Looking for some advice on an essay

[gunhilltrain]

I only ask for it occasionally, like once a year, but sometimes, like all of us, I get stuck on something that seems promising but I can't get it done.

Sometimes in the Reviews and Essays category people will expound upon the experiences that influence their writing. I’ve been trying to write such an essay about why I’ve often used my alma mater the City College of New York as a setting for fiction. The point of the essay is to compare the place and college experience of the 1970s with present-day reality.

Although I have a lot of information, I’m having trouble putting together a concise and coherent narrative about what to say about it. I’m on my third attempt to write it, and I still can’t get satisfactory results.

One of the themes is about how that period was when everyone realized that there were more liberal arts degrees being awarded than there were possible job opportunities for the graduates. That was on the minds of the people I knew there, and thus it is often discussed by the characters in the stories.

There are other things to mention, like how the campus has physically changed through the demolition and replacement of various old buildings, some of which are often used as settings for fictional events in the 1970s. Then there are other details about what it was like to live in New York through a difficult time in its history.

When I wrote about taxi driving, I broke it into a series of four essays (the may be a fifth one) to make it manageable to write it and to read it. That may be one option that I could use here. Thank you for any suggestions.

 

[NotWise]

I haven't written an essay for Lit, nor do I think I ever will. If they work like other essays, you might start with the ideas that you want to get across to your readers. You have some in this post. If there are more, then you should formulate them all clearly before you write. Once you know what you want to say, say it in the first few paragraphs, then segue into why it's so. Justify what you've already said, but don't write anything else.

I can't help with the content, because while we're only a year apart, I went to an engineering school that was socially a world away from NYC, and where most of the students seemed to see their future as some kind of straight line. For many that seems to have come true.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I have taught academic English to non native speakers before, so this may be the Noddy version. On the other hand if you are struggling a back to basics approach may help.

The most common reason for confused or meandering essays is not having a clear thesis statement. The thesis statement is usually one sentence for shorter essays and maybe upto a paragraph for longer ones. It should clearly and unambiguously say what the purpose of the essay is and then hint at is structure.

The other thing to consider is the genre. You've said you want to compare 70s college with today. That's fine, but traditionally we'd expect a compare and contrast essay to have as much about the modern college as the 70s one where I suspect you really want to write more about the history.


There also the wrinkle to decide how much the essay is about 'writing about college in the 70s' or just 'college in the 70s' If it's the latter you can justify posting it here by explaining why it's important to your writing in the introduction and then not mention it again till the conclusion. Alternatively, it should be the point of the essay and present in (nearly) every paragraph.


So using simplified language a thesis statement for the essay could be something like:


'Setting college stories in the 1970s makes them more interesting because the students then were more open to experimentation, had more active social lives and were more knowledgeable?about the world.'

Once you have the thesis statements the rest of your essay works in support of it.

If your still struggling you may want to try mind maps or other ways of brainstorming your ideas.

 

[PennameWombat]

To paraphrase Roy Edroso, "living in New York [City] in the 1970s and into the 1980s offered unparalleled opportunity. It also offered the possibility of being killed at any time for any reason. Or for no reason. But the rents were affordable and the entertainments unending." (I don't have the quote in front of me, but you can likely find it.)

I arrived later (1985) and didn't live in the City, but in the Hudson Valley. But a couple of forays into Brooklyn for soccer in those first years made a lasting impression . I popped out of a Brooklyn subway stop about 2005 and... did not find what I'd expected. It was a different world.

So I get the impression of what, I think, you're thinking off, and you have more direct experience. I also lived in NJ (I was there for Superstorm Sandy...), just the other side of the river from Manhattan for a while, an enduring memory was to walk my dog to the waterfront at dusk and watch the skyline light up.

But all I can say, decide if your essay is about CCNY... or about New York City... or about life and death and those are backdrops. My understanding of all of their trajectories (much less complete than yours) means any could make a fine core to it. But they're all also too big to mash into a single effort. But you don't seem to have focused in as yet.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I have taught academic English to non native speakers before, so this may be the Noddy version. On the other hand if you are struggling a back to basics approach may help.

The most common reason for confused or meandering essays is not having a clear thesis statement. The thesis statement is usually one sentence for shorter essays and maybe upto a paragraph for longer ones. It should clearly and unambiguously say what the purpose of the essay is and then hint at is structure.

The other thing to consider is the genre. You've said you want to compare 70s college with today. That's fine, but traditionally we'd expect a compare and contrast essay to have as much about the modern college as the 70s one where I suspect you really want to write more about the history.


There also the wrinkle to decide how much the essay is about 'writing about college in the 70s' or just 'college in the 70s' If it's the latter you can justify posting it here by explaining why it's important to your writing in the introduction and then not mention it again till the conclusion. Alternatively, it should be the point of the essay and present in (nearly) every paragraph.


So using simplified language a thesis statement for the essay could be something like:


'Setting college stories in the 1970s makes them more interesting because the students then were more open to experimentation, had more active social lives and were more knowledgeable?about the world.'

Once you have the thesis statements the rest of your essay works in support of it.

If your still struggling you may want to try mind maps or other ways of brainstorming your ideas.

Well, the only reason I'm bothering with this - and this was an originally an unconscious choice perhaps starting four years ago - was that I used the 1970s version of that college so often in fiction. And then when I revisited the place a few weeks ago, a lot of of the locations for the stories were gone. So I have both the real place as it existed then and how I used that fictionally. If I had never written the stories, I probably wouldn't be attempting such a comparison with the present in the first place.

So a thesis statement - maybe I'm trying to do too much, or maybe it's not feasible if I can't get a handle on it.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I haven't written an essay for Lit, nor do I think I ever will. If they work like other essays, you might start with the ideas that you want to get across to your readers. You have some in this post. If there are more, then you should formulate them all clearly before you write. Once you know what you want to say, say it in the first few paragraphs, then segue into why it's so. Justify what you've already said, but don't write anything else.

I can't help with the content, because while we're only a year apart, I went to an engineering school that was socially a world away from NYC, and where most of the students seemed to see their future as some kind of straight line. For many that seems to have come true.

Actually I have written two essays about certain aspects of the college and published them on Lit earlier. Those were relatively - easy? - to do because I made no mention of the fiction I wrote even though the locations - the exact building in fact - were the same. I know some writers do it (I'll have to think of some examples), but maybe fiction shouldn't always be "explained."

 

[Paul_Chance]

Just in what you've written so far, here, I think your "in" to the essay is would be the geographic/architectural changes that took place on the campus. Then, from there, take it into the sociological changes. Memories, and consequently stories, all take place in a certain physical environment and that physical environment works like a memory castle.

For the older readers, it hooks them back into the place of their experience, for the newer readers it hooks them in with the realization that their place did not exist then. I went to an entirely different college nearly thirty years ago now, but I still periodically visit the campus (as an associate professor who does maybe a class or two a year) and the physical changes that lead to sociological changes are evident to me.

 

[JGittes]

I suggest that an essay is not what you are trying to do. It seems to me that you want to juxtapose your artistically formative environment of the 70s with the feeling you have now as a much older man returning to the area and being shaken by the change. That's a story, not an essay. It's a factual story, but a story nonetheless. You're taking disparate and fractured impressions, memories, and current observations and finding a coherent narrative, a coherent story.

 

[gunhilltrain]

To paraphrase Roy Edroso, "living in New York [City] in the 1970s and into the 1980s offered unparalleled opportunity. It also offered the possibility of being killed at any time for any reason. Or for no reason. But the rents were affordable and the entertainments unending." (I don't have the quote in front of me, but you can likely find it.)

I arrived later (1985) and didn't live in the City, but in the Hudson Valley. But a couple of forays into Brooklyn for soccer in those first years made a lasting impression . I popped out of a Brooklyn subway stop about 2005 and... did not find what I'd expected. It was a different world.

So I get the impression of what, I think, you're thinking off, and you have more direct experience. I also lived in NJ (I was there for Superstorm Sandy...), just the other side of the river from Manhattan for a while, an enduring memory was to walk my dog to the waterfront at dusk and watch the skyline light up.

But all I can say, decide if your essay is about CCNY... or about New York City... or about life and death and those are backdrops. My understanding of all of their trajectories (much less complete than yours) means any could make a fine core to it. But they're all also too big to mash into a single effort. But you don't seem to have focused in as yet.

It would have been quite different if you had stepped out in Brooklyn in 1975. There were many streets in at least three of the boroughs (The Bronx, Brooklyn, upper Manhattan) that were too dangerous to walk on, even in the daytime. It's somewhat better now, but like in any city (or anywhere - see In Cold Blood) there are no guarantees.

So that could - tentatively - be a subject in itself. Trying to also bring in how I fictionalized it in the same essay may just be too much. So yes, reading these comments in the last two days reinforces my idea that I don't have something to focus on yet. One not so small thing - there was truly affordable housing here once, but that started to go away in the 1980s.

Of yeah, I did live in several towns in New Jersey. When I was still married I even owned a house in West Orange for a while.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I suggest that an essay is not what you are trying to do. It seems to me that you want to juxtapose your artistically formative environment of the 70s with the feeling you have now as a much older man returning to the area and being shaken by the change. That's a story, not an essay. It's a factual story, but a story nonetheless. You're taking disparate and fractured impressions, memories, and current observations and finding a coherent narrative, a coherent story.

I have never lived that far from the campus - I'm only about five miles away now - so I have been there a few times over the years. During the that time buildings were torn down and mostly not replaced. Then eventually - in the last five years or so - the place was rebuilt. I already knew about all that, but this was the first time I had seen it personally.

I suppose I wanted to describe why I picked it for a fictional setting, which has generally worked well for me. I have also been also written a couple of non-fiction pieces about my own experiences, which also went well. But trying to to describe both the fictional and non-fictional elements in the same piece - that may not be possible to do.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Well, the only reason I'm bothering with this - and this was an originally an unconscious choice perhaps starting four years ago - was that I used the 1970s version of that college so often in fiction. And then when I revisited the place a few weeks ago, a lot of of the locations for the stories were gone. So I have both the real place as it existed then and how I used that fictionally. If I had never written the stories, I probably wouldn't be attempting such a comparison with the present in the first place.

So a thesis statement - maybe I'm trying to do too much, or maybe it's not feasible if I can't get a handle on it.

I suggest that an essay is not what you are trying to do. It seems to me that you want to juxtapose your artistically formative environment of the 70s with the feeling you have now as a much older man returning to the area and being shaken by the change. That's a story, not an essay. It's a factual story, but a story nonetheless. You're taking disparate and fractured impressions, memories, and current observations and finding a coherent narrative, a coherent story.

Perhaps another way of approaching it is just to work it into a new fictional story. Guy with literary credentials visits old college, hooks up with young twenty something. During their encounter he remembers encounter he had as twenty something. The girls are differnet except when they are the same. His thoughts dwells on how everything is changing and the world he based his stories on is gone. Writing it this way means the thoughts don't need to be fully coherent and cohesive as long as they are evocative.

 

[SimonDoom]

I agree with TheRedChamber that the key is to find the central theme, whatever it is. You have already more or less asked the question: why do you keep returning to it as a setting for your stories. The answer to that question could be the theme. You can then explore different aspects of the theme, or different ways in which it influenced your writing. What IS it about that setting in that era that makes it right for your stories?

I think you can do it as an essay, but that the essay will be more effective if you figure out your theme and then figure out the analysis and use of facts.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I agree with TheRedChamber that the key is to find the central theme, whatever it is. You have already more or less asked the question: why do you keep returning to it as a setting for your stories. The answer to that question could be the theme. You can then explore different aspects of the theme, or different ways in which it influenced your writing. What IS it about that setting in that era that makes it right for your stories?

I think you can do it as an essay, but that the essay will be more effective if you figure out your theme and then figure out the analysis and use of facts.

I keep returning to it because if I need a college as a setting, I might as well use one for which I know the (former) layout. And I use college as a theme sometimes because I suppose that is a period when a lot of people go through changes in their romantic and sexual lives.

So, yes, that may be worth writing about. But adding in the history of the place, both before and after I got there - perhaps that is overdoing it. Or perhaps it should be a part of a different story if it's done at all.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I haven't written an essay for Lit, nor do I think I ever will. If they work like other essays, you might start with the ideas that you want to get across to your readers. You have some in this post. If there are more, then you should formulate them all clearly before you write. Once you know what you want to say, say it in the first few paragraphs, then segue into why it's so. Justify what you've already said, but don't write anything else.

I can't help with the content, because while we're only a year apart, I went to an engineering school that was socially a world away from NYC, and where most of the students seemed to see their future as some kind of straight line. For many that seems to have come true.

I just wanted to mention: there were departments of engineering and other, I guess you'd call them STEM fields now. But the students for that mostly had their classes at one end of the campus. They didn't mix too much with the liberal arts students at the other end. The few engineering students I met (they did have to take a couple of humanities courses to satisfy their requirements) seemed more confident in their futures and didn't have the anxiety that the liberal arts students had.

 

[ElectricBlue]

but maybe fiction shouldn't always be "explained."

That's a key sentence, Gunhill. Fiction never needs to be explained, it's purpose is to conjure, to evoke, to establish its own sense of place.

Your stories do that admirably - you know these places, so for someone like me who's never been to New York and has no desire to go there, their vibe comes across. Your fiction works. It's evocative. Remember that first comment I Ieft you, that your stuff reminded me of Last Exit to Brooklyn?

Who is the audience for this piece? Urban history is one thing, but this sounds more like reminiscence and longing for places lost. That's something for a literary piece, not a formal essay.

Just write your feelings down, see what shape it takes.

Most of my stories are written around places I know, both now and then, but I don't spell it out and I'm always pointing the finger in the opposite direction, to misdirect. Loqui summed it up nicely:

And despite the new setting it was classic electricblue. Only you could evoke a crowded café scene in the middle of the Canadian wilderness.

Your NY is just as recognisable, through your word pictures.

 

[gunhilltrain]

That's a key sentence, Gunhill. Fiction never needs to be explained, it's purpose is to conjure, to evoke, to establish its own sense of place.

Your stories do that admirably - you know these places, so for someone like me who's never been to New York and has no desire to go there, their vibe comes across. Your fiction works. It's evocative. Remember that first comment I Ieft you, that your stuff reminded me of Last Exit to Brooklyn?

Who is the audience for this piece? Urban history is one thing, but this sounds more like reminiscence and longing for places lost. That's something for a literary piece, not a formal essay.

Just write your feelings down, see what shape it takes.

Most of my stories are written around places I know, both now and then, but I don't spell it out and I'm always pointing the finger in the opposite direction, to misdirect. Loqui summed it up nicely:

Your NY is just as recognisable, through your word pictures.

Well, I'd like to visit Australia, but I don't think I'm getting there anytime soon!

Anyway, I remember your comment making a comparison to Hubert Selby's work. I have the impression that he was portraying almost everyone here as emotionally damaged in some way. Maybe that's because he thought that way of himself? His biography suggests that he had some unusual difficulties in his life. I think my emphasis is that people here are no better or worse - not that different, to put it another way - from those anyway else.

So my comments here and the responses I've been getting are confirming what I already suspected: I can't do all of this is one piece. Maybe I could eventually justify two submissions, one of which is straight history, but I'll have to think further about it. When I did do a completely non-fiction essay about it a while back it seemed to work pretty well.

https://classic.literotica.com/s/the-past-is-a-foreign-country

 

[LeoHardLee]

Since passive voice includes "to be" verbs, my high school's AP English teacher forbade us from using "to be" verbs (is, was, were, has been) ("was written by"). The same essay writing service reddit says. It's an effective ruse that compels you to speak more. Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation, making him the sixteenth president of the United States, as opposed to saying, "Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States." Your subject is actually performing an action rather than just identifying something. I've read many articles where practically every phrase began with the word "to be."

 

[SimonDoom]

Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation, making him the sixteenth president of the United States, as opposed to saying, "Abraham Lincoln was the sixteenth president of the United States." Your subject is actually performing an action rather than just identifying something. I've read many articles where practically every phrase began with the word "to be."

This advice to me, though, is a good example of misplaced grammar pedantry.

The first sentence makes no sense, because it implies that the authorship of the EP is what made Lincoln the 16th president, when that's not true.

"To be" verbs exist for a reason. They are perfectly legitimate. Crack open any "great work of literature" and you'll find plenty of to be verbs. People who give this advice in an overly zealous way don't know what they are talking about.

The use of "to be" verbs is not necessarily passive voice. "Abraham L was the 16th president" is not passive voice. Passive voice is when you have an active verb and make it passive by flipping the subject and object. E.g.:

Active: Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation.

Passive: The Emancipation Proclamation was written by Lincoln.

Generally speaking, but not always, active is better than passive. But that's not an indictment of "to be" verbs in all cases.