What makes an essay an essay?  For me, it’s the thinking work – the way the writer does more than just tell a story but uses that story to (as Andre Aciman says) speculate, explore, propose, and reconsider some kind of thought, argument, or idea. In this session we’ll discuss the difference between memoir and essay, examine the way different essayists think on the page, and then do a few exercises to spark some thinking work of our own.