Writing the 
Essay of Place

The quotations at the top of each page are from A Few Miles Short of Wisdom," by Kim Stafford (from Having Everything Right, Confluence Press, © 1986).

What about the Little Big Horn Battlefield? Chief Charlo's grave? The camping spot on Lolo Creek that Lewis and Clark called Travelers' Rest? Your favorite summer swimming hole?

Some "places" are really no place. That is, we pass them without seeing them. When we are there they have no meaning for us. We don't remember them when we are gone. But other places are part of the landscapes in our minds. When we are homesick, we remember them. Sometimes we feel an urge to go to them. When we think of important events, times full of life, we see in our minds the places where they occurred, which are inseparable from what happened.

Other places are storied with events of national significance, so the entire country remembers important events by remembering the place where they occurred. Gettysburg. Wounded Knee. Pearl Harbor. Thousands of people visit such places so that they can forge a personal connection with events that matter. At such places, monuments and signs and plaques usually re-tell the story.

And yet other places have more personal meaning. The place where a brother died, or the place where a friend shared a secret, or the place where you thought through a hard problem and decided to change your life. In these places, no memorials make the story public, but the story is real and important, nonetheless.

For this essay, you can choose to explore either a public place with which you want to have a better connection, or you can explore a personal place, to which you want to give a richer and deeper reality.

In your journal, make a list of places you may want to write about. Maybe a place where something important to you or your family has happened:

Does your family have a special place it goes for picnics or reunions?

Is there a place where you had an important conversation with a friend?

Is there a place where something traumatic happened to you?

Do you know where, exactly, your parents got married or got engaged?

Do you know where the first members of your family to come to this town slept the first night they got here?

Is there a special place you go with friends to be happy together?

Or maybe a place where something happened that changed your town or state or nation:

Are there places nearby where something of historical significance to the state or nation happened.

Are there places that are the subjects of debates today about what is going to happen to them?

Are there places that have cultural significance to groups who live in your community?

Don't pick a place that is completely private, about which you won't be able to gather any history or other people's stories.

You are going to write an essay that tells the story of one visit to the place you have chosen.

Writing Assignment

 When you have chosen a place that you want to write about. In a few paragraphs, say what meaning the place has for you right now, what seems important about it.

Include a narrative of one visit you made to this place, what happened on that visit, and how the trip made you feel.

Begin by telling us how you get to this place: what you see, what you hear, what you smell, and how you feel.

It would be best if this were a place that you will be able to visit as you work on your essay.

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