Stuff REALLY Old People Said
"I was born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and about twelve miles from Easton, in Talbot county, Maryland."
Frederick Douglass
In this book, a man escapes slavery and works to liberate his people.
The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
This is the minimum number of "so what" moments a college essay should have.
Miller didn’t just write The Crucible to criticize McCarthyism—he wrote it to confess his own guilt over betraying others and to flirt with martyrdom in the safest way possible: through historical allegory.
Biographical
“Can’t repeat the past?…Why of course you can!”
Gatsby (The Great Gatsby)
"There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly."
Henry David Thoreau
A man watches as his neighbor pursues the man's married cousin.
The Great Gatsby
This is the number of core values your college essay should include.
4-5
Daisy isn’t shallow—she’s surviving. Her voice “full of money” is weaponized femininity, a siren call forged in patriarchy that turns Gatsby into a willing sacrifice.
Gender
"The Constitution was not written for us. We know that."
Thurgood Marshall (in Marshall)
"I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me."
Ralph Waldo Emerson
A bunch of people freaked out about a bonfire party some random girls had in the woods.
The Crucible
This is the name of the College Essay Guy, who wrote the yellow books.
Ethan Sawyer
Douglass follows the Hero’s Journey to the letter—but unlike Odysseus or Moses, his epic ends not with divine favor, but with the terrifying responsibility of narrating freedom to a nation that still isn’t ready.
Archetypal
"I say--I say--God is dead!"
John Proctor (The Crucible)
"I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!"
Patrick Henry
Who wrote The Crucible?
Arthur Miller
How many personal statement prompts exist on the Common App?
6 (7 including the create-your-own)
Douglass’s trauma isn’t just personal—it’s generational. The brutal erasure of his mother and unknown father creates a psychic wound that drives his obsessive pursuit of self-definition.
Psychoanalytic
"We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race, and the human race is filled with passion. But poetry, romance, love, beauty? These are what we stay alive for!"
Mr. Keating (Dead Poets Society)
Hear me, my chiefs, my heart is sick and sad. From where the sun now stands I will fight no more against the white man.
Chief Joesph
What were the memoir options?
Crying in H-Mart
The Glass Castle
Miseducated
Honors: Being Heumann and A Place Called Home
Name at least three out of the four topics that I told you are overdone. (Remember, you can write about them, but you need to avoid cliches and have good so-whats.)
1. Sports, 2. Travel, 3. Volunteering, 4. Death/Loss/Tragedy
The witch trials aren’t about hysteria—they’re about real estate: this is a land grab disguised as spiritual warfare, and everyone’s just using God as a loophole.
Sociological
"The American dream [is] that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for every man, with opportunity for each according to his ability or achievement."
James Truslow Adams