Essay Test: Home, Heart, Hearth

The following essay was submitted to the essay prompt: describe the world you are from.

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Louisa

Summer in Louisa is a lazy, Faulknerian season, loud with rolls of thunder as imposing as the voice of God. In the fall, gunshots of hunters boom from behind my bedroom window; in winter, they are silenced in small part due to state regulation, but it’s mostly the muffling effects of snowfall. In the spring, clouds like flayed salmon-bellies coast across the dimming Virginia sky.  Between my home and I-64 is a lumber mill that reeks at night of cedar and a gamy pestilence.

Across from the mill, a gravel driveway that leads to an unkempt double-wide is marked by a state sign that reads ‘Misery Road.’ Go a few miles up to find Louisa County High. Their mascot is the lion, and, every year during the homecoming game, they bring a downtrodden African lion onto the field. During the off-season, the lion is kept in a barn and satiated on juicy t-bone steaks from the local Wal-Mart, located at Louisa’s main drag - Zion Crossroads. Local lore used to have it if you went there at midnight, you found yourself face to face with Beelzebub. Nowadays, you’d just find yourself face to face with a strip mall and a couple of gas stations.

My hometown is its own brand of wild. Here, houses burn to the ground not because of Absalom, Absalom!’s Clytie, but because of crystal meth labs. Here, residents still wonder how the South could have lost the Civil War. It is in this nescience that I pluck stories like seeds from the cornfields. I plant them in the red dirt so that they may lean towards the light.

If you had to rate this essay from 1-5 with 5 being the best what rating would you give and why?

How old is the person who wrote this essay? What makes you think so?

Is the writer male or female? What race is this student? What is the socio-economic background? Do these questions matter? If you had this information first would it alter your reading of the essay? Should it?

What personal character traits do you attribute to the writer of this essay?

Does this essay help predict success in a highly selective college? Why or why not?

                                                       Faulkner Nobel Prize Speech

Would an essay like this convince you to admit this student over others who might have a higher rank in class? Why or why not?

How important are essays in the overall evaluation of students to selective colleges and universities? How important should they be?

If you are currently a student would you want this writer as a roommate? Why or why not?

If you are a parent of a student would you want your son or daughter to have this writer as a roommate? Why or why not?

If you are an educator would you want this student in your class? Why or why not?