Essays
Given that it's been over a year since I actually wrote these essays and posted the images, I guess it's time for me to make a webpage, if a mediocre one, for the images. In 2000, near the end of my junior year of high school, I took a course on the history of the Vietnam war and modern American foreign policy. A fellow student, when asked to describe my participation in the class, replied "participation? No, he doesn't exactly participate, he usually just sits there and mutters to himself. Sometimes he drinks coffee. But that's it." I did, however, manage to express myself creatively in this class through the use of essays.
(Note that this page contains quite a few images, of fairly high resolution, so it may end up taking some time to load. One day I'll get around to shrinking the file sizes a bit.)
Napkins
The first of these essays was an essay about the controversy over the existence of MIAs in Vietnam. However, I was sitting in the cafeteria while working on it and didn't want to get up to find some paper, so I grabbed a stack of napkins, unfolded them, and started writing. The essay covered three napkins by the time it was complete. I learned that it's quite painful to write an entire essay by hand, especially if your skill at handwriting is as pitiful as mine. Also, napkins tend to tear when written on if unfolded too much. Alas, this work was lost before I could take a picture of it.
Paper plates
Having completed an essay written on napkins, the obvious question (for someone as crazy as I am) was then to determine what my next essay would be written on. And then someone found a bunch of paper plates lying around in the theater...
The essay, which analyzed the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was a total of three plates long, double-sided.
You can even see that my teacher read and graded it:
Paper cups
By the time I wrote this essay, I'd heard the teacher say that some of my arguments didn't hold water. There seemed to be only one solution to this problem: to write my next essay on paper cups. My chemistry teacher, a true evil genius himself, suggested that it'd be much more interesting if I were to write on the inside of the cups. By slicing the cup and otherwise dissecting it, I was able to write on the inside with a permanent pen, then reassemble the cup.
(Sorry about the quality of these pictures; I discovered after I'd taken them that the camera I borrowed must have been broken, as it took quite blurry pictures.)
The essay was, in total, 72 ounces long - a half gallon. It was written on 10-ounce paper coffee cups.
I then filled the essay with water. Fortunately, it didn't leak, since I sealed the seam and the bottom with hot glue; I was a bit worried that the water would ruin the writing, but it fortunately didn't. Note my cup of coffee next to the essay - I'd considered filling the essay with coffee, but it's a bit harder to find a half gallon of coffee than a half gallon of water.
The writing on this cup (number 5) probably isn't visible in this picture, but it begins with "Unlike this essay, Wallace's arguments do not hold water":
I then wandered into my class and proclaimed "I now give you an essay that holds water":
Various students gathered around as the teacher stared at the essay wondering how he was supposed to grade it. Eventually he decided to slice the cups open to read it.
It was a triumph of the human spirit.
Other ideas
I had a few other ideas that I wanted to try for future essays. Unfortunately, the teacher unexpectedly decided to (or was forced to) take a sabbatical, so I didn't get a chance to take his class the next year. Maybe some day I'll get to use these...
- An essay written on a t-shirt. Ideally, I would then be able to convince the teacher to wear it.
- Given that the teacher was also the basketball coach, an essay on a basketball would be interesting. But a spherical essay might pose a few problems.
- An essay could be printed out, affixed to some relatively hard backing like wood or maybe cardboard, then cut into a jigsaw puzzle. It'd have to be assembled in order to be read.
- An essay written on a balloon would have to be inflated before it could be read. Would it also have to recieve an inflated grade?
- This teacher once refused to assign an essay for a few weeks because of a rumor - entirely unfounded, I insist - that I was going to spray-paint my next essay on his car.
- Someone also suggested that I write an essay on his parking space with salami fat. I won't even comment on that one.
- That Great Dome at MIT has possibilities, I think. ;)
An epilogue
My essay-writing ended up being mentioned by my school's headmaster when I was given an award at graduation for my 'unique and creative approach to learning'. This strikes me as especially amusing considering that the previous school would have tried to kick me out for such bits of creativity. So, when in doubt, write an essay on the inside of a paper cup - it does pay off. *grin*
