<p>UChicago's "uncommon application" is now available with its noted, or perhaps notorious, essays. Here are this year's prompts. They look like fun, but since Chicago puts a great deal of weight on its essays (and in combination with Chicago's other two essays) I'm sure they will produce a certain amount of angst as well.</p>
<p>Essay Option 1
The instructor said,
Go home and write
a page tonight.
And let that page come out of you
Then, it will be true.
Theme for English B by Langston Hughes </p>
<p>Perhaps you recognize this poem. If you do, then your mind has probably moved on to the question the next line poses: I wonder if its that simple? Saying who we are is never simple (read the entire poem if you need evidence of that). Write a truthful page about yourself for us, an audience you do not knowa very tall order. Hughes begins: I am twenty-two, colored, born in Winston-Salem./ I went to school there, then Durham, then here/to this college on the hill above Harlem./I am the only colored student in my class. That is, each of us is of a certain age and of a particular family background. We have lived somewhere and been schooled. We are each what we feel and see and hear. Begin there and see what happens. </p>
<p>Essay Option 2
University of Chicago alumna and renowned author/critic Susan Sontag said, The only interesting answers are those that destroy the questions. We all have heard serious questions, absurd questions, and seriously absurd questions, some of which cannot be answered without obliterating the very question. Destroy a question with your answer.
Inspired by Aleksandra Ciric, Oyster Bay High School, Oyster Bay, New York </p>
<p>Essay Option 3
(Printed Calligraphy) means mind that does not stick. Zen Master Shoitsu (120280) </p>
<p>Essay Option 4
Superstring theory has revolutionized speculation about the physical world by suggesting that strings play a pivotal role in the universe. Strings, however, always have explained or enriched our lives, from Theseuss escape route from the Labyrinth, to kittens playing with balls of yarn, to the single hair that held the sword above Damocles, to the basic awfulness of string cheese, to the Old Norse tradition that ones life is a thread woven into a tapestry of fate, to the beautiful sounds of the finely tuned strings of a violin, to the childrens game of cats cradle, to the concept of stringing someone along. Use the power of string to explain the biggest or the smallest phenomenon.
Inspired by Adam Sobolweski, Pittsford Mendon High School, Pittsford, New York </p>
<p>Essay Option 5
Take as a model the students who inspired Options 2 and 4 as you pose and respond to an uncommon prompt of your own. If your prompt is original and thoughtful, then you should have little trouble writing a great essay. Draw on your best qualities as a writer, thinker, visionary, social critic, sage, sensible woman or man, citizen of the world, or future citizen of the University of Chicago; take a little risk and have fun.</p>