8. Sarah Manguso: “The Cure”
This 750-word personal memoir essay is an intense depiction of Manguso’s college experience of nearly dying from a rare blood disease. Manguso worried death would certainly happen if she didn’t have sex with more than one person in her life.
At last, one of her “legendarily promiscuous” friends agreed to have sex with her—and she recovered. Surprisingly heartbreaking, also funny, this essay is notable for the fact that 50% of it is devoted to a detailed description of the medical procedures used to treat her illness.
First line: For a year I worried that I might die having had sexual intercourse with only one person.
9. James Baldwin: “Notes on a Native Son”
Baldwin was, I suspect, one of the smartest writers of the 20th Century, and this essay shows his roving mind at its best. Ostensibly about a period of time when Baldwin was in his late teen years, and his father’s dying, but also about living under Jim Crow, and later in life when he lived in a still segregated New Jersey.
A true train-of-thought essay, the performance is less in terms of story, as digressions expand and probe in different directions. This is the kind of piece I’m reluctant to use with students, as it’s almost impossible to emulate.
First line: On the 29th of July, in 1943, my father died.
10. David Sedaris: “Understanding Owls”
This comic personal essay has a pretty great turn in the second half and contains amazing dialogue. Sedaris is in a shop of curiosities and oddities, trying to buy a taxidermied owl for his husband, Hugh.
The shop owner instinctually sees deep into Sedaris’s morbid soul and offers a surprising object to show him. And makes him touch it.
First line: Does there come a day in every man’s life when he looks around and says to himself, “I’ve got to weed out some of these owls”?
FAQs About Great Personal Essays
How Do I Write a Great Personal Essay?
First, understand your ideal reader’s expectations. Does the reader expect to be entertained, amused, or enlightened by your personal essay? Most likely, they’ll expect all three. Then, craft your essay to meet your reader’s needs while revealing underlying truths about the world and telling a great story. To understand what your reader wants, it can help to review editors’ insights on the personal essay.
Where Do I Send a Personal Essay?
You can send your personal essay to contests and to publications accepting personal essays. However, before you start sending out your work, you might try taking a personal essay class and having your piece workshopped—essentially, other writers read the work and give you feedback to improve the piece. Personal essays are a very challenging form to succeed at, right away.
How Do I Get Started on a Personal Essay?
Writers begin personal essays in a few ways—by recalling a pivotal moment in their lives that contains a narrative arc, or by using a writing prompt.