on June 12, 2019 [1 favorite]