我低了一下头，通过那个低矮的门框，并且眨了一下眼睛，以适应洞穴似的小屋里那昏暗灯光。所有一切就像阴影下的梦境一般，无意识地萦绕于脑海，让人挥之不去，但是它们又莫名其妙地开始散开，只是在人醒后，变得却更加清晰。进到屋子后，我逐渐能够看清，此时，我注意到一个在灰暗灯光下坐着的人影，但我很难分辨，他近在眼前，还是在一个遥不可及的世界。
我渐渐靠近这个身影，我知道他已然感到我的存在，但依旧忙于自己的事情，想来是想要等到我走得近些，直到看到我熟悉的脸庞。然后，他将头从膝盖上的画板挪开，抬起来，用暗淡柔软的目光望向我这边，冲我微笑的同时，用听不太清的西班牙语向我致谢。我好奇地研究着这张脸，很明显，他不过30岁，但却像经过多年沧桑一般，脸上已爬满皱纹。仿佛他黯淡的表情，让我穿过时空隧道，来到了尊贵的阿兹特克人的领袖面前。
我来到这片土地体验不同的文化，学习另一种外语，遇到了陌生的人们。我来到他的小工作室里，就像一帘白色画布：他注意到这帘画布，在上面描绘，像是在描绘马上就要发生的事情。他轻轻地将画笔从手边的颜料盘里拿起来，在画布上热情地挥洒。我知道他在为我开始描绘新作品。过了一会儿，他小心翼翼地递给我一幅画，并且将描绘这幅画的颜料盘和画笔一起递给我。我离开他满是昏暗小屋，开始用他交给我的画笔，描绘属于我的世界。
他的眼睛后面隐藏着深深的回忆。他曾经向我低调地炫耀着他的子民。再次细数着在这场革命里的挣扎与抗争，在墨西哥恰帕斯州边境的反抗。他曾向我描述，他及其家人如何受到当地政府的压迫，字里行间流露出一丝希望。
我们整整一天都在坐着欣赏写生簿，他一边看着我，一边用听不太清楚的西班牙语自言自语：即使事情没有变，即使没有充满希望，他始终相信总有一些东西是政府无法抢走的，这些东西，直到他用尽最后一丝力气，才可能幻灭。心灵是属于自己的，他想要用艺术作品来呈现内心所想。
我的思绪又飘回那间小屋，闪烁的昏暗灯光下出现这样的画面：柔软的灯光撒下，缄默的墙壁上任意而无尽的身影凌乱，真理轰鸣，面对面的两个身影，相距数英尺时空的距离，数年的阅历，就这样，慢慢地走近，慢慢的交织在了一起。
分析
这篇ESSAY，作者无需开门见山的告诉读者发生了什么。尽管Tessler有时还是会用一些老生常谈，但他在写作上很有技巧，并将这些技巧和才能，毫无保留地展现，神秘而有力。这篇ESSAY注定不是一篇平庸的作品，而是像极了一幅艺术作品在展示，颜色、影像的细致描述，是看到的，还是照片，让人难以分辨，而且不惧深入挖掘的作品。
这篇ESSAY里面，彰显作者写作功底的某些微妙情节，产生了一些神秘色彩，很容易让读者混淆。如第一段中写道“clouded dream”，甚至Tessler自己都难以分辨，到底是现实，还是梦境。最后一段中，他将意识从自己身上分离开来，并将其用在第三者身上。这样，他将读者完全封闭在自己的想象中。这个故事完全不同于大多数申请文书，会给招生官留下深刻的印象。
然而，在饱受褒奖的同时，一些读者，可能会认为这种像谜一样的文学作品太过极端。一些基本的问题都让人难以琢磨，比如，Tessler身在何处？在和谁交流？这些都不清楚。而且倘若作者不在作品中将写作风格和想象很好呈现的话，这篇ESSAY主题是有偏颇的。这可能就是为什么招生官在看过这篇ESSAY之后，留下的只有疑惑，这篇ESSAY到底在讲什么，而不是对其写作能力的夸奖和赞扬。
幸运的是，大部分读者，读罢这篇文章，是非常满意的，尤其是对其标新立异的风格。然而，这种风格，又让读者稍有疑惑，这样的写法是不建议的。若读者是疑惑的，则罪魁祸首还在于标新立异的写作风格；若读者并未感到疑惑，则注定这篇文章是Tessler被录取的加分项。
英文原版ESSAY赏析
ESSAY26：“Entering a Shaded World”
-- by Ezra S. Tessler
Bending my head to pass through the low doorway I blinked deliberately, allowing my eyes to adjust to the dim light of the cavernous room. Everything was a clouded dream, one that you are unable to disentangle as it spins through your unconscious, but which somehow begins to unravel and become clearer only after you have awakened. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness into which I had just entered, I caught sight of the seated figure illuminated by the dim light. I was unable to tell if he was miles away in my world or inches away in a distant world.
I approached the dark figure, knowing that his eyes had felt my presence but were occupied and could wait to meet my nearing figure with a familiar face. Then, he raised his head slowly from the drawing in his lap, his soft dark eyes focusing on mine as he gave a slight nod and a gentle smile, acknowledging me with a few muffled words in Spanish. I studied the face and noticed the subtle details. He was barely thirty, but his face was creased with lines of struggle, pressed into a clay mask by many hard years. His dark countenance transported me through time to a place where I stood in front of a noble Aztec leader.
I had come to this land to experience a different culture, to learn a foreign language, and to encounter new people. I had arrived in his studio like a blank canvas: he had found it, stretched it, and prepared it for the transformation that would soon take place. With a gentle hand he had lifted his paintbrush from his palette, and passionately sweeping his brush across the canvas, he had created a new composition in me. He then carefully handed me the new painting, and with it, his palette and paintbrush, still holding the paint he had used. I left containing the shades of his world and holding the tools needed to face my world.
His eyes shaded by memory., he had told me with humble pride the stories of his people. He had recounted his struggles his fighting in the revolution, and his combat in the countryside of Chiapas. He had described the oppression he and his family had suffered from the government, all with the gentle breeze of hope blowing through his words.
He had looked at me one day as we both sat hunched over our sketchbooks, and whispered in his lingering Spanish a single thought: even if things did not change, even if his hope was not fulfilled, he still had something that no government could take away, something that was his own and would wither away only after he had breathed his last breath. His soul was his, and he wanted to share it through his artwork.
My mind floated back into the cave, where it blinked, rubbed its eyes, and soared above the scene. The scene had two figures facing each other, inches away in place and time, but years away in experience, slowly connected inwardly as they proceeded in being amidst each other, joined by a connecting truth and by the soft light which threw its buoyant flicker over the two masses, distorting and twisting them into infinite and amorphous shapes wavering on the muted wall.
ANALYSIS
This is an example of how an essay doesn’t necessarily have to tell something about the author forthright. Although he succumbs occasionally to the use of clichés, Tessler is talented at writing, and he exhibits this talent unrestrained in a piece at once mysterious and engaging. It doesn’t try to be an ordinary essay, nor does it try to sneak in a list of achievements. Tessler constructs the essay as though it were a painting, filling it with detailed color and showing – not telling – everything he observes and imagines, unafraid to delve into the abstract.
Subtle aspects of Tessler’s writing style produce a sense of enigmatic fantasy which emphasizes his ability to write and yet may confuse the reader./ the first paragraph sets the stage for the essay by casting a “clouded dream” of confusion even on the part of the author, unsure of who is in what world, vacillating between the conscious and subconscious. And in the last paragraph, he separates his mind from himself and refers to this mind in the third person. Through such techniques, he envelops he reader in his imagination. The story is likely to be different from most college essays and would help instill a lasting impression on his critical readership.
Unfortunately, some might find this mystery to be too extreme. Certain fundamental ideas, such as where Tessler is and with whom he is interacting, are unclear. And the point of the essay seems lost if one does not consider the exhibition of writing style and imagination to be a major aspect of the piece. This may be to Tessler’s disadvantage if the admissions staff reading this essay is left more in a state of bewilderment at what the essay was about than of admiration at Tessler’s writing aptitude.
For the most part, however, the reader is likely to be left with a sense of satisfaction after reading this work, particularly due to its unusual nature. Taking the risk of lightly confusing the reader, in this case, is not inadvisable. If the reader is confused, the writing style will certainly make up for this. And if the reader is not confused, the essay succeeds in strengthening Tessler’s application.
注：ESSAY选自哈佛大学成功ESSAY50篇之第一版
