Reading Review: Edward Hoagland's "On Essay"

By: Wakhidatul Sisca Putri Anggraini - State University of Surabaya

Review : Hoagland, Edward (1976). On Essays. The Tugman’s Passage (1982)

            The author of “On Essays” is Edward Hoagland whose background is in academic writing. He is both essayist and short story writer but he is known as an essayist mostly. This essay was first published in 1976 and is included in Hoagland’s book, The Tugman’s Passage (1982) whose appropriate audiences are from essayist, fiction and non-fiction writers especially short story writers. The main claim of “On Essay” is essay is easier and more effective than literary works in which essay concerns about personal mind. So, the aim is automatically for driving and persuading the reader to tend writing essay than literary work.

            Edward Hoaglan argues that essay is more marketable and effective than any kinds of either literary works or articles. The human voice talking is the delineation which he uses to describe what an essay actually is. He emphasizes that an essay is about a couple of important elements; they are a systematized outline of ideas and a point as the centre. In addition, Hoagland argues what make essay more effective than literary works are because essay focuses only in its point which he calls as the truthful point.

            Hoagland’s perspective is quiet successful guiding the reader to have the same perspective as him by establishing reasons of whatever he wants to state in his arguments. In addition, he is known-well as an essayist who definitely knows all about what the strength and the weakness of an essay. He also understands well why he persuades the reader to tend to write essay than such kinds of literary works. His background as essayist might be able to be his extraordinary power to drive everyone in his own perspective. His delineation toward an essay is outstanding successful building the reader’s imagination up to the how effective an essay is. For everyone who earns money by writing, essay is the best choice to write because essay is more marketable than any literary works: “essays of nearly any kind are so much easier than short stories for a writer to sell, so many more see print, it is strange that though two fine anthologies remain that publish the year’s best stories, no comparable collection exists for essays”, he explains.

            However, there are several problems which can be found in “On Essay” if close reading method used by the reader. The diction he chooses in that essay is so unsuitable for the context. The reader will get confused when they are reading this Hoagland essay, so that they have to read so many times to reach the goal which Hoagland constructs. It may be he is the only one who knows well about this essay, not for others; especially for students, middle class society, low-educated people and teachers. It means that his essay is not extendable. There are several sentences whose meanings are incomprehensible, for instance: “Essays, if a comparison is to be made, although they go back four hundred years to Montaigne, seem a mercurial, newfangled, sometimes hockey affair that has lent itself to many of the excesses of the age, from spurious autobiography to spurious hallucination, as well as to the shabby careerism of traditional journalism.” According to Merriam Webster Dictionary, “mercurial” is pharmaceutical or chemical containing mercury; newfangled is recently invented or developed and hard to understand. Both of those words is placed close together which is separated by comma. It means that they must have a close meaning. However, their meanings are so contrast because one is about pharmaceutical and another is about invention. The use of “hockey affair” is extremely confusing. Even if it is delineation, but it certainly distracts the reader to determine what the most appropriate meaning to be put in the sentence is. In Merriam Webster Dictionary, “shabby” is in poor condition especially because of age or use. “Careerism” is an attitude or way of behaving that involves trying to do whatever you can to make more money or get promoted at your job. It is so difficult to be connected in the context by the reader. Hoagland may establish her perspective nicely, but the point still cannot be received by the reader well, unless the reader rereads the essay more than once. Those connotations are difficult to be understood by the reader as general.

            The evidences he states are too weak. He dominantly uses his personal experience and his own perspective. “Essays, however, hang somewhere on a line between two sturdy poles: this is what I think, and this is what I am,” he said, is like a pressure which forces the reader to follow his own argument. The use of “this is what I think, and this is what I am” is unreasonable and too individual. Evidence is nowhere. This sentence: “Essays do not usually boil down to a summary, as articles do, and the style of the writer has a “nap” to it, a combination of personality and originality and energetic loose ends that stand up like the nap on a piece of wool and cannot be brushed flat”, immensely needs a proof. Because this statement is a personal opinion. There is no strong evidence, such as an expert’s notion, in which strengthen the statement to become an accurate, valid and reliable one. Mark Twain’s idea is the only one evidence which he uses to support his essay in the sixth and seventh paragraph. For a well persuading essay, it will be failed to convey the reader if the writer only puts one supporting evidence.

            The conclusion is unclear whether it exists or not. Every single paragraph has the same function that is to put argument or opinion that the writer states. In addition, concluding signal sentences are found nowhere; for instance “in conclusion”, “we can conclude that”, “in summary”, “in brief” and so on. Those are so needed to facilitate the reader knowing the main point in the essay. The last paragraph is “A personal essay frequently is not autobiographical at all, but what it does keep in common with autobiography is that, through its tone and tumbling progression, it conveys the quality of the author’s mind. Nothing gets in the way. Because essays are directly concerned with the mind and the mind’s idiosyncrasy, the very freedom the mind possesses is bestowed on this branch of literature that does honour to it, and the fascination of the mind is the fascination of the essay”, which focuses only in a personal essay, autobiography, author’s mind and the fascination essay. The last paragraph should be the conclusion of the writer, but if we analyze thoroughly, it does not contain of the whole main point from Hoagland’s “On Essay”. What has to be justified by the readers about what they have read is still confusing.

            In summary, the weaknesses “On Essay” by Edward Hoagland are in his failed connotations, weak evidences and unclear conclusion. An essay writer should concern about the diction and delineation that he uses to avoid misunderstanding cases of the reader. It is also important to put expert’s idea which supports our own perspective, because that is the most powerful way to persuade and convey the reader having the same idea as we have. Nevertheless, this Edward Hoagland’s essay is inspirational for audiences which may be mostly from essayists, short story writers, fiction and non-fiction writes as I recommend.