famous game essay

Essays About Video Games: Top 12 Examples and Prompts

Video games have revolutionized the way we have fun today. If you are writing essays about video games, check out our guide to inspire your writing.  

Few can contest the fact that video games have taken over the world. From the basic, almost “primitive” games of the 1970s like Pong to the mind-bending virtual reality games of the 2020s, they have been a source of entertainment for all. Moreover, they have proven quite profitable; countries like Japan and the United States have made tens of billions of dollars solely from the video game market.

Despite their popularity, much has been debated over the potentially harmful side effects that video games may have, particularly on children. One side argues that playing certain video games can lead to people exhibiting violence in the future, while others believe that video games teach players essential life skills. Regardless, they will continue to be a part of our lives for the foreseeable future. 

For engaging essays about video games, read the essay examples featured below for inspiration.

1. What electronic games can teach us by Kendall Powell

2. designers are imagining video games without guns by keith stuart, 3. playing video games all summer won’t make you feel worse by nicole wetsman, 4.  violent video games bad by andrea newman.

• 5. ​​The health effects of too much gaming by Peter Grinspoon

Writing Prompts For Essays About Video Games

1. video games: good or bad, 2. the benefits of video games, 3. what is your favorite video game, 4. do video games cause people to become violent, 5. video games in your life, 6. video games vs. traditional games, 7. is the video game rating system enough.

“In other studies, researchers found that gamers who trained on Tetris were better at mentally rotating two-dimensional shapes than those who played a control game. Students who played two hours of All You Can E.T., an educational game designed to enhance the executive function of switching between tasks, improved their focus-shifting skills compared with students who played a word search game.”

Powell explains a few possibilities of applying video games to education. As it turns out, certain video games can improve players’ skills, depending on the mechanics. Researchers are inspired by this and hope to take advantage of the competitive, motivational nature of gaming to encourage children to learn. New games are designed to help kids improve their focus, coordination, and resilience, and game designers hope they will succeed. 

“Imagine a game where you’re a war reporter seeking to capture the most iconic, representative images in a battle environment: You’d still get the sense of peril that audiences expect from action adventures, but your relationship with the environment would be more profound. It would be Call of Duty from the perspective of a creative participant rather than a violent interloper.”

The graphic nature of some video games is said to make kids violent, so it is only natural that some creators try to change this. Stuart writes that it is possible to maintain the fun that shooter-type games induce without using guns. He gives examples of games where you do not kill your enemy, simply stunning or capturing them instead. He also suggests photography as an alternative to killing in a “shooting” game. Finally, he suggests basing video games around helping others, making friends, and doing more peaceful, creative tasks.

“Any role video games play in skewing well-being that did pop up in the study was too small to have a real-world impact on how people feel, the authors said. People would have to play games for 10 more hours per day than their baseline to notice changes in their well-being, the study found.”

Wetsman counters the widespread belief that video games “destroy your brain.” Research done with a sample of 39,000 players over six weeks has shown that whether one plays video games for long or short periods, their mental health is not impacted much. There are some exceptions; however, there are not enough to conclude that video games are, in fact, harmful.

“Some people believe that the connection between violent games, and real violence is also fairly intuitive. In playing the games kids are likely to become desensitized to gory images;which could make them less disturbing, and perhaps easier to deal with in real life. While video games aren’t about violence their capacity to teach can be a good thing.”

In her essay, Newman writes about the supposed promotion of violence in some video games. However, she believes this violence does not cause people to be more aggressive later. Instead, she believes these games expose children to certain atrocities so they will not be traumatized if they see them in real life. In addition, these games supposedly promote connections and friendships. Finally, Newman believes that these “harmful” can make you a better person.

5. ​​ The health effects of too much gaming by Peter Grinspoon

“Gamers need to be educated on how to protect their thumbs, wrists, and elbows, their waistlines, their emotional state, their sleep, and their eyes. Simple education around taking breaks, stretching, eating healthy snacks, and resting and icing your thumb, wrist, or elbow when it starts hurting can address injuries early, before they become significant. For the eyes, gamers can try the 20-20-20 rule: every 20 minutes, try to look at something 20 feet away for 20 seconds.”

Grinspoon discusses both the benefits and the health risks of gaming. Video games allow people to interact with each other remotely and bond over specific missions or tasks, and some research shows that they have cognitive benefits. However, some gamers may develop vision problems and hand and wrist injuries. Gaming and “staring in front of a screen the whole day” is also associated with obesity. Overall, Grinspoon believes that gaming is best done in moderation.

Looking for more? Check out these essays about hobbies .

Many parents believe that their children’s “bad behavior” is because of video games. Based on your experience and others, decide: are video games good or bad for you? Make sure to read viewpoints from both sides and write an essay based on your position. Would you encourage others to play video games? Discuss these pros and cons for an interesting argumentative essay.

Like anything else, video games have both positive and negative aspects. Explain the good that video games can do for you: the skills they can equip you with, the lessons they can teach, and anything else. Also, include whether you believe their benefits outweigh the disadvantages they may pose. 

For your essay, write about your favorite video game and why you chose it. What is its meaning to you, and how has it affected your life? Describe the gameplay mechanics, characters, storyline, and general impact on the gaming community or society. You can write about any game you want, even if you have not played it; just ensure the content is sufficient.

Many claim that playing violent video games can make you violent in the future. Research this phenomenon and conclude whether it is true or not. Is the evidence sufficient? There are many resources on this topic; support your argument by citing credible sources, such as news articles, statistics, and scientific research.

Video games have been a part of almost all our lives. Recall a treasured experience with video games and explain why it is significant. How old were you? Why do you remember it fondly? How did this experience make you feel? Answer these questions in your own words for an exciting essay.

There are stark differences between video and traditional games, such as board games and card games. For an engaging essay, compare and contrast them and write about which is more entertaining, in your opinion. Be creative; this should be based on your own opinions and ideas.

The video game content rating system is used to classify video games based on their appropriateness for specific ages. However, parents complain that they are not strict enough and allow the display of violent content to children. Explore the criteria behind the rating system, decide whether it needs to be changed or not, and give examples to support your argument.

If you are interested in learning more, check out our essay writing tips !

Tip: If writing an essay sounds like a lot of work, simplify it. Write a simple 5 paragraph essay instead.

Martin is an avid writer specializing in editing and proofreading. He also enjoys literary analysis and writing about food and travel.

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107 Video Game Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

Inside This Article

Video games have become a popular form of entertainment for people of all ages. From action-packed shooters to immersive role-playing games, there is a video game out there for everyone. With such a wide variety of games to choose from, it can be overwhelming to decide on a topic for an essay about video games. To help you get started, here are 107 video game essay topic ideas and examples to inspire your writing:

• The impact of violent video games on children's behavior
• The evolution of video game graphics over the years
• The rise of esports and its influence on the gaming industry
• The benefits of playing video games for cognitive development
• The representation of gender and race in video games
• The history of virtual reality gaming
• The psychology of loot boxes in video games
• The role of music in enhancing the gaming experience
• The ethics of video game journalism
• The impact of video game addiction on mental health
• The cultural significance of video game franchises like Mario and Pokemon
• The future of cloud gaming and streaming services
• The role of storytelling in video games
• The influence of video games on popular culture
• The relationship between video games and education
• The impact of video game censorship on creative expression
• The portrayal of mental health issues in video games
• The role of social media in video game marketing
• The history of video game consoles
• The impact of online multiplayer games on social interaction
• The evolution of game mechanics in the survival horror genre
• The representation of LGBTQ+ characters in video games
• The influence of Japanese culture on video game aesthetics
• The role of nostalgia in the popularity of retro gaming
• The impact of microtransactions on player experience
• The relationship between video games and violence in society
• The role of artificial intelligence in game development
• The impact of video game streaming platforms like Twitch
• The representation of disability in video games
• The influence of game design on player engagement
• The evolution of mobile gaming
• The role of virtual economies in online multiplayer games
• The impact of video game sound design on immersion
• The portrayal of mental illness in video games
• The influence of Eastern philosophy on game narratives
• The role of user-generated content in game communities
• The impact of fan culture on video game development
• The representation of indigenous cultures in video games
• The influence of literature on game storytelling
• The role of game difficulty in player satisfaction
• The impact of video game piracy on the industry
• The portrayal of war in military shooter games
• The relationship between video games and sports
• The influence of board games on video game design
• The role of player choice in game narratives
• The impact of virtual reality on therapy and rehabilitation
• The representation of historical events in video games
• The influence of film on game aesthetics
• The role of gender stereotypes in video game marketing
• The impact of game mods on player creativity
• The portrayal of mental health professionals in video games
• The influence of tabletop role-playing games on video game mechanics
• The role of game mechanics in promoting teamwork and cooperation
• The impact of game development crunch on industry workers
• The representation of animals in video games
• The influence of science fiction on game narratives
• The role of player agency in game storytelling
• The impact of game difficulty on player motivation
• The portrayal of addiction in video games
• The influence of mythology on game aesthetics
• The role of puzzles in game design
• The impact of game reviews on player purchasing decisions
• The representation of mental illness in horror games
• The influence of architecture on game environments
• The role of game soundtracks in enhancing the player experience
• The impact of game tutorials on player learning
• The portrayal of robots and AI in video games
• The influence of fashion on character design in games
• The role of humor in game narratives
• The impact of game localization on cultural representation
• The representation of environmental issues in video games
• The influence of psychology on game design
• The role of game narratives in exploring complex themes
• The impact of game communities on player engagement
• The portrayal of mental health struggles in indie games
• The influence of mythology on game storytelling
• The role of player feedback in game development
• The impact of game accessibility on player inclusivity
• The representation of gender identity in video games
• The influence of surrealism on game aesthetics
• The role of morality systems in game narratives
• The impact of game tutorials on player retention
• The portrayal of mental health professionals in horror games
• The influence of psychology on game narratives
• The role of player choice in shaping game outcomes
• The impact of game aesthetics on player immersion
• The representation of LGBTQ+ relationships in video games
• The role of environmental storytelling in game design
• The impact of game streaming on player engagement
• The portrayal of mental illness in puzzle games
• The role of player feedback in shaping game development
• The impact of game aesthetics on player perception
• The representation of LGBTQ+ characters in horror games
• The influence of film noir on game narratives
• The role of environmental storytelling in shaping game worlds
• The impact of game tutorials on player skill progression
• The portrayal of mental illness in narrative-driven games
• The influence of science fiction on game aesthetics
• The role of player choice in determining game endings
• The impact of game aesthetics on player emotional response
• The representation of LGBTQ+ relationships in indie games
• The influence of literature on game design
• The role of environmental storytelling in immersive game worlds
• The impact of game streaming on player community building
• The portrayal of mental health struggles in interactive fiction games

Whether you are writing a research paper, a critical analysis, or a personal reflection on video games, these topics provide a diverse range of ideas to explore. From examining the psychological effects of gaming to analyzing the cultural significance of game narratives, there is no shortage of fascinating topics to delve into. So, pick a topic that interests you and start exploring the world of video games through the lens of your essay. Happy writing!

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Essay on My Favourite Game

Students are often asked to write an essay on My Favourite Game in their schools and colleges. And if you’re also looking for the same, we have created 100-word, 250-word, and 500-word essays on the topic.

Let’s take a look…

100 Words Essay on My Favourite Game

Introduction.

My favourite game is football. It’s a popular sport loved worldwide.

Why I Love Football

I love football because it’s thrilling and unpredictable. It helps me stay fit.

The Joy of Playing

Playing football brings me immense joy. I enjoy the teamwork and the rush of scoring a goal.

Football is an exciting game that teaches me about teamwork and perseverance. It’s my favourite game.

Also check:

• 10 Lines on My Favourite Game
• Speech on My Favourite Game

250 Words Essay on My Favourite Game

My favourite game, without a doubt, is chess. It’s a game that transcends age, language, and culture, providing a universal platform for strategic thought and intellectual engagement.

The Game of Kings

Chess, often referred to as the “Game of Kings”, is a two-player strategy board game with a history dating back over a thousand years. It’s a game that requires a deep understanding of strategy, planning, and tactics. Each piece has its own unique movement and capturing abilities, demanding a comprehensive understanding of the game’s mechanics.

The Intellectual Challenge

What makes chess my favourite game is the intellectual challenge it presents. It’s a game of endless possibilities, with more potential sequences of moves than there are atoms in the observable universe. It’s a game that requires foresight, with players needing to think several moves ahead and anticipate their opponent’s strategy.

Life Lessons from Chess

Additionally, chess is more than just a game; it’s a metaphor for life. It teaches the importance of planning, the value of sacrifice for greater gain, and the necessity of adapting to changing circumstances. It’s a game that cultivates patience, discipline, and critical thinking, skills that are crucial in our daily lives.

In conclusion, chess, with its intricate complexities and intellectual demands, is my favourite game. It’s more than just a pastime; it’s a tool for developing strategic thinking and problem-solving skills. The beauty of chess lies in its simplicity on the surface and its complexity underneath, mirroring the paradox of life itself.

500 Words Essay on My Favourite Game

My favourite game, a subject that elicits a sense of excitement and nostalgia, is chess. Chess, a two-player strategy board game played on a checkered gameboard, is not just a game, but a metaphor for life. The game’s strategic and tactical complexities, combined with its historical roots and universal appeal, make it my favourite.

Historical Significance

Chess is believed to have originated in northern India in the 6th century, and has since evolved into the game we know today. The game’s rich history is a testament to its enduring appeal. It transcends cultural and geographical boundaries, boasting a global community of enthusiasts and professionals. The historical significance of chess adds to its allure, making it a fascinating game that connects the present with the past.

Intellectual Stimulation

Chess is often referred to as the “game of kings” due to its intellectual nature. It is a game that requires strategic thinking, foresight, and problem-solving skills. Each piece on the chessboard has a unique movement pattern, and the interplay between these pieces creates a complex web of possibilities. This complexity provides a platform for intellectual growth and mental exercise, making chess a perfect blend of entertainment and education.

Life Lessons

Beyond its intellectual appeal, chess also offers valuable life lessons. It teaches patience, as hasty decisions often lead to devastating consequences. It reinforces the importance of planning and foresight, as a well-executed strategy can lead to victory even against formidable opponents. It also fosters resilience, as the game is never truly lost until the very end. These lessons extend beyond the chessboard, making chess a microcosm of life’s challenges and triumphs.

Universal Appeal

Chess, despite its complexity, has a universal appeal. It is a game that can be enjoyed by people of all ages and from all walks of life. Its rules are relatively simple to learn, but the game itself is incredibly difficult to master. This balance between accessibility and depth is part of what makes chess so captivating. Whether played casually in a park or competitively in a tournament, chess offers a rewarding experience that can be tailored to each player’s preferences.

In conclusion, chess is my favourite game due to its historical significance, intellectual stimulation, life lessons, and universal appeal. It is a game that challenges the mind, enriches the spirit, and connects people across time and space. The beauty of chess lies in its simplicity on the surface and its complexity beneath. It is a game that offers endless possibilities, making each match a unique and captivating experience.

That’s it! I hope the essay helped you.

If you’re looking for more, here are essays on other interesting topics:

• Essay on Value of Games
• Essay on Service to Man is Service to God
• Essay on Swami Dayanand Saraswati

Apart from these, you can look at all the essays by clicking here .

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• Video Games
• Why <i>Super Mario Bros.</i> Was One of the Best Games Ever Made

Why Super Mario Bros. Was One of the Best Games Ever Made

T he Nintendo classic Super Mario Bros. , widely considered one of the best video games ever made — and certainly one of the most important — celebrates its 30th anniversary on September 13.

But what’s so special about a decades-old game revolving around an Italian plumber trying to save a lost princess? It’s all about history. When Super Mario Bros. came out, the video game industry was a wreck. But Mario helped save it — and it wasn’t even in another castle.

To find out more about Super Mario Bros., watch the video above.

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Write to Arpita Aneja at [email protected]

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• PlayStation

Why Fortnite is the most important game of the decade

A ll the best, and the worst, of gaming over the last 10 years

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In the two short years since its release, Epic Games’ battle royale game Fortnite has reshaped not just video games, but pop culture. Don’t let its speed fool you, though. Behind Fortnite : Battle Royale ’s monolithic popularity are creators who’ve learned hard lessons from the last 10 years in the game industry. Their game is the culmination of countless other games and, as a result, Fortnite embodies the best and worst of the 2010s.

Fortnite was first announced in 2011, but wasn’t released until 2017. That year, Fortnite originated as a $40 retail product, Save the World, without the battle royale mode that catapulted it into the global consciousness. Epic had stuffed this cooperative multiplayer experience to the gills with microtransactions . Few players took interest, and it looked like Fortnite would end up being a nearly decadelong boondoggle.

The best of the decade, 2010-2019

As the 2010s draw to a close, we’re taking stock of the best pop culture of the decade. And we’re reevaluating the all the ways in which the face of entertainment changed from 2010 through 2019. Join us !

The 100 best games of the decade

• The best movies of the decade, according to us
• The best comics of the decade

Just as Fortnite launched, Korean developer Bluehole struck gold in the PC multiplayer space with its battle royale game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds . Epic moved heaven and Earth internally to come up with its own version. While PUBG staked its claim as the first hit game in the battle royale space, Epic dug an entire gold mine with Fortnite: Battle Royale , released in September 2017 . Where PUBG was rough, realistic, and grim, Fortnite ’s take was comparably polished, cartoonish, and silly.

The Save the World mode was quickly forgotten by most people, as the new Battle Royale mode climbed to the top of its genre.

Fortnite ’s impact continues to radiate outward, further and further from games. It has minted new celebrities , and played host to old ones . It held an in-game music concert attended by nearly 11 million people , and spawned a new corner of the advertising market . It showed up in just about every sports league in the world , with one lawsuit-tinged celebration dance after another .

What had nearly been a failure quickly became one of Epic Games’ defining products, opening an entire new chapter for the company by turning an idea that had been struggling to find its way for six years into an “overnight” success.

Learning to run

It’s tough to tell if Fortnite found success despite or because of its difficulty. It may look like a cute kids game, but it takes weeks, if not months, of steady practice to become competitive in its world.

Players not only master combat, but they must learn how to build structures in 3D space. The former is an assumed skill from the past few decades in games. The latter is a relatively new skill honed by the generation raised on Minecraft . It’s the collision of combat and building that makes Fortnite shine, and sets it apart from its competition.

Most players didn’t understand the advantage of the building mechanics at first. But as folks got faster at erecting defensive and offensive structures, building quickly and precisely became akin to hitting skillshots in League of Legends , or timing a dodge in Dark Souls. Now it’s a fundamental skill. If you hear a bullet, you need to construct a wall or an entire building instantly, without thinking. If you don’t, you’re at an immediate disadvantage, and the chances are good that you’re about to head back to the lobby.

Watching two pros battle becomes a vision of swirling construction and on-the-fly designs meant to trap, control, and funnel the other player into a vulnerable position. It’s breathtakingly complicated. And yet, it’s also easy and fun to watch.

Selling, perfected

Fortnite also has a finely honed microtransaction system that seems like a reaction to loot boxes and the controversy around them. Epic Games had already had negative experiences with loot boxes in Fortnite: Save the World , and clearly didn’t want to take a swim in those waters again.

Instead, the company emphasized clarity. Fortnite Battle Royale shows players which skins they can buy, and Epic only sells each one for a limited amount of time. So if you see something you like, you better buy it; there’s no telling when it may come back. It’s a fiendishly clever system, built on the backs of the almost-always-available skin system of League of Legends and the time-gating of mobile games, with a dash of Disney’s old “vault” system thrown in for good measure.

On top of that, Epic incorporated a battle pass system into the game, a system that had been a huge success in Dota 2 . Fortnite ’s battle pass costs $9.50 at the start of each season, and unlocks a reward path with over 100 different cosmetic items . The catch: The cosmetics must still be unlocked, by playing lots and lots of Fortnite . Since Epic implemented this system, battle passes have shown up in everything from Call of Duty to Rocket League to Destiny 2 .

Fortnite proved that the way to make money — huge buckets full of money — isn’t gambling . It’s just good ol’ fashioned FOMO.

Always in motion

Fortnite is always changing, with Epic adding and dropping new ideas so fast that it can feel impossible to keep up. League of Legends maker Riot Games has been doing one patch every two weeks for years now , but Epic decided to pick up the pace with weekly updates, some of which have changed the game’s basic strategy and shaken up competitive play . It’s unpredictable. Certain weeks have bigger, more gameplay-altering patches, while others have smaller patches that add just one gun or item.

With the essentially overnight success of Fortnite , Epic Games simply didn’t have the staff to keep up with the demand for new content. Over the course of 2018, according to a report from Polygon’s own Colin Campbell , some Fortnite designers faced long hours and intense pressure to meet the tight deadlines.

Fortnite isn’t the most important game of the decade because it was the first game to try something new or the best game to come out. It’s important because it has synthesized the medium. Just about every gaming news item of the past 10 years, from the rise of battle royale to the danger of loot boxes to quality of life for developers, showed up in Fortnite in some manner.

Where Fortnite goes from here is uncharted territory. Just last month, Epic shut the game down for almost two days . Instead of battle royale, Fortnite was a black screen — and it was still the most watched thing on Twitch . No other game in the world could pull that off . Then Epic pressed reset on the game, releasing a new map and a variety of consequential changes.

Fortnite ’s future, just like its success so far, can likely be glimpsed by paying close attention to what is working today across the industry. Odds are, Fortnite will incorporate it in the not-so-distant tomorrow.

The most influential video games aren’t always the most popular, and rankings never tell the whole story. To mark the end of the decade, our editorial team published a list of the top 100 games . We’ve also created this supplemental series, in which individual Polygon writers get to talk about the most important games from that same period, and exactly how they changed the course of the industry.

The decade in review

• The most surprising video game predictions from a decade ago
• League of Legends transformed the video game industry over the last decade
• The 69 biggest crushes of the last decade
• Angry Birds continued influencing games long after its big moment
• Nine new genres that defined the decade in games
• The Fallout franchise has had a risky roller coaster of a decade
• The decade when online video games changed everything
• It’s been a weird decade for Warcraft
• Early access changed everything about games
• The most influential board games of the decade, according to top designers
• The 100 best games of the decade: 100-51
• The 100 best games of the decade: 50-11
• The 100 best games of the decade: 10-1
• The best Pokémon of the decade
• The best anime of the decade
• The best animated movies of the decade
• The best game spoilers of the decade
• The 70 best video game characters of the decade
• Why Minecraft is the most important game of the decade
• Why Spelunky is the most important game of the decade
• Breath of the Wild is one of the best games of this decade, and perhaps the most impactful of the next decade
• Why Kentucky Route Zero is the most important game of the decade
• Why Gone Home is the most important game of the decade

110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples

🔝 top 10 video game topics for 2024, 🏆 best video game topic ideas & essay examples, 🎮 good video game research topics, 🕹️ interesting gaming topics to write about, ❓ video game research questions, ✅ simple & easy video game essay topics.

Looking for video game topics for your project? Look no further! Here, we’ve collected excellent essay topics for true gaming enthusiasts. Whether you’re looking for argumentative essay ideas on video games, research topics, or questions for debate, you will find them here.

• History of Video Game Consoles
• Myths of Video Game Violence
• The Global Phenomenon of Esports
• VR Gaming and Its Future Possibilities
• How Video Games Influence Cognitive Skills
• Therapeutic Mental Health Benefits of Video Games
• Diversity and Gender Representation in Video Games
• How Multiplayer Games Impact Social Interaction
• Healthy Gaming Habits Against Video Game Addiction
• Aesthetic and Narrative Qualities of Artistic Video Games
• Product Life Cycle & Marketing of Video Game Industry One of the most important advantages of the concept of life cycle can be seen in the sphere of marketing, where if used as a tool it allows adjusting the strategies, including marketing, based on […]
• Sony and Nintendo in the Video Game Industry The firm has manufactured several generations of the home console since the 1980s, beginning with the Nintendo Entertainment System, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System released in the early 1990s, and the Nintendo 64 that was […]
• Video Game Addiction and Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs As to me, I was interested in video games when I was a child because this industry was at its beginning and almost every pupil was involved in it.
• FIFA 10 Football Simulation Video Game A lack of consistency is evident in the various versions of this game as FIFA 10 played on a PC lacks the realism that is exhibited when the game is played on XBOX 360 and […]
• Video Game Effects: Good or Bad? Given the fact that there is indeed a logically sound rationale to such a suggestion, throughout the course of conducting my study, I remained thoroughly observant of the article’s classification-related suggestions, in regards to the […]
• The “Medal of Honor” Video Game Analysis The game is set to depict the Afghanistan invention in 2002 and the battle between the U.S.military and the Taliban. Due to the close resemblance of the game to the Afghanistan war, the game has […]
• The Monopoly Tycoon Video Game Review The game is stylistically similar to the board game Monopoly, and it can be played both online and offline. It is important to note that the game has a multiplayer feature, which can be played […]
• The Video Game Industry Evolution The first mention of the creation of such games dates back to the 1940s, but it was in 1952 that Alexander Shafto “Sandy” Douglas officially presented his dissertation at the University of Cambridge. One of […]
• The NASCAR Video Game Project Management Plan The plan attempts to draw the features and gameplay mechanics by replicating the thought process of a potential player. At this stage, the game should be well-advertised and ready for release.
• The Motivation of the Video Game Player For instance, the project gave its players the dynamic and fast pace of the game, a vast and detailed map, various locations, several different weapons, and character skins, and this is not all the possibilities.
• Human Life: Video Game, Simulation, or Reality? Drawing parallels between the real and the virtual world, one can admit the unreality of the existence of the planet and people and compare everything that happens with the simulation in which we are.
• Does Video Game Violence Lead to Aggression in Children? Among the gaming community, children participate vigorously in absorbing the plethora of entertaining content, including age-restricted ones where the scenes of violence are abundant.
• A Role-Playing Video Game Ayiti: The Cost of Life This strategy worked but not to the topmost level simply because the burden of the living cost was gradually weighing down the overall income of my family.
• BioWare Video Game Project Management For example, Dragon Age: Inquisition, the third installment of the company’s flagship series, switched to the Frostbite engine used by most of the EA games and succeeded in delivering the product despite the technical difficulties […]
• Video Game History: Overview From the 1990s to Nowadays In addition to arcade car behavior, the game was also famous for its beautiful graphics at the time, with each game in the series being a launch title showing the capabilities of the console.
• Video Game Delivery Project: Strategic Marketing To initiate strategies in marketing of Video Game, the company will decide to develop a web based application by ABC CORP and this application is customized to meet the requirements of the project. The purpose […]
• A Video Game Store’s Business Plan The projected cash flow of the cash in the balance sheet will appear positive for the next five years and will show that the company’s profitability in will be good enough pay for operating expenses […]
• The U.S. Video Game Industry This was also based on the views of the company’s developers who assumed that the technological advantages of the the16-bit system were extremely less than that of the 8-bit system.
• Video Game Company Against Online Piracy The purpose of the said DRM software is to protect the intellectual rights of the company. The fourth major issue is the encompassing goal of the VGC to end all types of piracy.
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IvyPanda. (2023, December 27). 110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/video-game-essay-topics/

"110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples." IvyPanda , 27 Dec. 2023, ivypanda.com/essays/topic/video-game-essay-topics/.

IvyPanda . (2023) '110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples'. 27 December.

IvyPanda . 2023. "110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples." December 27, 2023. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/video-game-essay-topics/.

1. IvyPanda . "110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples." December 27, 2023. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/video-game-essay-topics/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "110 Video Game Topic Ideas for Essays & Examples." December 27, 2023. https://ivypanda.com/essays/topic/video-game-essay-topics/.

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Essay on My Favourite Game in English for Students and Children

Many games can be our favourites. But, for me, Football is a thrilling game wherein I rejoice in every victory, and my heart sinks at every defeat. Football is a game where we see our champions take on the field to fulfil their dreams and lift a trophy that is so valuable to all of us too. Here are a few sample essays on "My Favourite Game".

100 Words Essay on My Favourite Game

200 words on my favourite game essay, 500 words on my favourite game essay.

My favourite sport is football. The game of modern football is believed to have been invented in England. It is a 90-minute game wherein 11 players play. It is one of the most followed sports where almost all countries play at the international level. Football's regulatory body is FIFA. It organises a World Cup called 'FIFA World Cup', which is the most popular international competition held every four years. Apart from international matches, football is often played and followed at the club level. Each country has its national league, with numerous clubs eyeing for the national championship title. This game is very dear to me as it teaches me valuable lessons for succeeding in the game of life.

I love playing all sports, but the sport that I am a great fan of is football. It is a team sport played on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. In this game, the football is to be sent to the opponent's goal post score points. The team with the most goals wins the game. The first rules and regulations of football were made in England at the end of the 19th century. The game has evolved since then. Playstyles have become much more complex, and rules have been added to keep up with the modern game style. Football is a 90-minute game consisting of two halves of 45 minutes each. FIFA is an official body of football. Every four years, the world cup is organised, and the winner of the world cup 2022 was Argentina.

This sport is a beautiful combination of determination, skill, and passion. It is a sport that I love because it teaches me never to give up until it is over. It is a game wherein every match, a new hero and a new team emerge victorious. In this game, a young player with grit and determination can be a legend that everybody follows. This is the game of football that I love and live for.

A sport demands a lot—time, energy, and all sorts of emotions we would not even know we had. A game that I love playing and is an important aspect of my life is none other than football. Football gives an equal opportunity for every new player to shine. Football provides a chance for every new team to break all shackles and emerge victorious in this beautiful game.

Significance of Football in My Life

My favourite sport is football. For me, football is not just a game; it is an emotion that unites us all. Football is a game that we football fans live for. Every game, every goal, and every trophy gives me immense happiness or sadness. It is not easy to see your favourite player lose any award or game, but it is a treat to watch your favourite player win all the laurels in the world. A minute can change the game, and within minutes we can see ourselves celebrating in joy or crying our hearts out. Football is a beautiful game both from the perspective of spectators and players. This 90-minute game of football is full of excitement and thrills.

About Football

In two halves of 45 minutes each, the game of football is played. The game is full of thrill and tension. A player must be in top shape on match day and have solid control of the football. It takes years of hard work and training to master the ball, and many professional players start at a young age and become masters of the technique. Football is one of the most popular games in the world due to its simplicity and passion. Football is played at club levels as well as internationally.

The goalkeeper is the last line of defence, and his job is to defend the goal and help build the attack. Modern football games consist of attackers who lead the whole team and strikers who form the backbone of the team. It also consists of a midfielder who acts as a link between defenders. Defenders defend goals and fend off enemy attacks. Over time, different formations, strategies, tactics, and techniques have emerged that make the game fun and interesting.

Every football game is a competitive game to achieve glory. This game transforms a mortal player into an individual who will forever live in our hearts. In football, the best of the best comes to the field and fights for the crown. Football helps people to push the limits to tackle, attack, and defend. Every goal in football is, in a way, a cause of every emotion, whether a happy or a sad one. In every game, we see the best fight their hearts out to achieve the ultimate happiness in football.

World Cup of 2022

In football, we see the best play on the field. We are very lucky to live in the generation where we have experienced a match between Messi and Ronaldo. This duo helps to push each other to be the better version of themselves. Every fight has a good side as well as an unpleasant side. The good side is that ultimately in this duel, the winner will emerge victorious. The grim side is that many great players get overshadowed due to this duel. The 2022 world cup proved that years of determination could put you on the pillar of success. A team like Morocco can also beat the giants of the game. This world cup gave the best gift to Messi for his determination and passion.

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The Field of Dreams Approach: On Writing About Video Games

Tony Tulathimutte on the future of video game criticism

Every year, more and more great essays are published on literary sites concerning video games. In the past year I’ve especially loved entries like Janet Frishberg’s “On Playing Games, Productivity, and Right Livelihood,” Joseph Spece’s “A Harvest of Ice,” and Adam Fleming Petty’s “The Spatial Poetics of Nintendo: Architecture, Dennis Cooper, and Video Games.” But for each great essay there are a handful of others written like apologies, seemingly perennial pleas to take video games seriously as a form of meaningful narrative.

I hoped to have a conversation with a writer about games that went a little deeper. There were two main reasons I turned to the Whiting Award-winning writer Tony Tulathimutte. The first was because of his response in an interview with Playboy , in which he said that his interest in gaming probably “had something to do with my desire to bend or break formal conventions in fiction.” The second was his three thousand word essay about Clash of Clans , “Clash Rules Everything Around Me,” which was exactly the type of essay about gaming I wanted to see more of. Tulathimutte is the author of Private Citizens , which we listed as one of the 25 best novels of 2016 .

What I want is long-form literary criticism. But writers should just write what they want to read. The body of work will be there and the audience will follow it. The ‘ Field of Dreams’ approach.

Graham Oliver: Can we have this conversation without getting stuck trying to legitimize video games as a medium?

Tony Tulathimutte: “Are video games art?” “Have we had the video game Citizen Kane  yet?”

GO: That’s such a boring and overdone conversation. I think it’s more interesting to look at the ways in which video games actually do interact with literature, and not to hold the conversation just as a demonstration of our respect.

TT: Take the respect for granted and go from there. I thought about starting a literary magazine about video games a while back, but the discourse had by then become so toxic that, even with the most anodyne academic essay you could write, the best you could hope for was that it would be ignored. There needs to be more space for this kind of writing, but I just didn’t want to wade into it then. I feel a little better about it now, which is why I did the Clash of Clans  essay.

GO: What is the difference between video game-related essays showing up on a literary site, versus a site where the primary purpose is the intersection of video games and literature? What could that site do that can’t be done (or isn’t being done) otherwise?

TT: Part of it is just volume. You can’t have a general interest magazine like the New Yorker covering video games to the same depth or degree as it does film or music or even theater. Every big magazine at this point covers video games occasionally — I know the New Yorker has written about Minecraft and No Man’s Sky , for instance. New York Magazine just did a big essay on gaming more broadly.

But for some reason, there’s no video game editor at the New Yorker , no dedicated departments or verticals, except at newer places like VICE, Vox , The Verge . Unlike music or movies, video games aren’t equally distributed through the culture; it’s more compartmentalized. This owes in part to a marketing apparatus around games that caters to and fosters a specific audience, and because the audience for certain genres — responding to these pressures — became self-selecting, especially with respect to gender. Video games may be art, but they are also a STEM [Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics] industry, which makes them no different from any other STEM field in that regard.

GO: It’s a question of access. I was thinking about your Clash essay; you have this entire paragraph that has to explain this massively popular and mechanically fairly simple game. Does that automatically turn off an audience who are already proficient in those basics? In which case, are you only writing for people who don’t game? I suppose that’s another conundrum of coverage in a general interest publication…

TT: If you read an essay by Susan Sontag or Martin Amis about the great books, or by André Bazin about film, they can assume a certain level of knowledge about the text or film from their audience. I can write that way about games on my own time and my own dime, but there’s no presumed canon or general readership for games, because they’re not taught in schools and not regularly discussed in big publications. So you either write for the diehards — the equivalent of film buffs or bookworms — or for novices.

GO: Is that why we haven’t had novels which interact with video games the way David Foster Wallace did with tennis, or Ann Patchett with opera? Neither of their books included explanatory paragraphs; it’s so ingrained in our culture that it seems almost impossible to have grown up without some idea of what tennis or opera are.

TT: Most people have played a game, and the average gamer spends six hours a week playing them. I think it has less to do with the medium inherently than just the failure of writers who have approached the subject. I haven’t read everything on games, but so far, the fledgling efforts have been too literal or kind of corny. Some writers seem to think that you’re supposed to transpose the form of games into fiction — to provide this very lightly remediated experience of reading a book so that it feels like you’re playing a game.

The last thing you want to do is create a watered-down experience of gaming in a text. A book should still work as a book. It’s the usual difficulty of writing about other mediums; there’s that old chestnut that writing about music is like dancing about architecture. But there are special considerations for how to write about any form in a way that conveys deep presence and vividness comparable to the experience itself.

GO: When you’re writing about games in one form or another, do you find you prefer to write for someone who is like you — very interested in both writing and video games — or is your preference for someone in that liminal space somewhere between them?

TT: I approach it as I do with all my creative writing, which is to write for the audience of Tony. That frees to me to write things irrespective of their publishability. Right now I’m working on a long essay about Metal Gear Solid  — the whole series. That’s between ten and twenty games, depending on which ones you call canon. The dialogue alone stacks up to something like sixty thousand words each. And the companion synopsis is almost three thousand words. I’m just trying to make points about the series that haven’t been made before. Would Kill Screen or The New York Review of Books ever run that? Hell to the fuck no.

If writers keep doing this, eventually there will be a readership equipped to deal with it. For the longest time there have been really smart people playing video games and wondering where all the good criticism was. It’s a discoverability issue, to a certain extent. There’s so much good writing out there about games, but most games-writing outlets cater to fairly niche perspectives. Action Button is extremely good, irreverent creative criticism, probably my favorite. Five Out of Ten is academically oriented, Kill Screen is mainstream journalism. What I want is long-form literary criticism. But writers should just write what they want to read. The body of work will be there and the audience will follow it. The Field of Dreams approach.

GO: You said earlier (and you’ve also mentioned it in your Playboy interview) that the discourse around games is toxic and partisan. Are you talking about within or outside of the gaming community?

TT: All of it. Partisan lines have been drawn within it for purposes far beyond aesthetic disagreement. In part because so much of this discourse occurs in a medium where people are not held accountable for their words, i.e. on the internet.

GO: How does that compare to conversations within the literary community? You’ve written before, for instance, about the MFA vs. NYC debate .

TT: I want to do my part to de-estrange gaming discourse. Not de-stigmatize or demystify, but de-estrange. This cancerous shit happens everywhere — it just happens in a spectacularly aggressive and organized way in gaming.

GO: When you’re not actually writing about video games, what place do they hold in your life? Are they the stress relief at the end of the day, the reward after two hours of writing? Or something you try to avoid when you’re in the middle of a big project?

TT: I’ve played video games since I was three years old. I have loved video games a lot longer than I’ve loved literature — which is not to say more. Actually… yeah, probably more. It just so happens that I’m a writer. I don’t feel the guilt that some people do who, even if they enjoy gaming, approach it feeling as if it’s a waste of time, or a form of entertainment which takes them away from their “real life.” You wouldn’t condemn a cineaste or a lover of literature. But a fug of non-respectability still attends video games.

That said, the reward mechanisms in most games are designed to get you hooked in cognitive motivational ways that don’t apply to most literature. So it’s absolutely possible for games to displace other things that you would want to do just as much. I don’t struggle to fit them into my life, but I probably would, if my life consisted of much more than just teaching and writing.

GO: I suppose I was thinking more about the effect on your mental state. For instance, I have to save video games for the end of the day, because I have a hard time going from the almost meditative state of game-playing into writing. How does it fit in, not in the sense of time but in how it interacts with your ability to produce writing afterwards?

TT: If a visual narrative enters my head before I start writing, it’s enormously difficult to pull myself back into writing. A huge amount of psychic inertia has to be overcome to transition from consuming a narrative to assembling one. I have a lot of wacko bird theories as to why. Perhaps language is such an information-poor medium that it demands a sparseness of input, so that you can have room to envision or create new stuff in your head. Maybe the act of viewing, which puts you in the posture of evaluation and judgment, beefs up the inner critic that makes it hard to write. That’s all pure superstition, I have nothing to base that on.

GO: What about when it comes to the type of video game? You’ve mentioned playing DotA 2 in other interviews, which is very different from more narrative-heavy single player games. In the middle of a big writing project, do you find yourself drawn more to one type of game over another?

TT: With the caveat that writers are the worst self-appraisers, I’ll say that I have not noticed any influence from the type of games I’m playing on what I write. I think games engage an entirely different part of my brain, which might also account for the difficulty I have toggling between those two modes. That said, I think longer games can work like long books — immersively — where you have to pinch your nose and take a deep breath before plunging into the Neapolitan books and it just becomes the medium you swim in for months. Some games demand a higher or more frequent degree of engagement to get any kind of nuance at all. You can play a thousand hours of DotA 2 , without coming anywhere near understanding it.

GO: How does that compare to the relationship between reading and your own work? Do you avoid other people’s writing when working, or do you keep books on your desk for the sake of referencing them?

TT: I do. I try to keep a messy puddle of books around my work area, in case I want to steal something from somebody else. But I Google as much as I refer to other books. I don’t disconnect from the internet when I’m writing, like some writers who have this almost mystical anathema against technology. I generally find I benefit from my procrastination.

You can have a rom-com game, a campus game, an adultery game, or a boring-but-important game that will get taught in high schools circa 2110.

GO: You referred to language as being information-poor a minute ago, which reminds me of the AGNI essay you wrote on boredom. The thesis of that essay was basically that boredom in literature is okay. Can you also apply that idea to video games? Can there be meaningful or productive boredom while playing, through the act of repetition, for instance? I just played Her Story, which I know you enjoyed, and while it has a super interesting story you have to slog through a certain amount of repetition to get to it.

TT: The democratization of game creation is producing a wider range of games, like the Super 8 camera did with film. You can have vignette-style games like Nina Freeman’s —  Cibele , how do you Do It? , Freshman Year , etc. You can have “walking simulators” that are almost purely meditative, like Gone Home , Firewatch , or Dear Esther . I just saw a piece on a game based on Thoreau’s Walden .

The impulses and tendencies that make people want to create literature are present. It will happen more as people are able to do what they want to do, without enormous corporate financial support or even crowdfunding, which, to an extent, just moves the bottom line to having to be crowd-pleasing. Games can be plenty boring in spite of themselves, even if that’s not what they’re trying to do. It’s a cliché by now to point out that the most time investment-heavy games like World of Warcraft consist largely of “grinding.” Or, if you play something like DotA 2 , queuing for a game.

GO: For DotA 2 you also have to spend a lot of time reading up on viable builds. Work that’s not in actually playing the game.

TT: Yes, although I will say that that intellectual work doesn’t feel like tedious labor to me. I have fun looking up builds. The deep strategy and understanding are coextensive with the pleasure of playing the game.

Moments of boredom are built into games for reasons that range from comedy to suspense. I think a lot about the moment in Final Fantasy VI where you’re directed to just wait at the edge of a floating continent for a character to come along. On the one hand you’re sitting watching a clock tick down. On the other hand, it’s extremely tense.

Contrasting aesthetic effects in games to those in other media is not always productive, because it’s like playing Twenty Questions. Can games do X like books? Can games do Y like films? In the same way we should assume games are art, and that there’s an audience out there hungry to make something of them, we should assume that games can do anything. You can have a rom-com game, a campus game, an adultery game, or a boring-but-important game that will get taught in high schools circa 2110.

GO: I go to these academic conferences where a similar conversation is happening among professors who write in the field of gaming studies. Some bring in literary and film theory, and try to lay that on top of video games, while others reject that. The tools and the language are already there from other fields, so it seems easy. On the other hand, it can be kind of reductive, and perhaps prevents you from having the more meaningful conversation.

TT: Right, or even just the conversation you’re trying to have. There are also those efforts to create a language around game studies, partly I think try to legitimatize it in the eyes of the academy. You get people going on about the Ludologists versus the Narratologists, about ludonarrative dissonance, copping these quasi-academic terms. I can see the point of systematizing things, but my favorite criticism helps you not to just describe and understand, but to enjoy stuff more.

GO: How much do you worry about the effect that being an “out” gamer will have on your literary career?

TT: If I were bashful or coy about my love of video games I wouldn’t do this interview. The same goes for pornography or television. Even the language of being “out” implies a political and social pressure or an importance that just doesn’t exist. I’d hate to believe that being a writer means living in a constant state of deposition, publicizing everything you do, think, or feel. The fact that I like video games isn’t interesting. Video games are interesting. I love talking about them with smart people, both within and outside of gaming culture. But I’m also perfectly happy to be left alone with them.

GO: Do you hope there’s a day around the corner where a game developer decides to make a narrative-heavy game like Life is Strange , Her Story , or Kentucky Route Zero , and they look at a list of literary authors to figure out who should write it?

TT: Not at all. I believe that I can do a lot of things in writing, but I haven’t felt an urge to create a video game since the third grade. It’s always good to have some kind of interest that is totally pure, where you’re going to be an eternal fan, because sausage-making can disillusion you fast. If part of the charge of art comes from mystique or sheer baffled admiration, that’s something I want to preserve in at least a few departments of my life.

GO: As a writer, you’re expected to be both a creator and a thoughtful critic as well. It seems like once you publish a book, there is an expectation that you’ll be reviewing or blurbing for other books for the rest of your life. How does your approach to writing about literature differ from your essays on games?

TT: I review books as a practitioner; I know what goes into putting one together, so I can pan one that isn’t well-made. I write about games as an appreciator, in that I want to take something I like and enlarge people’s sense of pleasure or wonder at it. This doesn’t mean that I can’t be critical of a game. I have negative things to say about everything. But because I’m not highly qualified to trivialize or disparage a game on the level of craft — for instance, a sunbeam in a video game might look shitty and aliased because of technological or budgetary constraints that I’m not aware of — my main task is to study its narrative and to add value.

GO: You’ve been thinking about games critically for a long time. I read that you wrote your theses — both in undergrad and for your first master’s degree — on video game interaction. What were you looking at in those?

TT: I majored in something called Symbolic Systems, which would be called cognitive sciences anywhere else. They add linguistics and philosophy to the standard curriculum of formal logic, computer science, and cognitive psychology. I applied the extremely specific language of human-computer interaction studies to video games. So I wrote pretty dry literature surveys of game-writing and interaction theory, and how the latter could be applied to the former.

One was about game controller design, which ended up anticipating the Nintendo Wii controller by a couple of years. I talked about the potential for modular design and gestural input. The second thesis was about menus. They’re the basis of turn-based RPGs, and in games their definitional boundaries are weird. Take the Warp Zone Pipes in Super Mario Brothers . You go over a ceiling and drop into a room where you’re invited to select one of three pipes to go through. It is very clearly a menu, where you’re selecting one of three options, but it’s also a part of the action.

God, I sound so stoned when I talk about this.

GO: I hate to keep mentioning Her Story , but I just started it today. In that game, the user interface also has this blurry boundary. You read a ReadMe file to learn how to use the system, but that’s all part of the in-game computer you interact with as part of the story.

TT: Yeah, it’s brilliant. Any computer interaction can be extrapolated into a game premise. Here it’s basically Database Search: The Game, but it’s fun and well written. To analogize with literature, there are plenty of stories whose premise comes from its formal conceit. My favorite is “ Going for a Beer ” by Robert Coover. He takes a simple sentence gimmick — where two things that happen at different times are written as though they’re simultaneous — and it becomes the conceit of the story. The story is, “what if your life was composed of moments with endings and beginnings but no middles?”

GO: Form matching content. That happens in all types of art, right? There was a piece on Hamilton which pointed out that, as the first half progresses, the Marquis de Lafayette’s rhymes get denser and faster, coinciding with him being in America and increasingly speaking English. The music reflects the plot.

TT: Form generating content, I would say. It’s a classical idea. Sometimes it’s done very explicitly, like with Oulipo. It can be super corny, but it’s a dependable source of inspiration.

It’s Tristram Shandy-levels of batshit.

GO: Going back to your idea for a game-writing website, were you imagining a place that just collected the kind of long-form writing you want to see, or were you also imagining a community that would be built around it?

TT: I am not too concerned with building community. The idea was simply to get critical essays on games­ — not fiction, poetry, reviews, or personal essays, but literary analysis. Like the essay I’m working on about the Metal Gear Solid series… So many of the male characters lose their hands and are sterile and have daddy issues and misinterpret the will of one female character, The Boss. Aside from the glaring Freudian overtones, what’s that about? This is not stuff that figures into the plot as it plays out, but is something that I think screams out for conversation.

GO: I was a Nintendo kid and then jumped to PC gaming, so I never got into the Metal Gear  games.

TT: It’s like the Infinite Jest of games. As far as I know, it’s the longest continuous scripted narrative in games. You can make a strained case for things like Zelda or Metroid , but this is the most sustained vision from an auteurist figure, Hideo Kojima, and it’s just bonkers. It’s Tristram Shandy -levels of batshit.

GO: Well, that sells it. I now have to ask the big, speculative question, since you just called it the Infinite Jest of games. What do you think David Foster Wallace’s writing would have been like, had he been obsessed with video games rather than television?

TT: This question is so enormously counterfactual it might as well be a novel. The guy was hugely tech-avoidant. He typed with one finger on an old computer. But games seem very contiguous with his concerns in Infinite Jest . Though who’s to say Virginia Woolf wouldn’t have also gotten equally invested in games? Wallace is a gimme because of the technological overlap, but to me the more interesting speculative question is, What would a game written by P.G. Wodehouse be like? I want to see an essay on  that .

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Home — Essay Samples — Entertainment — Video Games — Video Games and Their Impact

Video Games and Their Impact

• Categories: Cognitive Development Video Games

About this sample

Words: 433 |

Published: Feb 12, 2024

Words: 433 | Page: 1 | 3 min read

References:

• Barr, Matthew. “Video Games Can Turn University Graduates into Better Employees.” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 2019.
• Etchells, Pete. “Five Damaging Myths about Video Games – Let’s Shoot ‘Em Up.” The Guardian, 2019.

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MultiVersus Review: Back & Looking To Knock Out The Competition

Grey's anatomy season 21's best romance is over before it even started, this 8 foot tall sentinel cosplay makes x-men's death machine a terrifying reality.

Although video games can be mindless fun at times, some of the biggest releases of the later half of this year have included The Last of Us: Part 1 and the upcoming God of War: Ragnarök , titles that serve to highlight video games as an art form to rival traditional media. When it comes to what makes games like these work, YouTube has any gaming enthusiast covered.

From essayists who focus on the storytelling element of video games like Jacob Geller to ones that go in-depth to take apart the mechanical side of creating video games like Game Maker's Toolkit or even GDC, these are the channels that Reddit thinks fans should be checking out.

When most people think of video essays, they tend to think of channels where a single person presents their thoughts on a variety of topics but GDC is a little different. The name stands for Game Developers Conference and the YouTube channel presents clips and full talks from professionals.

Redditor rebilax13 comments that you can "never go wrong with GDC" as you get to "hear from the industry themselves." Whilst analysis from an outsider is always interesting, there's something about hearing developers, artists, and producers talk about their own methods of bringing video games to life that's uniquely insightful.

Writing On Games

Focusing on game design and what makes video game narratives so powerful , Writing on Games presents video game essays and reviews in a sharp and engaging style that has won the channel many fans over the years. That includes Redditor Party_McFly710 who rates them as a top channel when it comes to "general story analysis" for video games.

Whilst the channel isn't afraid to criticize games for their shortcomings, a lot of their videos involve going in-depth and taking apart exactly why highly-rated games like The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild , Elden Ring , and The Last of Us are so effective. Even better, Writing on Games generally draws attention to small details and game elements that most people would never pick up on.

Matthewmatosis

Well-researched, well-edited, and interesting video essays often take a lot of time to put together, which is why they aren't always easy to find. For those who don't mind infrequent uploads, Matthewmatosis provides just that, presenting videos that very obviously have a ton of thought and time put into them.

Redditor GhettoRussianSpy says they "wholeheartedly recommend" the channel and calls it "thought-provoking." Whereas some channels attempt to make videos about the most relevant game to ensure views, it's obvious that Matthewmatosis simply pursues whatever interests him at that time, presenting a fascinating dissection of Death Stranding nearly a year after Hideo Kojima's divisive title was released.

For retrospectives on awesome older video games , there are few channels that do so as effectively and entertainingly as Raycevick. Redditor Malix82 recommends the channel for "lengthy deconstructions" of exactly how and why a game once "made waves" or came to be perceived the way it is.

With his "... x Years Later" series, which includes "Metro Exodus... 3 Years Later" and "Need for Speed: Most Wanted... 13 Years Later," Raycevick uses the advantage of hindsight to look at games from a different perspective to usual and sometimes even challenge people's perceptions. Along with covering a wide range of games from different periods, Raycevick offers something for everyone.

Noah Caldwell-Gervais

There are plenty of channels that offer extremely long-form and comprehensive video essays on games but very few go to the extremes of Noah Caldwell-Gervais whose "Thorough Look" series has episodes that break the 5-hour mark. It's not just quantity he provides though as, according to Redditor Frittenbudenpapst , "His analysis, critique and description of games is just stellar."

"Whilst his almost-exclusive use of gameplay footage might not appeal to those who like more flashy and visually engaging video essays, it helps him to effectively capture the feel of the games he talks about and that's something his fans appreciate. This is especially true as he often talks about games where the atmosphere is one of the most important elements.

Tongue-in-cheek humor and sharp critiques go hand-in-hand in Whitelight's video essays, which often take on critically-lauded or critically-panned games and offer an interesting take. Whilst it's not a channel for fans who like their video essays to be completely serious, there are good reasons why Redditors like BrandalfFTW consider him one of "the best."

For example, despite taking a more humorous approach to the YouTube format , Whitelight's critiques tend to be fairly balanced, taking into account arguments for and against the games he takes on. Whilst no viewer is likely to agree with all of his opinions, that's a part of the charm of Whitelight's channel.

Though Hbomberguy takes on everything from politics and conspiracy theories to TV shows, some of his most popular and most compelling videos are those where he simply discusses video games. Redditor AMtheVile is one fan who says they "really like" his video game content.

Though his approach to video games can be divisive, often taking extreme stances on beloved video game franchises like The Elder Scrolls and the Fallout series and presenting his views in an over-the-top, impassioned way, the level of effort he puts into making his videos well-researched and visually interesting is something anyone can appreciate.

With the description on YouTube reading simply "Insightful gaming videos," Ahoy manages to perfectly capture why fans love the channel's video essays so much. Although not exclusively about video games, with many historical videos as well, their visually striking and perfectly composed video game essays easily rival that of completely game-focused channels.

That's why Redditor GustavGarlicBread calls them "amazing" at what they do, adding that they have "extremely clean editing, and original music to top it all off." Whilst this means uploads are infrequent, each essay has so much originality that they're more than worth the wait.

Game Maker's Toolkit

Presented by British video game journalist and game developer Mark Brown, Game Maker's Toolkit aims to deliver exactly what the channel name promises which is to help with the viewer's understanding of how games are made. Though this technical approach of drawing attention to how games are crafted is great for budding game developers, it's also fascinating as a fan of games too.

One of those fans is Redditor nas1992 who comments that the channel is their "favorite" when it comes to gaming video essays. Rather than focusing on a specific game in each video, Brown nearly always dedicates each one to a particular, and usually small, aspect of game design, providing a much more technical perspective.

Jacob Geller

Though he does consider specific elements of game design in his gaming video essays, the unique appeal of Jacob Geller's YouTube channel is that they often provide deep and interesting reflections on the thematic story elements of great games. For fans of the story-telling side of video game creation, there are few better than Geller.

Redditor Frosch90 recommends the channel for anyone "into a more intellectual and "artsy" approach to games." Taking in a variety of sources that go far beyond what most YouTube video essays consider, Geller's approach is just as thorough as those on the more technical side of video games which helps make each one a treat to watch.

NEXT: 10 Best YouTube Channels For Film Video Essays, According To Reddit

Essay on Games

Games are an essential part of everyone’s childhood. Games are a fun way to keep kids entertained. They provide an interactive and engaging way to learn something new while considering themselves and others. They give children a break from daily study routines. Playing games improves kids’ immunity and helps them stay strong. BYJU’S essay on games allows the little ones to understand the difference between indoor and outdoor games and the importance of playing games.

Table of Contents

Indoor games, outdoor games, importance of playing games.

The essay on games is an article that explains why playing indoor games is vital for the development of kids in their early years. Indoor games are essential for kids who spend a lot of time indoors. There are many benefits to playing these games, like improving a child’s vision and developing memory skills. These skills help them in academics. While playing indoor games, kids can have a friendly competition.

The importance of indoor games is something that many people have probably not thought about. Indoor games can teach children how to move a coin, improve coordination, and use their imaginations. Examples of indoor games are carrom board, table tennis, chess, scrabble, charades, paper games, ludo, etc.

Outdoor games are essential to children’s health and development. Children who play outdoors experience nature, which is good for their physical, social, and mental health. Outdoor games are a fun way to get out of the house, meet new people, and take an opportunity to bond with new friends.

The little ones need to engage in physical activities to stay healthy. They help children develop problem-solving, teamwork, communication, cooperation, flexibility, and physical activity skills. Outdoor activities can be more beneficial than indoor activities because they provide more exposure to sunlight. Examples of outdoor games are kabaddi, cricket, football, kho kho , etc.

Playing games is an excellent way for kids to learn about the world and make new friends. Games improve kids’ learning experience and interest in studies, which helps them score better grades. Experts say playing games has cognitive benefits and can help increase social skills.

When playing games, kids’ brains grow stronger and wiser. Games teach children how to interact with others and think strategically while they are still young and learning new things. They also provide a safe place for kids to learn and explore without fear of judgement. You can also use games to teach your child how to communicate using a game board or cards.

To conclude, games are an essential part of early childhood, and an essay on games helps children understand the value of playing games. When kids soak in the sun while playing, they become strong, improving their vitamin D levels. In addition, playing games keep the kids engaged and entertained. For more kid-friendly activities, stories , GK questions and other games visit, BYJU’S website.

Frequently Asked Questions on Essay on Games

What are the benefits of playing indoor games.

Indoor games provide kids with a way to exercise their minds while playing. Solving puzzles or educational games help children learn new skills, strengthen maths skills and improve memory. Research is also being conducted to see how playing indoor board games can improve children’s literacy skills.

Why are outdoor games important for children?

Parents should encourage their children to participate in outdoor games to teach them the importance of teamwork and cooperation. Games like kabaddi, cricket, and hockey are fun ways for children to stay active during the summer. They also help children build their physical strength.

Why is BYJU’S essay on games vital for kids?

BYJU’S essay on games is essential for children because it explains the significance of playing and how games allow them to release stress, have fun, and learn valuable skills.

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Essay on Sports and Games for Students and Children

500+ words essay on sports and games.

sports and games are essential for both physical and mental of the students. Moreover, it increases the immunity of the person. As it increases the blood flow in the body and makes it adaptable for exertion. The main difference between a sport and a game is, we can play games both indoors and outdoors. But we can only play sports outdoors. Furthermore, there are various advantages to sports and games. Some of them are below:

Advantages of sports

Physical Fitness- Sports and games play a major rule in keeping a person fit and fine. Furthermore, it increases the blood flow in the entire body. So this helps in keeping the heart in the best condition. Moreover, the immunity of the body increases by playing outdoor sports. Also, it helps in keeping your body fat percentage low. This makes the appearance of the body better and makes a person good-looking.

Increase mental health- Games like chess , card games increase the mental health of a person . As it develops Spontaneity and the response time of a person. As a result, a person’s mind can make a decision under pressure. Thus this helps in increasing the IQ of a person and its’ presence of mind.

Increase Stamina- Outdoor Sports like Football , cricket, basketball, swimming builds the stamina of a person. As all these sports require a lot of running, the stamina of a person automatically increases. Therefore a person can work for a longer period of time without getting tired.

Builds a sense of teamwork- Some sports need individual participation, while some require teamwork. Thus sports enlists teamwork in a person. Which is essential in every fieldwork. A company can only run by working together and not individually. So it is important for a person to know how to work together in a team. Only then you can achieve the desired goal .

Stress-relieving- Sports can bring a change to your day to day routine. Moreover, it can relieve you from stress as your body will experience a change. It gives your mind a boost of enthusiasm and happiness. As a result, it will fill you with energy for the next day.

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Disadvantages of sport and games

Dangerous- Some sports like football, cricket , basketball, swimming can be dangerous. Because any injury can occur while playing these sports. Therefore you should wear proper safety gear before playing it. Moreover, it can be harmful if you are playing it while you are sick.

Exhausting- Sports require energy, so a person needs to have proper meals. Moreover, the body needs rest to recover from the exertion. Therefore you need proper sleep every day if you are indulging in any sport.

Takes time- In order to play any sport, you have to take out time from your busy schedule. This may be very difficult for some people. As they work day and night to fulfill the needs of their family. So a person needs to cut off some things from their busy schedule to take out time to play a sport.

FAQ On the essay on sports and games

Q1. What is the main difference between sports and games?

A1. The main difference between sports and games is, we can play sports only outdoors. But games can take place both indoors and outdoors.

Q2. Write any two advantages and disadvantages of sports.

A2. The advantages of sports are it keeps a person fit and is a stress buster. The disadvantages of sports are it can be dangerous to play, injury can occur while playing and it is can be exhausting.

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40 Best Essays of All Time (Including Links & Writing Tips)

I wanted to improve my writing skills. I thought that reading the forty best essays of all time would bring me closer to my goal.

I had little money (buying forty collections of essays was out of the question) so I’ve found them online instead. I’ve hacked through piles of them, and finally, I’ve found the great ones. Now I want to share the whole list with you (with the addition of my notes about writing). Each item on the list has a direct link to the essay, so please click away and indulge yourself. Also, next to each essay, there’s an image of the book that contains the original work.

About this essay list:

Reading essays is like indulging in candy; once you start, it’s hard to stop. I sought out essays that were not only well-crafted but also impactful. These pieces genuinely shifted my perspective. Whether you’re diving in for enjoyment or to hone your writing, these essays promise to leave an imprint. It’s fascinating how an essay can resonate with you, and even if details fade, its essence remains. I haven’t ranked them in any way; they’re all stellar. Skim through, explore the summaries, and pick up some writing tips along the way. For more essay gems, consider “Best American Essays” by Joyce Carol Oates or “101 Essays That Will Change The Way You Think” curated by Brianna Wiest.

40 Best Essays of All Time (With Links And Writing Tips)

1. david sedaris – laugh, kookaburra.

A great family drama takes place against the backdrop of the Australian wilderness. And the Kookaburra laughs… This is one of the top essays of the lot. It’s a great mixture of family reminiscences, travel writing, and advice on what’s most important in life. You’ll also learn an awful lot about the curious culture of the Aussies.

Writing tips from the essay:

• Use analogies (you can make it funny or dramatic to achieve a better effect): “Don’t be afraid,” the waiter said, and he talked to the kookaburra in a soothing, respectful voice, the way you might to a child with a switchblade in his hand”.
• You can touch a few cognate stories in one piece of writing . Reveal the layers gradually. Intertwine them and arrange for a grand finale where everything is finally clear.
• Be on the side of the reader. Become their friend and tell the story naturally, like around the dinner table.
• Use short, punchy sentences. Tell only as much as is required to make your point vivid.
• Conjure sentences that create actual feelings: “I had on a sweater and a jacket, but they weren’t quite enough, and I shivered as we walked toward the body, and saw that it was a . . . what, exactly?”
• You may ask a few tough questions in a row to provoke interest and let the reader think.

2. Charles D’Ambrosio – Documents

Do you think your life punches you in the face all too often? After reading this essay, you will change your mind. Reading about loss and hardships often makes us sad at first, but then enables us to feel grateful for our lives . D’Ambrosio shares his documents (poems, letters) that had a major impact on his life, and brilliantly shows how not to let go of the past.

• The most powerful stories are about your family and the childhood moments that shaped your life.
• You don’t need to build up tension and pussyfoot around the crux of the matter. Instead, surprise the reader by telling it like it is: “The poem was an allegory about his desire to leave our family.” Or: “My father had three sons. I’m the eldest; Danny, the youngest, killed himself sixteen years ago”.
• You can use real documents and quotes from your family and friends. It makes it so much more personal and relatable.
• Don’t cringe before the long sentence if you know it’s a strong one.
• At the end of the essay, you may come back to the first theme to close the circuit.
• Using slightly poetic language is acceptable, as long as it improves the story.

3. E. B. White – Once more to the lake

What does it mean to be a father? Can you see your younger self, reflected in your child? This beautiful essay tells the story of the author, his son, and their traditional stay at a placid lake hidden within the forests of Maine. This place of nature is filled with sunshine and childhood memories. It also provides for one of the greatest meditations on nature and the passing of time.

• Use sophisticated language, but not at the expense of readability.
• Use vivid language to trigger the mirror neurons in the reader’s brain: “I took along my son, who had never had any fresh water up his nose and who had seen lily pads only from train windows”.
• It’s important to mention universal feelings that are rarely talked about (it helps to create a bond between two minds): “You remember one thing, and that suddenly reminds you of another thing. I guess I remembered clearest of all the early mornings when the lake was cool and motionless”.
• Animate the inanimate: “this constant and trustworthy body of water”.
• Mentioning tales of yore is a good way to add some mystery and timelessness to your piece.
• Using double, or even triple “and” in one sentence is fine. It can make the sentence sing.

4. Zadie Smith – Fail Better

Aspiring writers feel tremendous pressure to perform. The daily quota of words often turns out to be nothing more than gibberish. What then? Also, should the writer please the reader or should she be fully independent? What does it mean to be a writer, anyway? This essay is an attempt to answer these questions, but its contents are not only meant for scribblers. Within it, you’ll find some great notes about literary criticism, how we treat art , and the responsibility of the reader.

• A perfect novel ? There’s no such thing.
• The novel always reflects the inner world of the writer. That’s why we’re fascinated with writers.
• Writing is not simply about craftsmanship, but about taking your reader to the unknown lands. In the words of Christopher Hitchens: “Your ideal authors ought to pull you from the foundering of your previous existence, not smilingly guide you into a friendly and peaceable harbor.”
• Style comes from your unique personality and the perception of the world. It takes time to develop it.
• Never try to tell it all. “All” can never be put into language. Take a part of it and tell it the best you can.
• Avoid being cliché. Try to infuse new life into your writing .
• Writing is about your way of being. It’s your game. Paradoxically, if you try to please everyone, your writing will become less appealing. You’ll lose the interest of the readers. This rule doesn’t apply in the business world where you have to write for a specific person (a target audience).
• As a reader, you have responsibilities too. According to the critics, every thirty years, there’s just a handful of great novels. Maybe it’s true. But there’s also an element of personal connection between the reader and the writer. That’s why for one person a novel is a marvel, while for the other, nothing special at all. That’s why you have to search and find the author who will touch you.

5. Virginia Woolf – Death of the Moth

Amid an ordinary day, sitting in a room of her own, Virginia Woolf tells about the epic struggle for survival and the evanescence of life. This short essay is truly powerful. In the beginning, the atmosphere is happy. Life is in full force. And then, suddenly, it fades away. This sense of melancholy would mark the last years of Woolf’s life.

• The melody of language… A good sentence is like music: “Moths that fly by day are not properly to be called moths; they do not excite that pleasant sense of dark autumn nights and ivy-blossom which the commonest yellow- underwing asleep in the shadow of the curtain never fails to rouse in us”.
• You can show the grandest in the mundane (for example, the moth at your window and the drama of life and death).
• Using simple comparisons makes the style more lucid: “Being intent on other matters I watched these futile attempts for a time without thinking, unconsciously waiting for him to resume his flight, as one waits for a machine, that has stopped momentarily, to start again without considering the reason of its failure”.

6. Meghan Daum – My Misspent Youth

Many of us, at some point or another, dream about living in New York. Meghan Daum’s take on the subject differs slightly from what you might expect. There’s no glamour, no Broadway shows, and no fancy restaurants. Instead, there’s the sullen reality of living in one of the most expensive cities in the world. You’ll get all the juicy details about credit cards, overdue payments, and scrambling for survival. It’s a word of warning. But it’s also a great story about shattered fantasies of living in a big city. Word on the street is: “You ain’t promised mañana in the rotten manzana.”

• You can paint a picture of your former self. What did that person believe in? What kind of world did he or she live in?
• “The day that turned your life around” is a good theme you may use in a story. Memories of a special day are filled with emotions. Strong emotions often breed strong writing.
• Use cultural references and relevant slang to create a context for your story.
• You can tell all the details of the story, even if in some people’s eyes you’ll look like the dumbest motherfucker that ever lived. It adds to the originality.
• Say it in a new way: “In this mindset, the dollars spent, like the mechanics of a machine no one bothers to understand, become an abstraction, an intangible avenue toward self-expression, a mere vehicle of style”.
• You can mix your personal story with the zeitgeist or the ethos of the time.

7. Roger Ebert – Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Probably the greatest film critic of all time, Roger Ebert, tells us not to rage against the dying of the light. This essay is full of courage, erudition, and humanism. From it, we learn about what it means to be dying (Hitchens’ “Mortality” is another great work on that theme). But there’s so much more. It’s a great celebration of life too. It’s about not giving up, and sticking to your principles until the very end. It brings to mind the famous scene from Dead Poets Society where John Keating (Robin Williams) tells his students: “Carpe, carpe diem, seize the day boys, make your lives extraordinary”.

• Start with a powerful sentence: “I know it is coming, and I do not fear it, because I believe there is nothing on the other side of death to fear.”
• Use quotes to prove your point -”‘Ask someone how they feel about death’, he said, ‘and they’ll tell you everyone’s gonna die’. Ask them, ‘In the next 30 seconds?’ No, no, no, that’s not gonna happen”.
• Admit the basic truths about reality in a childlike way (especially after pondering quantum physics) – “I believe my wristwatch exists, and even when I am unconscious, it is ticking all the same. You have to start somewhere”.
• Let other thinkers prove your point. Use quotes and ideas from your favorite authors and friends.

8. George Orwell – Shooting an Elephant

Even after one reading, you’ll remember this one for years. The story, set in British Burma, is about shooting an elephant (it’s not for the squeamish). It’s also the most powerful denunciation of colonialism ever put into writing. Orwell, apparently a free representative of British rule, feels to be nothing more than a puppet succumbing to the whim of the mob.

• The first sentence is the most important one: “In Moulmein, in Lower Burma, I was hated by large numbers of people — the only time in my life that I have been important enough for this to happen to me”.
• You can use just the first paragraph to set the stage for the whole piece of prose.
• Use beautiful language that stirs the imagination: “I remember that it was a cloudy, stuffy morning at the beginning of the rains.” Or: “I watched him beating his bunch of grass against his knees, with that preoccupied grandmotherly air that elephants have.”
• If you’ve ever been to war, you will have a story to tell: “(Never tell me, by the way, that the dead look peaceful. Most of the corpses I have seen looked devilish.)”
• Use simple words, and admit the sad truth only you can perceive: “They did not like me, but with the magical rifle in my hands I was momentarily worth watching”.
• Share words of wisdom to add texture to the writing: “I perceived at this moment that when the white man turns tyrant it is his freedom that he destroys.”
• I highly recommend reading everything written by Orwell, especially if you’re looking for the best essay collections on Amazon or Goodreads.

9. George Orwell – A Hanging

It’s just another day in Burma – time to hang a man. Without much ado, Orwell recounts the grim reality of taking another person’s life. A man is taken from his cage and in a few minutes, he’s going to be hanged. The most horrible thing is the normality of it. It’s a powerful story about human nature. Also, there’s an extraordinary incident with the dog, but I won’t get ahead of myself.

• Create brilliant, yet short descriptions of characters: “He was a Hindu, a puny wisp of a man, with a shaven head and vague liquid eyes. He had a thick, sprouting mustache, absurdly too big for his body, rather like the mustache of a comic man on the films”.
• Understand and share the felt presence of a unique experience: “It is curious, but till that moment I had never realized what it means to destroy a healthy, conscious man”.
• Make your readers hear the sound that will stay with them forever: “And then when the noose was fixed, the prisoner began crying out on his god. It was a high, reiterated cry of “Ram! Ram! Ram! Ram!”
• Make the ending original by refusing the tendency to seek closure or summing it up.

10. Christopher Hitchens – Assassins of The Mind

In one of the greatest essays written in defense of free speech, Christopher Hitchens shares many examples of how modern media kneel to the explicit threats of violence posed by Islamic extremists. He recounts the story of his friend, Salman Rushdie, author of Satanic Verses who, for many years, had to watch over his shoulder because of the fatwa of Ayatollah Khomeini. With his usual wit, Hitchens shares various examples of people who died because of their opinions and of editors who refuse to publish anything related to Islam because of fear (and it was written long before the Charlie Hebdo massacre). After reading the essay, you realize that freedom of expression is one of the most precious things we have and that we have to fight for it. I highly recommend all essay collections penned by Hitchens, especially the ones written for Vanity Fair.

• Assume that the readers will know the cultural references. When they do, their self-esteem goes up – they are a part of an insider group.
• When proving your point, give a variety of real-life examples from eclectic sources. Leave no room for ambiguity or vagueness. Research and overall knowledge are essential here.
• Use italics to emphasize a specific word or phrase (here I use the underlining): “We live now in a climate where every publisher and editor and politician has to weigh in advance the possibility of violent Muslim reprisal. In consequence, several things have not happened.”
• Think about how to make it sound more original: “So there is now a hidden partner in our cultural and academic and publishing and the broadcasting world: a shadowy figure that has, uninvited, drawn up a chair to the table.”

11. Christopher Hitchens – The New Commandments

It’s high time to shatter the tablets and amend the biblical rules of conduct. Watch, as Christopher Hitchens slays one commandment after the other on moral, as well as historical grounds. For example, did you know that there are many versions of the divine law dictated by God to Moses which you can find in the Bible? Aren’t we thus empowered to write our version of a proper moral code? If you approach it with an open mind, this essay may change the way you think about the Bible and religion.

• Take the iconoclastic approach. Have a party on the hallowed soil.
• Use humor to undermine orthodox ideas (it seems to be the best way to deal with an established authority).
• Use sarcasm and irony when appropriate (or not): “Nobody is opposed to a day of rest. The international Communist movement got its start by proclaiming a strike for an eight-hour day on May 1, 1886, against Christian employers who used child labor seven days a week”.
• Defeat God on legal grounds: “Wise lawmakers know that it is a mistake to promulgate legislation that is impossible to obey”.
• Be ruthless in the logic of your argument. Provide evidence.

12. Phillip Lopate – Against Joie de Vivre

While reading this fantastic essay, this quote from Slavoj Žižek kept coming back to me: “I think that the only life of deep satisfaction is a life of eternal struggle, especially struggle with oneself. If you want to remain happy, just remain stupid. Authentic masters are never happy; happiness is a category of slaves”. I can bear the onus of happiness or joie de vivre for some time. But this force enables me to get free and wallow in the sweet feelings of melancholy and nostalgia. By reading this work of Lopate, you’ll enter into the world of an intelligent man who finds most social rituals a drag. It’s worth exploring.

• Go against the grain. Be flamboyant and controversial (if you can handle it).
• Treat the paragraph like a group of thoughts on one theme. Next paragraph, next theme.
• Use references to other artists to set the context and enrich the prose: “These sunny little canvases with their talented innocence, the third-generation spirit of Montmartre, bore testimony to a love of life so unbending as to leave an impression of rigid narrow-mindedness as extreme as any Savonarola. Their rejection of sorrow was total”.
• Capture the emotions in life that are universal, yet remain unspoken.
• Don’t be afraid to share your intimate experiences.

13. Philip Larkin – The Pleasure Principle

This piece comes from the Required Writing collection of personal essays. Larkin argues that reading in verse should be a source of intimate pleasure – not a medley of unintelligible thoughts that only the author can (or can’t?) decipher. It’s a sobering take on modern poetry and a great call to action for all those involved in it. Well worth a read.

• Write about complicated ideas (such as poetry) simply. You can change how people look at things if you express yourself enough.
• Go boldly. The reader wants a bold writer: “We seem to be producing a new kind of bad poetry, not the old kind that tries to move the reader and fails, but one that does not even try”.
• Play with words and sentence length. Create music: “It is time some of you playboys realized, says the judge, that reading a poem is hard work. Fourteen days in stir. Next case”.
• Persuade the reader to take action. Here, direct language is the most effective.

14. Sigmund Freud – Thoughts for the Times on War and Death

This essay reveals Freud’s disillusionment with the whole project of Western civilization. How the peaceful European countries could engage in a war that would eventually cost over 17 million lives? What stirs people to kill each other? Is it their nature, or are they puppets of imperial forces with agendas of their own? From the perspective of time, this work by Freud doesn’t seem to be fully accurate. Even so, it’s well worth your time.

• Commence with long words derived from Latin. Get grandiloquent, make your argument incontrovertible, and leave your audience discombobulated.
• Use unending sentences, so that the reader feels confused, yet impressed.
• Say it well: “In this way, he enjoyed the blue sea and the grey; the beauty of snow-covered mountains and green meadowlands; the magic of northern forests and the splendor of southern vegetation; the mood evoked by landscapes that recall great historical events, and the silence of untouched nature”.
• Human nature is a subject that never gets dry.

15. Zadie Smith – Some Notes on Attunement

“You are privy to a great becoming, but you recognize nothing” – Francis Dolarhyde. This one is about the elusiveness of change occurring within you. For Zadie, it was hard to attune to the vibes of Joni Mitchell – especially her Blue album. But eventually, she grew up to appreciate her genius, and all the other things changed as well. This top essay is all about the relationship between humans, and art. We shouldn’t like art because we’re supposed to. We should like it because it has an instantaneous, emotional effect on us. Although, according to Stansfield (Gary Oldman) in Léon, liking Beethoven is rather mandatory.

• Build an expectation of what’s coming: “The first time I heard her I didn’t hear her at all”.
• Don’t be afraid of repetition if it feels good.
• Psychedelic drugs let you appreciate things you never appreciated.
• Intertwine a personal journey with philosophical musings.
• Show rather than tell: “My friends pitied their eyes. The same look the faithful give you as you hand them back their “literature” and close the door in their faces”.
• Let the poets speak for you: “That time is past, / And all its aching joys are now no
• more, / And all its dizzy raptures”.
• By voicing your anxieties, you can heal the anxieties of the reader. In that way, you say: “I’m just like you. I’m your friend in this struggle”.
• Admit your flaws to make your persona more relatable.

16. Annie Dillard – Total Eclipse

My imagination was always stirred by the scene of the solar eclipse in Pharaoh, by Boleslaw Prus. I wondered about the shock of the disoriented crowd when they saw how their ruler could switch off the light. Getting immersed in this essay by Annie Dillard has a similar effect. It produces amazement and some kind of primeval fear. It’s not only the environment that changes; it’s your mind and the perception of the world. After the eclipse, nothing is going to be the same again.

• Yet again, the power of the first sentence draws you in: “It had been like dying, that sliding down the mountain pass”.
• Don’t miss the extraordinary scene. Then describe it: “Up in the sky, like a crater from some distant cataclysm, was a hollow ring”.
• Use colloquial language. Write as you talk. Short sentences often win.
• Contrast the numinous with the mundane to enthrall the reader.

17. Édouard Levé – When I Look at a Strawberry, I Think of a Tongue

This suicidally beautiful essay will teach you a lot about the appreciation of life and the struggle with mental illness. It’s a collection of personal, apparently unrelated thoughts that show us the rich interior of the author. You look at the real-time thoughts of another person, and then recognize the same patterns within yourself… It sounds like a confession of a person who’s about to take their life, and it’s striking in its originality.

• Use the stream-of-consciousness technique and put random thoughts on paper. Then, polish them: “I have attempted suicide once, I’ve been tempted four times to attempt it”.
• Place the treasure deep within the story: “When I look at a strawberry, I think of a tongue, when I lick one, of a kiss”.
• Don’t worry about what people might think. The more you expose, the more powerful the writing. Readers also take part in the great drama. They experience universal emotions that mostly stay inside.  You can translate them into writing.

18. Gloria E. Anzaldúa – How to Tame a Wild Tongue

Anzaldúa, who was born in south Texas, had to struggle to find her true identity. She was American, but her culture was grounded in Mexico. In this way, she and her people were not fully respected in either of the countries. This essay is an account of her journey of becoming the ambassador of the Chicano (Mexican-American) culture. It’s full of anecdotes, interesting references, and different shades of Spanish. It’s a window into a new cultural dimension that you’ve never experienced before.

• If your mother tongue is not English, but you write in English, use some of your unique homeland vocabulary.
• You come from a rich cultural heritage. You can share it with people who never heard about it, and are not even looking for it, but it is of immense value to them when they discover it.
• Never forget about your identity. It is precious. It is a part of who you are. Even if you migrate, try to preserve it. Use it to your best advantage and become the voice of other people in the same situation.
• Tell them what’s really on your mind: “So if you want to hurt me, talk badly about my language. Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity – I am my language”.

19. Kurt Vonnegut – Dispatch From A Man Without a Country

In terms of style, this essay is flawless. It’s simple, conversational, humorous, and yet, full of wisdom. And when Vonnegut becomes a teacher and draws an axis of “beginning – end”, and, “good fortune – bad fortune” to explain literature, it becomes outright hilarious. It’s hard to find an author with such a down-to-earth approach. He doesn’t need to get intellectual to prove a point. And the point could be summed up by the quote from Great Expectations – “On the Rampage, Pip, and off the Rampage, Pip – such is Life!”

• Start with a curious question: “Do you know what a twerp is?”
• Surprise your readers with uncanny analogies: “I am from a family of artists. Here I am, making a living in the arts. It has not been a rebellion. It’s as though I had taken over the family Esso station.”
• Use your natural language without too many special effects. In time, the style will crystalize.
• An amusing lesson in writing from Mr. Vonnegut: “Here is a lesson in creative writing. First rule: Do not use semicolons. They are transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing. All they do is show you’ve been to college”.
• You can put actual images or vignettes between the paragraphs to illustrate something.

20. Mary Ruefle – On Fear

Most psychologists and gurus agree that fear is the greatest enemy of success or any creative activity. It’s programmed into our minds to keep us away from imaginary harm. Mary Ruefle takes on this basic human emotion with flair. She explores fear from so many angles (especially in the world of poetry-writing) that at the end of this personal essay, you will look at it, dissect it, untangle it, and hopefully be able to say “f**k you” the next time your brain is trying to stop you.

• Research your subject thoroughly. Ask people, have interviews, get expert opinions, and gather as much information as possible. Then scavenge through the fields of data, and pull out the golden bits that will let your prose shine.
• Use powerful quotes to add color to your story: “The poet who embarks on the creation of the poem (as I know by experience), begins with the aimless sensation of a hunter about to embark on a night hunt through the remotest of forests. Unaccountable dread stirs in his heart”. – Lorca.
• Writing advice from the essay: “One of the fears a young writer has is not being able to write as well as he or she wants to, the fear of not being able to sound like X or Y, a favorite author. But out of fear, hopefully, is born a young writer’s voice”.

21. Susan Sontag – Against Interpretation

In this highly intellectual essay, Sontag fights for art and its interpretation. It’s a great lesson, especially for critics and interpreters who endlessly chew on works that simply defy interpretation. Why don’t we just leave the art alone? I always hated it when at school they asked me: “What did the author have in mind when he did X or Y?” Iēsous Pantocrator! Hell if I know! I will judge it through my subjective experience!

• Leave the art alone: “Today is such a time, when the project of interpretation is reactionary, stifling. Like the fumes of the automobile and heavy industry which befoul the urban atmosphere, the effusion of interpretations of art today poisons our sensibilities”.
• When you have something really important to say, style matters less.
• There’s no use in creating a second meaning or inviting interpretation of our art. Just leave it be and let it speak for itself.

22. Nora Ephron – A Few Words About Breasts

This is a heartwarming, coming-of-age story about a young girl who waits in vain for her breasts to grow. It’s simply a humorous and pleasurable read. The size of breasts is a big deal for women. If you’re a man, you may peek into the mind of a woman and learn many interesting things. If you’re a woman, maybe you’ll be able to relate and at last, be at peace with your bosom.

• Touch an interesting subject and establish a strong connection with the readers (in that case, women with small breasts). Let your personality shine through the written piece. If you are lighthearted, show it.
• Use hyphens to create an impression of real talk: “My house was full of apples and peaches and milk and homemade chocolate chip cookies – which were nice, and good for you, but-not-right-before-dinner-or-you’ll-spoil-your-appetite.”
• Use present tense when you tell a story to add more life to it.
• Share the pronounced, memorable traits of characters: “A previous girlfriend named Solange, who was famous throughout Beverly Hills High School for having no pigment in her right eyebrow, had knitted them for him (angora dice)”.

23. Carl Sagan – Does Truth Matter – Science, Pseudoscience, and Civilization

Carl Sagan was one of the greatest proponents of skepticism, and an author of numerous books, including one of my all-time favorites – The Demon-Haunted World . He was also a renowned physicist and the host of the fantastic Cosmos: A Personal Voyage series, which inspired a whole generation to uncover the mysteries of the cosmos. He was also a dedicated weed smoker – clearly ahead of his time. The essay that you’re about to read is a crystallization of his views about true science, and why you should check the evidence before believing in UFOs or similar sorts of crap.

• Tell people the brutal truth they need to hear. Be the one who spells it out for them.
• Give a multitude of examples to prove your point. Giving hard facts helps to establish trust with the readers and show the veracity of your arguments.
• Recommend a good book that will change your reader’s minds – How We Know What Isn’t So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday Life

24. Paul Graham – How To Do What You Love

How To Do What You Love should be read by every college student and young adult. The Internet is flooded with a large number of articles and videos that are supposed to tell you what to do with your life. Most of them are worthless, but this one is different. It’s sincere, and there’s no hidden agenda behind it. There’s so much we take for granted – what we study, where we work, what we do in our free time… Surely we have another two hundred years to figure it out, right? Life’s too short to be so naïve. Please, read the essay and let it help you gain fulfillment from your work.

• Ask simple, yet thought-provoking questions (especially at the beginning of the paragraph) to engage the reader: “How much are you supposed to like what you do?”
• Let the readers question their basic assumptions: “Prestige is like a powerful magnet that warps even your beliefs about what you enjoy. It causes you to work not on what you like, but what you’d like to like”.
• If you’re writing for a younger audience, you can act as a mentor. It’s beneficial for younger people to read a few words of advice from a person with experience.

25. John Jeremiah Sullivan – Mister Lytle

A young, aspiring writer is about to become a nurse of a fading writer – Mister Lytle (Andrew Nelson Lytle), and there will be trouble. This essay by Sullivan is probably my favorite one from the whole list. The amount of beautiful sentences it contains is just overwhelming. But that’s just a part of its charm. It also takes you to the Old South which has an incredible atmosphere. It’s grim and tawny but you want to stay there for a while.

• Short, distinct sentences are often the most powerful ones: “He had a deathbed, in other words. He didn’t go suddenly”.
• Stay consistent with the mood of the story. When reading Mister Lytle you are immersed in that southern, forsaken, gloomy world, and it’s a pleasure.
• The spectacular language that captures it all: “His French was superb, but his accent in English was best—that extinct mid-Southern, land-grant pioneer speech, with its tinges of the abandoned Celtic urban Northeast (“boned” for burned) and its raw gentility”.
• This essay is just too good. You have to read it.

26. Joan Didion – On Self Respect

Normally, with that title, you would expect some straightforward advice about how to improve your character and get on with your goddamn life – but not from Joan Didion. From the very beginning, you can feel the depth of her thinking, and the unmistakable style of a true woman who’s been hurt. You can learn more from this essay than from whole books about self-improvement . It reminds me of the scene from True Detective, where Frank Semyon tells Ray Velcoro to “own it” after he realizes he killed the wrong man all these years ago. I guess we all have to “own it”, recognize our mistakes, and move forward sometimes.

• Share your moral advice: “Character — the willingness to accept responsibility for one’s own life — is the source from which self-respect springs”.
• It’s worth exploring the subject further from a different angle. It doesn’t matter how many people have already written on self-respect or self-reliance – you can still write passionately about it.
• Whatever happens, you must take responsibility for it. Brave the storms of discontent.

27. Susan Sontag – Notes on Camp

I’ve never read anything so thorough and lucid about an artistic current. After reading this essay, you will know what camp is. But not only that – you will learn about so many artists you’ve never heard of. You will follow their traces and go to places where you’ve never been before. You will vastly increase your appreciation of art. It’s interesting how something written as a list could be so amazing. All the listicles we usually see on the web simply cannot compare with it.

• Talking about artistic sensibilities is a tough job. When you read the essay, you will see how much research, thought and raw intellect came into it. But that’s one of the reasons why people still read it today, even though it was written in 1964.
• You can choose an unorthodox way of expression in the medium for which you produce. For example, Notes on Camp is a listicle – one of the most popular content formats on the web. But in the olden days, it was uncommon to see it in print form.
• Just think about what is camp: “And third among the great creative sensibilities is Camp: the sensibility of failed seriousness, of the theatricalization of experience. Camp refuses both the harmonies of traditional seriousness and the risks of fully identifying with extreme states of feeling”.

28. Ralph Waldo Emerson – Self-Reliance

That’s the oldest one from the lot. Written in 1841, it still inspires generations of people. It will let you understand what it means to be self-made. It contains some of the most memorable quotes of all time. I don’t know why, but this one especially touched me: “Every true man is a cause, a country, and an age; requires infinite spaces and numbers and time fully to accomplish his design, and posterity seems to follow his steps as a train of clients”. Now isn’t it purely individualistic, American thought? Emerson told me (and he will tell you) to do something amazing with my life. The language it contains is a bit archaic, but that just adds to the weight of the argument. You can consider it to be a meeting with a great philosopher who shaped the ethos of the modern United States.

• You can start with a powerful poem that will set the stage for your work.
• Be free in your creative flow. Do not wait for the approval of others: “What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness”.
• Use rhetorical questions to strengthen your argument: “I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do I not know beforehand that not possibly say a new and spontaneous word?”

29. David Foster Wallace – Consider The Lobster

When you want simple field notes about a food festival, you needn’t send there the formidable David Foster Wallace. He sees right through the hypocrisy and cruelty behind killing hundreds of thousands of innocent lobsters – by boiling them alive. This essay uncovers some of the worst traits of modern American people. There are no apologies or hedging one’s bets. There’s just plain truth that stabs you in the eye like a lobster claw. After reading this essay, you may reconsider the whole animal-eating business.

• When it’s important, say it plainly and stagger the reader: “[Lobsters] survive right up until they’re boiled. Most of us have been in supermarkets or restaurants that feature tanks of live lobster, from which you can pick out your supper while it watches you point”.
• In your writing, put exact quotes of the people you’ve been interviewing (including slang and grammatical errors). It makes it more vivid, and interesting.
• You can use humor in serious situations to make your story grotesque.
• Use captions to expound on interesting points of your essay.

30. David Foster Wallace – The Nature of the Fun

The famous novelist and author of the most powerful commencement speech ever done is going to tell you about the joys and sorrows of writing a work of fiction. It’s like taking care of a mutant child that constantly oozes smelly liquids. But you love that child and you want others to love it too. It’s a very humorous account of what it means to be an author. If you ever plan to write a novel, you should read that one. And the story about the Chinese farmer is just priceless.

• Base your point on a chimerical analogy. Here, the writer’s unfinished work is a “hideously damaged infant”.
• Even in expository writing, you may share an interesting story to keep things lively.
• Share your true emotions (even when you think they won’t interest anyone). Often, that’s exactly what will interest the reader.
• Read the whole essay for marvelous advice on writing fiction.

31. Margaret Atwood – Attitude

This is not an essay per se, but I included it on the list for the sake of variety. It was delivered as a commencement speech at The University of Toronto, and it’s about keeping the right attitude. Soon after leaving university, most graduates have to forget about safety, parties, and travel and start a new life – one filled with a painful routine that will last until they drop. Atwood says that you don’t have to accept that. You can choose how you react to everything that happens to you (and you don’t have to stay in that dead-end job for the rest of your days).

• At times, we are all too eager to persuade, but the strongest persuasion is not forceful. It’s subtle. It speaks to the heart. It affects you gradually.
• You may be tempted to talk about a subject by first stating what it is not, rather than what it is. Try to avoid that.
• Simple advice for writers (and life in general): “When faced with the inevitable, you always have a choice. You may not be able to alter reality, but you can alter your attitude towards it”.

32. Jo Ann Beard – The Fourth State of Matter

Read that one as soon as possible. It’s one of the most masterful and impactful essays you’ll ever read. It’s like a good horror – a slow build-up, and then your jaw drops to the ground. To summarize the story would be to spoil it, so I recommend that you just dig in and devour this essay in one sitting. It’s a perfect example of “show, don’t tell” writing, where the actions of characters are enough to create the right effect. No need for flowery adjectives here.

• The best story you will tell is going to come from your personal experience.
• Use mysteries that will nag the reader. For example, at the beginning of the essay, we learn about the “vanished husband” but there’s no explanation. We have to keep reading to get the answer.
• Explain it in simple terms: “You’ve got your solid, your liquid, your gas, and then your plasma”. Why complicate?

33. Terence McKenna – Tryptamine Hallucinogens and Consciousness

To me, Terence McKenna was one of the most interesting thinkers of the twentieth century. His many lectures (now available on YouTube) attracted millions of people who suspect that consciousness holds secrets yet to be unveiled. McKenna consumed psychedelic drugs for most of his life and it shows (in a positive way). Many people consider him a looney, and a hippie, but he was so much more than that. He dared to go into the abyss of his psyche and come back to tell the tale. He also wrote many books (the most famous being Food Of The Gods ), built a huge botanical garden in Hawaii , lived with shamans, and was a connoisseur of all things enigmatic and obscure. Take a look at this essay, and learn more about the explorations of the subconscious mind.

• Become the original thinker, but remember that it may require extraordinary measures: “I call myself an explorer rather than a scientist because the area that I’m looking at contains insufficient data to support even the dream of being a science”.
• Learn new words every day to make your thoughts lucid.
• Come up with the most outlandish ideas to push the envelope of what’s possible. Don’t take things for granted or become intellectually lazy. Question everything.

34. Eudora Welty – The Little Store

By reading this little-known essay, you will be transported into the world of the old American South. It’s a remembrance of trips to the little store in a little town. It’s warm and straightforward, and when you read it, you feel like a child once more. All these beautiful memories live inside of us. They lay somewhere deep in our minds, hidden from sight. The work by Eudora Welty is an attempt to uncover some of them and let you get reacquainted with some smells and tastes of the past.

• When you’re from the South, flaunt it. It’s still good old English but sometimes it sounds so foreign. I can hear the Southern accent too: “There were almost tangible smells – licorice recently sucked in a child’s cheek, dill-pickle brine that had leaked through a paper sack in a fresh trail across the wooden floor, ammonia-loaded ice that had been hoisted from wet Croker sacks and slammed into the icebox with its sweet butter at the door, and perhaps the smell of still-untrapped mice”.
• Yet again, never forget your roots.
• Childhood stories can be the most powerful ones. You can write about how they shaped you.

35. John McPhee – The Search for Marvin Gardens

The Search for Marvin Gardens contains many layers of meaning. It’s a story about a Monopoly championship, but also, it’s the author’s search for the lost streets visible on the board of the famous board game. It also presents a historical perspective on the rise and fall of civilizations, and on Atlantic City, which once was a lively place, and then, slowly declined, the streets filled with dirt and broken windows.

• There’s nothing like irony: “A sign- ‘Slow, Children at Play’- has been bent backward by an automobile”.
• Telling the story in apparently unrelated fragments is sometimes better than telling the whole thing in a logical order.
• Creativity is everything. The best writing may come just from connecting two ideas and mixing them to achieve a great effect. Shush! The muse is whispering.

36. Maxine Hong Kingston – No Name Woman

A dead body at the bottom of the well makes for a beautiful literary device. The first line of Orhan Pamuk’s novel My Name Is Red delivers it perfectly: “I am nothing but a corpse now, a body at the bottom of a well”. There’s something creepy about the idea of the well. Just think about the “It puts the lotion in the basket” scene from The Silence of the Lambs. In the first paragraph of Kingston’s essay, we learn about a suicide committed by uncommon means of jumping into the well. But this time it’s a real story. Who was this woman? Why did she do it? Read the essay.

• Mysterious death always gets attention. The macabre details are like daiquiris on a hot day – you savor them – you don’t let them spill.
• One sentence can speak volumes: “But the rare urge west had fixed upon our family, and so my aunt crossed boundaries not delineated in space”.
• It’s interesting to write about cultural differences – especially if you have the relevant experience. Something normal for us is unthinkable for others. Show this different world.
• The subject of sex is never boring.

37. Joan Didion – On Keeping A Notebook

Slouching Towards Bethlehem is one of the most famous collections of essays of all time. In it, you will find a curious piece called On Keeping A Notebook. It’s not only a meditation about keeping a journal. It’s also Didion’s reconciliation with her past self. After reading it, you will seriously reconsider your life’s choices and look at your life from a wider perspective.

• When you write things down in your journal, be more specific – unless you want to write a deep essay about it years later.
• Use the beauty of the language to relate to the past: “I have already lost touch with a couple of people I used to be; one of them, a seventeen-year-old, presents little threat, although it would be of some interest to me to know again what it feels like to sit on a river levee drinking vodka-and-orange-juice and listening to Les Paul and Mary Ford and their echoes sing ‘How High the Moon’ on the car radio”.
• Drop some brand names if you want to feel posh.

38. Joan Didion – Goodbye To All That

This one touched me because I also lived in New York City for a while. I don’t know why, but stories about life in NYC are so often full of charm and this eerie-melancholy-jazz feeling. They are powerful. They go like this: “There was a hard blizzard in NYC. As the sound of sirens faded, Tony descended into the dark world of hustlers and pimps.” That’s pulp literature but in the context of NYC, it always sounds cool. Anyway, this essay is amazing in too many ways. You just have to read it.

• Talk about New York City. They will read it.
• Talk about the human experience: “It did occur to me to call the desk and ask that the air conditioner be turned off, I never called, because I did not know how much to tip whoever might come—was anyone ever so young?”
• Look back at your life and reexamine it. Draw lessons from it.

39. George Orwell – Reflections on Gandhi

George Orwell could see things as they were. No exaggeration, no romanticism – just facts. He recognized totalitarianism and communism for what they were and shared his worries through books like 1984 and Animal Farm . He took the same sober approach when dealing with saints and sages. Today, we regard Gandhi as one of the greatest political leaders of the twentieth century – and rightfully so. But did you know that when asked about the Jews during World War II, Gandhi said that they should commit collective suicide and that it: “would have aroused the world and the people of Germany to Hitler’s violence.” He also recommended utter pacifism in 1942, during the Japanese invasion, even though he knew it would cost millions of lives. But overall he was a good guy. Read the essay and broaden your perspective on the Bapu of the Indian Nation.

• Share a philosophical thought that stops the reader for a moment: “No doubt alcohol, tobacco, and so forth are things that a saint must avoid, but sainthood is also a thing that human beings must avoid”.
• Be straightforward in your writing – no mannerisms, no attempts to create ‘style’, and no invocations of the numinous – unless you feel the mystical vibe.

40. George Orwell – Politics and the English Language

Let Mr. Orwell give you some writing tips. Written in 1946, this essay is still one of the most helpful documents on writing in English. Orwell was probably the first person who exposed the deliberate vagueness of political language. He was very serious about it and I admire his efforts to slay all unclear sentences (including ones written by distinguished professors). But it’s good to make it humorous too from time to time. My favorite examples of that would be the immortal Soft Language sketch by George Carlin or the “Romans Go Home” scene from Monty Python’s Life of Brian. Overall, it’s a great essay filled with examples from many written materials. It’s a must-read for any writer.

• Listen to the master: “This mixture of vagueness and sheer incompetence is the most marked characteristic of modern English prose.” Do something about it.
• This essay is all about writing better, so go to the source if you want the goodies.

Other Essays You May Find Interesting

The list that I’ve prepared is by no means complete. The literary world is full of exciting essays and you’ll never know which one is going to change your life. I’ve found reading essays very rewarding because sometimes, a single one means more than reading a whole book. It’s almost like wandering around and peeking into the minds of the greatest writers and thinkers that ever lived. To make this list more comprehensive, below I included more essays you may find interesting.

Oliver Sacks – On Libraries

One of the greatest contributors to the knowledge about the human mind, Oliver Sacks meditates on the value of libraries and his love of books.

Noam Chomsky – The Responsibility of Intellectuals

Chomsky did probably more than anyone else to define the role of the intelligentsia in the modern world . There is a war of ideas over there – good and bad – intellectuals are going to be those who ought to be fighting for the former.

Sam Harris – The Riddle of The Gun

Sam Harris, now a famous philosopher and neuroscientist, takes on the problem of gun control in the United States. His thoughts are clear of prejudice. After reading this, you’ll appreciate the value of logical discourse overheated, irrational debate that more often than not has real implications on policy.

Tim Ferriss – Some Practical Thoughts on Suicide

This piece was written as a blog post , but it’s worth your time. The author of the NYT bestseller The 4-Hour Workweek shares an emotional story about how he almost killed himself, and what can you do to save yourself or your friends from suicide.

Edward Said – Reflections on Exile

The life of Edward Said was a truly fascinating one. Born in Jerusalem, he lived between Palestine and Egypt and finally settled down in the United States, where he completed his most famous work – Orientalism. In this essay, he shares his thoughts about what it means to be in exile.

Richard Feynman – It’s as Simple as One, Two, Three…

Richard Feynman is one of the most interesting minds of the twentieth century. He was a brilliant physicist, but also an undeniably great communicator of science, an artist, and a traveler. By reading this essay, you can observe his thought process when he tries to figure out what affects our perception of time. It’s a truly fascinating read.

Rabindranath Tagore – The Religion of The Forest

I like to think about Tagore as my spiritual Friend. His poems are just marvelous. They are like some of the Persian verses that praise love, nature, and the unity of all things. By reading this short essay, you will learn a lot about Indian philosophy and its relation to its Western counterpart.

Richard Dawkins – Letter To His 10-Year-Old Daughter

Every father should be able to articulate his philosophy of life to his children. With this letter that’s similar to what you find in the Paris Review essays , the famed atheist and defender of reason, Richard Dawkins, does exactly that. It’s beautifully written and stresses the importance of looking at evidence when we’re trying to make sense of the world.

Albert Camus – The Minotaur (or, The Stop In Oran)

Each person requires a period of solitude – a period when one’s able to gather thoughts and make sense of life. There are many places where you may attempt to find quietude. Albert Camus tells about his favorite one.

Koty Neelis – 21 Incredible Life Lessons From Anthony Bourdain

I included it as the last one because it’s not really an essay, but I just had to put it somewhere. In this listicle, you’ll find the 21 most original thoughts of the high-profile cook, writer, and TV host, Anthony Bourdain. Some of them are shocking, others are funny, but they’re all worth checking out.

Lucius Annaeus Seneca – On the Shortness of Life

It’s similar to the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam because it praises life. Seneca shares some of his stoic philosophy and tells you not to waste your time on stupidities. Drink! – for once dead you shall never return.

Bertrand Russell – In Praise of Idleness

This old essay is a must-read for modern humans. We are so preoccupied with our work, our phones, and all the media input we drown in our business. Bertrand Russell tells you to chill out a bit – maybe it will do you some good.

James Baldwin – Stranger in the Village

It’s an essay on the author’s experiences as an African-American in a Swiss village, exploring race, identity, and alienation while highlighting the complexities of racial dynamics and the quest for belonging.

Bonus – More writing tips from two great books

The mission to improve my writing skills took me further than just going through the essays. I’ve come across some great books on writing too. I highly recommend you read them in their entirety. They’re written beautifully and contain lots of useful knowledge. Below you’ll find random (but useful) notes that I took from The Sense of Style and On Writing.

The Sense of Style – By Steven Pinker

• Style manuals are full of inconsistencies. Following their advice might not be the best idea. They might make your prose boring.
• Grammarians from all eras condemn students for not knowing grammar. But it just evolves. It cannot be rigid.
• “Nothing worth learning can be taught” – Oscar Wilde. It’s hard to learn to write from a manual – you have to read, write, and analyze.
• Good writing makes you imagine things and feel them for yourself – use word pictures.
• Don’t fear using voluptuous words.
• Phonesthetics – or how the words sound.
• Use parallel language (consistency of tense).
• Good writing finishes strong.
• Write to someone. Never write for no one in mind. Try to show people your view of the world.
• Don’t tell everything you are going to say in summary (signposting) – be logical, but be conversational.
• Don’t be pompous.
• Don’t use quotation marks where they don’t “belong”. Be confident about your style.
• Don’t hedge your claims (research first, and then tell it like it is).
• Avoid clichés and meta-concepts (concepts about concepts). Be more straightforward!
• Not prevention – but prevents or prevented – don’t use dead nouns.
• Be more vivid while using your mother tongue – don’t use passive where it’s not needed. Direct the reader’s gaze to something in the world.
• The curse of knowledge – the reader doesn’t know what you know – beware of that.
• Explain technical terms.
• Use examples when you explain a difficult term.
• If you ever say “I think I understand this” it probably means you don’t.
• It’s better to underestimate the lingo of your readers than to overestimate it.
• Functional fixedness – if we know some object (or idea) well, we tend to see it in terms of usage, not just as an object.
• Use concrete language instead of an abstraction.
• Show your work to people before you publish (get feedback!).
• Wait for a few days and then revise, revise, revise. Think about clarity and the sound of sentences. Then show it to someone. Then revise one more time. Then publish (if it’s to be serious work).
• Look at it from the perspective of other people.
• Omit needless words.
• Put the heaviest words at the end of the sentence.
• It’s good to use the passive, but only when appropriate.
• Check all text for cohesion. Make sure that the sentences flow gently.
• In expository work, go from general to more specific. But in journalism start from the big news and then give more details.
• Use the paragraph break to give the reader a moment to take a breath.
• Use the verb instead of a noun (make it more active) – not “cancellation”, but “canceled”. But after you introduce the action, you can refer to it with a noun.
• Avoid too many negations.
• If you write about why something is so, don’t spend too much time writing about why it is not.

On Writing Well – By William Zinsser

• Writing is a craft. You need to sit down every day and practice your craft.
• You should re-write and polish your prose a lot.
• Throw out all the clutter. Don’t keep it because you like it. Aim for readability.
• Look at the best examples of English literature . There’s hardly any needless garbage there.
• Use shorter expressions. Don’t add extra words that don’t bring any value to your work.
• Don’t use pompous language. Use simple language and say plainly what’s going on (“because” equals “because”).
• The media and politics are full of cluttered prose (because it helps them to cover up for their mistakes).
• You can’t add style to your work (and especially, don’t add fancy words to create an illusion of style). That will look fake. You need to develop a style.
• Write in the “I” mode. Write to a friend or just for yourself. Show your personality. There is a person behind the writing.
• Choose your words carefully. Use the dictionary to learn different shades of meaning.
• Remember about phonology. Make music with words .
• The lead is essential. Pull the reader in. Otherwise, your article is dead.
• You don’t have to make the final judgment on any topic. Just pick the right angle.
• Do your research. Not just obvious research, but a deep one.
• When it’s time to stop, stop. And finish strong. Think about the last sentence. Surprise them.
• Use quotations. Ask people. Get them talking.
• If you write about travel, it must be significant to the reader. Don’t bother with the obvious. Choose your words with special care. Avoid travel clichés at all costs. Don’t tell that the sand was white and there were rocks on the beach. Look for the right detail.
• If you want to learn how to write about art, travel, science, etc. – read the best examples available. Learn from the masters.
• Concentrate on one big idea (“Let’s not go peeing down both legs”).
• “The reader has to feel that the writer is feeling good.”
• One very helpful question: “What is the piece really about?” (Not just “What the piece is about?”)

Now immerse yourself in the world of essays

By reading the essays from the list above, you’ll become a better writer , a better reader, but also a better person. An essay is a special form of writing. It is the only literary form that I know of that is an absolute requirement for career or educational advancement. Nowadays, you can use an AI essay writer or an AI essay generator that will get the writing done for you, but if you have personal integrity and strong moral principles, avoid doing this at all costs. For me as a writer, the effect of these authors’ masterpieces is often deeply personal. You won’t be able to find the beautiful thoughts they contain in any other literary form. I hope you enjoy the read and that it will inspire you to do your writing. This list is only an attempt to share some of the best essays available online. Next up, you may want to check the list of magazines and websites that accept personal essays .

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Could a video game developer win the Nobel Prize for Literature?

Profesor de Humanidades, IE University

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Andrés Porras Chaves does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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In October 2016, the Swedish Academy announced that it was awarding the Nobel prize for Literature to the singer-songwriter Bob Dylan for “having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition”. The decision sent out shockwaves: for the first time, a musician had received the most prestigious literary award on the planet. It sparked debate , with many questioning the decision and even sarcastic suggestions that novelists could aspire to winning a Grammy.

The controversy fed into much needed debates on the boundary between poetry and song, but the question of what constitutes literature is much broader. Does it mean the same as it did in 1901, when the first Nobel prize for literature was awarded?

High and low culture

These questions date back far beyond 2016. In the late 1950s, a group of professors from the University of Birmingham founded a new interdisciplinary area of study, called cultural studies , in order to ask new questions: What was the role of TV and other mass media in cultural development? Is there a justification for distinguishing high and low culture? What is the relationship between culture and power?

These questions are all still relevant to current debates around literature. Often, the word “literary” is a status symbol, a seal of approval to distinguish “high” culture from more vulgar or less valuable “low” forms of culture. Comics, for example, were not invited to join the club until recently, thanks in part to a rebranding under the more respectable guise of “graphic novels”.

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, literature displays “excellence of form or expression and expressing ideas of permanent or universal interest”. It seems that an artist like Bob Dylan can take home the Nobel prize thanks to literature’s defining feature of “excellence of form or expression”, which is not strictly limited to the written word.

But how do we account for other language-based forms of expression? If performed works such as theatre or songwriting can be considered literature, where is the limit?

Word play: text-based video games

According to data from video game data consultancy Newzoo , more than 3 billion people play video games worldwide – almost half of the world’s population. In Spain alone, 77% of young people play videogames , making them a massively relevant form of culture. But what does this have to do with “excellence of form or expression”? To answer this question we have to look back several decades.

When the first video games were developed in the 1950s, two distinct genres emerged: one was action oriented (such as the pioneering 1958 game Tennis for Two ), and the other more text based. The original written games, known as “ interactive fiction ”, were made up exclusively of text, and the player’s job was to read and make decisions that would determine the game’s outcome using a keyboard.

The inclusion of images in adventure games would not arrive until 1980, when Mystery House became the first “graphic adventure” game. These would reach their heyday in the 1990s: famous examples include the first two Monkey Island games (1990, 1991), Day of the Tentacle (1993), Full Throttle (1995), and Grim Fandango (1998), though there were many others. Despite technological advances, these games inherited several features from interactive fiction, including the predominant role of text.

The experience of playing one of these titles is not so different from that of a book: reading, pauses, the possibility of backtracking, and so on. The player spends most of their time in dialogue with various characters in search of information, stories, or even banter and jokes that are irrelevant to the game’s progress, much like footnotes or subplots.

Several classic adventure games even have direct links to literature: The Abbey of Crime (1987) is a Spanish adaptation of Umberto Eco’s The Name of the Rose , while the legendary insult sword fighting of The Secret of Monkey Island was written by science fiction author Orson Scott Card . In Myst (1993), the gameplay itself revolves around two books.

Literature on the screen: “story-rich” games

In more recent years, a new sub-genre of adventure games – known as “story-rich” games – has become popular thanks to independent creators and producers. In Papers, Please (2013), a border policeman in a fictional dictatorial regime deals with terrible moral dilemmas on a daily basis. In Firewatch (2016), players take the role of a forest ranger who investigates a conspiracy by walkie-talkie. In Return of the Obra Dinn (2018), the player must reconstruct a tragedy on the high seas with the help of an incomplete book and a peculiar compass. In all these cases, gameplay and visuals take a back seat to strong narratives.

A quintessential example is The Stanley Parable (2011), where the player takes the role of a worker in a strangely deserted office. They have to explore several corridors while trying unsuccessfully to interact with their surroundings, accompanied by the voice of an enigmatic narrator. Upon reaching a room with two open doors, the voiceover states that Stanley “entered the door on his left”.

The player can choose to follow the instructions or disobey, provoking the wrath of the narrator much like in the denouement of Miguel de Unamuno’s 1914 novel Fog , where the main character speaks directly to the author.

Each decision then opens up new paths leading to dozens of possible endings, similar to a “choose your own adventure” book. Its fragmentary and disordered story – as well as its playful spirit – is reminiscent of Julio Cortázar’s 1963 novel Hopscotch . The experience of playing the game is marked by postmodern literary features – as described by critics like Mikhail Bakhtin or Linda Hutcheon – including metafiction, intertextuality and parody.

One of its creators – Davey Wreden, a critical studies graduate – also created The Beginner’s Guide (2015), a game in which the player moves through levels of failed video games to learn more about their mysterious creator. In one, the player’s task consists solely of wandering through a virtual cave reading the countless comments left there by other frustrated players.

In recent years, the genre of digital or electronic literature has emerged, including books with QR codes, works that can only be read with virtual reality headsets, poetry collections published as apps, and so on. These works are fundamentally based on language, begging the question of why video games cannot also fit into this category.

This debate takes on added relevance today, as digital formats are having an undeniable impact on our reading habits. Just as today we accept oral cultures or popular music as literature, perhaps one day we will do the same with interactive stories like The Stanley Parable . Writing has always tried to break away from established ideas, and we know that literature is not limited to words on paper. Sometimes it pays to disobey the voice in our heads and walk through the door on the right, the one that leads to new, unexplored possibilities.

This article was originally published in Spanish

• Nobel Prize
• Video games
• Nobel Prize for Literature
• The Conversation Europe

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What was Trump found guilty of? See the 34 business records the jury decided he falsified

Donald Trump was found guilty of 34 felony counts of falsifying business records after prosecutors successfully convinced a jury he disguised hush money reimbursement as legal expenses. He is the first former president to be convicted of a crime.

Each count is tied to a different business record that prosecutors demonstrated Trump is responsible for changing to conceal or commit another crime .

Those records include 11 checks paid to former lawyer Michael Cohen , 11 invoices from Michael Cohen and 12 entries in Trump's ledgers.

The jury found that Trump authorized a plan to reimburse Cohen for the $130,000 hush money payment issued to Stormy Daniels and spread the payments across 12 months disguised as legal expenses.

Live updates: Former President Donald Trump found guilty on all counts in hush money case

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Breakdown of 34 counts of falsifying business records

Here are the 34 business records Trump was found guilty of falsifying, as described in Judge Juan Merchan 's jury instructions :

• Count 1: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Feb. 14, 2017
• Count 2: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust dated Feb. 14, 2017
• Count 3: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust dated Feb. 14, 2017
• Count 4: A Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust Account check and check stub dated Feb. 14, 2017
• Count 5: Michael Cohen's invoice dated March 16, 2017
• Count 6: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for the Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust dated March 17, 2017
• Count 7: A Donald J. Trump Revocable Trust Account check and check stub dated March 17, 2017
• Count 8: Michael Cohen's invoice dated April 13, 2017
• Count 9: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated June 19, 2017
• Count 10: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated June 19, 2017
• Count 11: Michael Cohen's invoice dated May 22, 2017
• Count 12: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated May 22, 2017
• Count 13: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub May 23, 2017
• Count 14: Michael Cohen's invoice dated June 16, 2017
• Count 15: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated June 19, 2017
• Count 16: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated June 19, 2017
• Count 17: Michael Cohen's invoice dated July 11, 2017
• Count 18: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated July 11, 2017
• Count 19: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated July 11, 2017
• Count 20: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Aug. 1, 2017
• Count 21: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated Aug. 1, 2017
• Count 22: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated Aug. 1, 2017
• Count 23: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Sept. 11, 2017
• Count 24: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated Sept. 11, 2017
• Count 25: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated Sept. 12, 2017
• Count 26: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Oct. 18, 2017
• Count 27: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated Oct. 18, 2017
• Count 28: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated Oct. 18, 2017
• Count 29: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Nov. 20, 2017
• Count 30: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated Nov. 20, 2017
• Count 31: A Donald J. Trump account check and check stub dated Nov. 21, 2017
• Count 32: Michael Cohen's invoice dated Dec. 1, 2017
• Count 33: Entry in the Detail General Ledger for Donald J. Trump dated Dec. 1, 2017
• Count 34: A check and check stub dated Dec. 5 2017

Jurors saw copies of these records entered as evidence. Evidence from the entire trial is available on the New York Courts website .

Contributing: Aysha Bagchi

Gamma - PS 1 Game Emulator 4+

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The famous Play Station 1 game emulator! The best PS 1 emulator is right here! You heard about Gamma, now see for yourself. Gamma is a fully featured video game console emulator. Gamma has the best looking user interface, complete with instant cover artwork, custom controller skins, previews, save state syncing, and more! It's easy to use and fun to play! Featuring: Graphically superior: - Renders at the highest resolution File support: - CUE+BIN support - CHD, PBP, ISO, MDS, and more! Hardware Controller Support: - Supports your favorite console and PC bluetooth & MFi game controllers. - Bluetooth & wired keyboards are also supported! Sync: - Use your favorite backup services to sync your files. - Automatically backs up your save states. Import options: - From your browser - From your desktop, just drag and drop Save States: - Save and load a game at any point. - Automatically save your progress. Controller Skins: - Comes with well-crafted portrait and landscape controllers. - Create your own controller skins. Game Cover Artwork: - Sets your game cover artwork to your titles. Thank you for 15 years of your support! *Gamma is in no way affiliated with Sony. The name "Sony" and all their associated video game console names are registered trademarks of Sony Corporation.*

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Guest Essay

Will Roy Cohn Save Donald Trump’s Hide One Last Time?

By Kai Bird

Mr. Bird is the director of the Leon Levy Center for Biography. He is working on a biography of Roy Cohn.

Sitting still for hours on end in a chilly, drab courtroom, unable to speak his mind, forced to listen to people say objectionable things about him, Donald Trump at a defense table in Manhattan’s Criminal Court may seem as far from his usual domain — the cheering crowds and the trappings of wealth — as could be imagined.

But it was in another courthouse just down the street that Mr. Trump’s wily mentor, Roy Cohn, pulled off one of his greatest legal feats. It was Mr. Cohn who taught Mr. Trump how to manipulate the law, and other people, to his advantage. His ghost now hovers over the former president’s entire legal outlook, influencing proceedings in ways large and small. The outcome in this case may be the final verdict on Mr. Cohn’s brilliant, sinister strategies.

Mr. Trump always admired Mr. Cohn’s bravado and belligerence; Mr. Cohn’s whole worldview seemed to validate the young developer’s crassest instincts. “If you need somebody to get vicious,” Mr. Trump once said, “hire Roy Cohn.” His legal strategy boiled down to: Delay and deny. Don’t hesitate to attack the judge and prosecutor (“I don’t care what the law is; tell me who the judge is” was his most famous line). Address the press every chance you get. And intimidate and ridicule witnesses.

Mr. Trump’s lawyers have aggressively sought every delay possible and called for mistrials or new judges on a regular basis. Of the four criminal proceedings Mr. Trump faces, the one wrapping up now is probably the only case that will be heard before Election Day — and if Mr. Trump wins a second term, all bets are off. He attacked Justice Juan Merchan and witnesses so many times that he has been placed under gag orders — and then fined, when he repeatedly failed to honor them. And as for litigating a case through the media, Mr. Trump went Mr. Cohn one better: He founded his own social media organization, Truth Social, and litigates his cases there.

In the Manhattan case, the defense attorney Todd Blanche went for the jugular when cross-examining Mr. Trump’s former fixer, Michael Cohen, shouting , “The jury doesn’t want to hear what you think happened!” and invoking a disparaging remark that Mr. Cohen had made — about Mr. Blanche himself — with such fidelity that Justice Merchan rebuked him for his profanity. Later, the attorney Susan Necheles sought to shame Stormy Daniels, a porn star, accusing her of “selling” herself and having “a lot of experience making phony stories about sex appear to be real.”

Most recently we learned that the former president would not be taking the witness stand and exposing himself to cross-examination, choosing instead to let a stream of prominent Republicans visitors make his case for him on the courthouse steps. That is the strategy that Mr. Cohn lived by.

Roy Cohn was indicted four times by Manhattan’s legendary prosecutor Robert Morgenthau. “I said to him, ‘Roy, just tell me one thing,’” Mr. Trump wrote in “The Art of the Deal.” “‘Did you really do all that stuff?’ He looked at me and smiled. ‘What the hell do you think?’ he said. I never really knew.” The most notorious of these cases involved charges of conspiracy, extortion, blackmail and bribing a former city appraiser inside the Foley Square courthouse. The trial dragged on for 11 weeks.

Mr. Cohn filed a formal affidavit of prejudice against the judge, asking him to recuse himself from the case. Mr. Cohn also claimed that the indictment should be dismissed because it was the result of a “personal vendetta” against him by Mr. Morgenthau. Both motions were denied, but they served to delay the prosecution’s case.

On Dec. 8, 1969, the last day of the proceedings, Mr. Cohn’s lawyer, Joseph Brill, was about to make his summation when he complained of chest pains and was rushed to a hospital. The court adjourned, not knowing what would happen next.

The following afternoon, Mr. Cohn, dressed in a monogrammed shirt and a dark-blue suit with thin stripes, astonished the judge and prosecutors by announcing that he was prepared to make his own summation.

It was an ingenious strategy that in effect allowed him to testify on his own behalf — which he had avoided doing — without having to submit to a cross-examination.

He spoke, brilliantly and without notes, for an hour that day, then for an extraordinary seven hours the next day. Peter King, who would go on to serve as a member of New York’s congressional delegation, was there as a young lawyer in Mr. Cohn’s firm. “It was effective, low-key,” he told me last week. “It was emotional, but in a quiet way. No histrionics. He was like the ultimate perfect summation.” By the end, one female juror was weeping , overcome with emotion.

It took the jury a mere four hours to declare him not guilty. Mr. Cohn turned to the assembled reporters and said simply, “God bless America.”

Mr. Trump has found his own ways to communicate to the jury without submitting to cross-examination, closing his eyes to shut out testimony he cannot abide and even audibly cursing at one point while Stormy Daniels was on the stand.

Of all the lessons Mr. Trump learned from his mentor, the value of treating people transactionally may have been the most important. The former president has run through countless lawyers in his decades of legal proceedings. Many were discarded. Some were not paid. But he held Mr. Cohn in high regard and took his lessons to heart. In 1981, he gave his mentor a pair of huge diamond cuff links as a gesture of profound gratitude. Years later, a friend of Mr. Cohn’s had them appraised. They were worthless fakes.

Kai Bird is the director of the Leon Levy Center for Biography and a co-author with Martin J. Sherwin of “American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer.” He is working on a biography of Roy Cohn.

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