Essay ClubMember-HQ
Essay Club
Member-HQ
Join a group that cares about craft

Reverse engineer50 classic essays& transform how you write.

Read the classics, learn to edit, & publish monthly alongside other writers.

Fall syllabus starts October 12
70+ memberspublishing by the 1st
Live reading on Zoom with a shared doc
Live readings · every Monday · 15–20 writers · a shared doc
Essay Club
Member-HQ
Join a group that cares about craft

Reverse engineer50 classic essays& transform how you write.

Read the classics, learn to edit, & publish monthly alongside other writers.

Fall syllabus starts October 12
70+ memberspublishing by the 1st
Live reading on Zoom with a shared doc
Live readings · every Monday · 15–20 writers · a shared doc
Essay Club
Member-HQ
Join a group that cares about craft

Reverse engineer50 classic essays& transform how you write.

Read the classics, learn to edit, & publish monthly alongside other writers.

Fall syllabus starts October 12
70+ memberspublishing by the 1st
Live reading on Zoom with a shared doc
Live readings · every Monday · 15–20 writers · a shared doc
Essay Club
Member-HQ
Join a group that cares about craft

Reverse engineer50 classic essays& transform how you write.

Read the classics, learn to edit, & publish monthly alongside other writers.

Fall syllabus starts October 12
70+ memberspublishing by the 1st
Essay Club
Member-HQ
Join a group that cares about craft

Reverse engineer50 classic essays& transform how you write.

Read the classics, learn to edit, & publish monthly alongside other writers.

Fall syllabus starts October 12
70+ memberspublishing by the 1st
A place to read and write essays together

Every Monday at 7pm, we read a classic essay together in the margins.

Essay Club is a studio for essayists. Eight classics this fall, a deadline every month, and a room of writers who care how sentences work.

A place to read and write essays together

Every Monday at 7pm, we read a classic essay together in the margins.

Essay Club is a studio for essayists. We read the classics together on Monday nights, publish by the 1st of every month, and edit each other in between.

Join Essay Club — $500/yearFirst session free · Oct 12
What is this?

A place to forge your practice and become an essay writer.

  • 1

    Learn from the classics

    Stop scrolling the news. Show up at 7pm ET and read works that have endured decades and centuries. You get a short seminar on the writer—then we co-read, comment in the margins, and discuss as a group.

  • 2

    Improve your editing process

    Overcome your feedback avoidance. Join Feedback Fridays at 3pm ET every week, exchange drafts in our forum, or use Margin Muse (our software for detailed, pattern-level feedback).

  • 3

    Build publishing momentum

    Break the slump. Each month you set your goal and publish by the 1st. It can be a short 500-word essay, or long form with multiple drafts. You decide. We throw parties to read each other's work.

A place to read and write essays together

Read the classics. Edit each other. Publish every month.

1

Learn from the classics

A classic essay every Monday at 7pm ET, together in the margins. Forty a year.

2

Improve your editing process

Friday feedback calls, the forum, and Margin Muse reports on your drafts.

3

Build publishing momentum

By the 1st of every month. Then a publish party. Never publish to crickets.

“
The structure of reading great essays, the camaraderie and insights of weekly sessions with fellow writers, the monthly accountability of producing essays, and Michael's lively, warm, and intelligent leadership make Essay Club a unique, effective and encouraging group. I'm writing pieces I am very happy with.Stephen Morrison · member

From the club

Oct 12 – Nov 30
Fall
SyllabusMondays · 7pm ET

Every week, we read a classic and study the patterns we can bring into our own writing. It's like a book club, except you don't have to read anything in advance. Just show up, read, and comment in the margins. We chat as a group afterwards. Long essays are compressed to their essential 3,000 words so they fit in our 1-hour session. We run these seasonally, and I recommend essay anthologies for the short breaks between them.

  • June 2026Summer Syllabus
  • October 2026Fall Syllabus
  • January 2027Winter Syllabus
  • April 2027Spring Syllabus
  • July 2027Summer Syllabus 2
Fall syllabus · Oct 12 – Nov 30

Eight Mondays. Eight essays. Nothing to read in advance.

Scroll →

The life

David Foster Wallace

1962–2008 · Bloomington, Illinois · September 2001

Patterns to watch
  • Hook
  • Tension
  • Motif
Slide 1 / 12
Wallace · The View from Mrs. Thompson's (compressed)
Leanna
Chris
Room 2 · five writers
Live, every Monday at 7pm ET

Seventy minutes with a great essay and fifteen other writers.

7:00

The life

A ten-minute talk on the writer: where they were, what the style is doing, which patterns to watch for.

7:10

The margins

We read the essay together in a shared doc, in silence, writing in the margins as we go.

7:40

The rooms

Breakouts, then the whole group. The essay first, then the composition: what it does and what you could steal.

Keep scrolling to move through the call

Live reading on Zoom with a shared doc
Live, every Monday at 7pm ET

Seventy minutes with a great essay and fifteen other writers.

7:00
The life

A ten-minute talk on the writer: where they were, what the style is doing, which patterns to watch for.

7:10
The margins

We read the essay together in a shared doc, in silence, writing in the margins as we go.

7:40
The rooms

Breakouts, then the whole group. The essay first, then the composition: what it does and what you could steal.

Neither a lecture nor a book club. A seminar, once a week.

A week in the club

Two live calls a week. One deadline a month. Click an event.

Monday · Reading · 7:00–8:10pm ET

7:00 · ten minutesThe lifeA short talk on the writer, the context, the style, the patterns.
7:10 · thirty minutesThe marginsWe read the compressed essay together in a shared doc, writing in the margins.
7:40 · twenty minutesThe roomsBreakouts, then the whole group. What it does, how, what to steal.
Can't make it live?

Every session
lives in the library.

All our readings come with two documents: the slides from our live sessions are formatted as animated lesson plans you can read async; the essay we read—including everyone's comments—is always available (leave your thoughts in the margins).

Can't make it live?

Every session
lives in the library.

All our readings come with two documents: the slides from our live sessions are formatted as animated lesson plans you can read async; the essay we read—including everyone's comments—is always available (leave your thoughts in the margins).

    Can't make it live?

    Every session
    lives in the library.

    All our readings come with two documents: the slides from our live sessions are formatted as animated lesson plans you can read async; the essay we read—including everyone's comments—is always available (leave your thoughts in the margins).

    Can't make it live? The library

    Twelve summer sessions, each with the reading and the slides.

    Scroll →

    Essay Architecture

    Learn the secret architecture of great essays.

    For every classic essay we read, we'll look at color-coded diagrams to make sense of the patterns on the page. Through reading analytically, you'll learn how to bring these into your own work. Everyone in the club gets the textbook for free.

    See what's in the textbook →
    Essay Architecture

    Learn the secret architecture of great essays.

    For every classic essay we read, we'll look at color-coded diagrams to make sense of the patterns on the page. Through reading analytically, you'll learn how to bring these into your own work. Everyone in the club gets the textbook for free.

    See what's in the textbook →
    1 / 9 · keep scrolling
    Essay Architecture

    Learn the secret architecture of great essays.

    For every classic essay we read, we'll look at color-coded diagrams to make sense of the patterns on the page. Through reading analytically, you'll learn how to bring these into your own work. Everyone in the club gets the textbook for free.

    See what's in the textbook →
    Essay Architecture

    Learn the secret architecture of great essays.

    For every classic essay we read, we'll look at color-coded diagrams to make sense of the patterns on the page. Through reading analytically, you'll learn how to bring these into your own work. Everyone in the club gets the textbook for free.

    See what's in the textbook →
    Essay Architecture

    Learn the secret architecture of great essays.

    For every classic essay we read, we'll look at color-coded diagrams to make sense of the patterns on the page. Through reading analytically, you'll learn how to bring these into your own work. Everyone in the club gets the textbook for free.

    See what's in the textbook →
    Converse in the margins

    It's like a book club for essays, except we read together live, and you see how others think.

    Loading the essay…

    Converse in the margins

    It's like a book club for essays, except we read together live, and you see how others think.

    Essay Club · Dixon · Scrolling Alone (compressed) · 19 viewers

    Scrolling Alone

    To reduce phone use, there are a few tactical things like deleting social media apps, deciding not to scroll during daylight, setting the screen to black and white, or downgrading to a dumb phone. But the reality is that without addressing the deeper, more metaphysical angst that drives this addiction, no tactics will make that much of a difference.

    As the cultural conversation is dominated by what is fast and loud and immediately engaging, we lose the capacity to think in paragraphs, to think hard about the same thing for half an hour, to practice any kind of sustained attention.

    The faster things go, the more immersed we are in the infinitude of flow, the more we forget to feed the part of ourselves that likes quiet, that can live in quiet. That deprivation makes itself felt in the body as a kind of dread. A full body angst.

    Improve your editing process

    Get feedback whenever you need it.

    Feedback Fridays: writing room, idea room, feedback room
    Fridays · 3pm ET · community

    Feedback Fridays

    Every Friday at 3 pm, we jump on a call to work through our own essays. You can either use the time to write, to talk through ideas, or exchange drafts with another member in a breakout room. This is your chance to refine your ideas, become a better editor, and meet others in the club.

    Margin Muse editor with pattern reports
    Our in-house software for essay writers

    Margin Muse

    We're developing a writing interface that's built specifically for essayists. You can customize the interface, view tabs in split screen, chat with the best Anthropic models, and use tools built around the Essay Architecture framework. AI never writes for you; it leaves comments in the margins.

    Improve your editing process

    Get feedback whenever you need it.

    Fridays · 3pm ET · community

    Feedback Fridays

    Every Friday at 3 pm, we jump on a call to work through our own essays. You can either use the time to write, to talk through ideas, or exchange drafts with another member in a breakout room. This is your chance to refine your ideas, become a better editor, and meet others in the club.

    Our in-house software for essay writers

    Margin Muse

    We're developing a writing interface that's built specifically for essayists. You can customize the interface, view tabs in split screen, chat with the best Anthropic models, and use tools built around the Essay Architecture framework. AI never writes for you; it leaves comments in the margins.

    Improve your editing process

    Get feedback whenever you need it.

    Feedback Fridays: writing room, idea room, feedback room
    Fridays · 3pm ET · community

    Feedback Fridays

    Every Friday at 3 pm, we jump on a call to work through our own essays. You can either use the time to write, to talk through ideas, or exchange drafts with another member in a breakout room. This is your chance to refine your ideas, become a better editor, and meet others in the club.

    Margin Muse editor with pattern reports
    Our in-house software for essay writers

    Margin Muse

    We're developing a writing interface that's built specifically for essayists. You can customize the interface, view tabs in split screen, chat with the best Anthropic models, and use tools built around the Essay Architecture framework. AI never writes for you; it leaves comments in the margins.

    The textbook under the software · 25,000 words

    Three dimensions. Nine elements. Twenty-seven patterns.

    The textbook under the software · 25,000 words

    Three dimensions. Nine elements. Twenty-seven patterns.

    Essay Architecture grid
    The textbook under the software · 25,000 words

    Twenty-seven recurring problems every essayist has to solve. Margin Muse scores your draft on each.

    EthosLogosPathos
    Essay ArchitectureThree dimensions. Nine elements. Twenty-seven patterns.

    Hover any node to trace its lineage. Margin Muse scores your draft on all twenty-seven.

    What the margins teach · Emerson

    Nine elements, one paragraph. Hover an element to see where it lives in the prose.

    I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius. Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lustre of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string.
    October 2026Mon · Tue · Wed · Thu · Fri · Sat · Sun
    A month in the club

    One deadline. Two calls a week.

    1st

    Set your goal, publish by the 1st

    Check in on the 1st with one goal. Publish by the next 1st. Anything with a URL counts. Then the publish party.

    Fri

    Feedback Fridays

    3pm ET, every week. Bring a draft, get paired, exchange notes.

    Mon

    Monday nights

    7pm ET, every week. A classic essay, read together in the margins. Oct 12 and 19 are open.

    Keep scrolling to move through the month

    Schedule

    The monthly deadline is the metronome of the group.

    Start of the monthShare your goal for the month in the community forum so others can see what you're up to. This keeps you accountable.
    Mondays 7pm ETRead a classic essay to find inspiration for your own ideas.
    Fridays 3pm ETStop by to make progress on your essay. Use the time to write, to jam on your idea, or to exchange drafts and get feedback.
    Any timePost in the forum, read the textbook, develop your draft in Margin Muse.
    The 1stWe have a shared deadline. We publish something with a URL before the 1st. Keep your streak alive.
    Publish partyOn the first weekday after the 1st, we meet to read each other's essays and leave comments. Never publish to crickets.
    Get feedback three ways

    Then publish by the 1st.

    Fridays · 3pm ET

    The feedback call

    Bring a draft, get paired with another writer, exchange notes in a breakout, talk it through. No feedback grenades.

    Any time

    The forum

    Members trade drafts and comments between calls. Each request shows your goal, what you're looking for, and your deadline.

    3,000 credits · about 15 reports

    Margin Muse

    Upload a draft and get a report on the 27 patterns: where your thesis is hiding, where the structure sags, where the voice drops.

    The 1stSet a goal.
    MondaysRead.
    FridaysFeedback.
    Any timeForum, Margin Muse.
    The 1stPublish.
    PartyGet read.
    Between the calls

    A place of our own, open all week.

    The forum is where drafts go between Fridays. Post a piece with what you're looking for and your deadline, read what others are working on, trade comments, and see what got published this month. Your goal, your streak, and your essays live here too.

    The forumA place of our own, open all week.

    Between the calls

    Post a draft with what you're looking for and your deadline. Read what others are working on. Trade comments. See what got published this month. Your goal, your streak, and your essays live here too.

    Is it for you?

    Describe yourself as a writer.

    I have drafts I haven't published.
    I publish, but I want to get better.
    I'm starting from scratch.
    I read essays I admire and can't say why they work.
    Click a line, and I'll tell you what the club is like for you.
    Who is this for?

    Do you have unpublished drafts of compelling ideas that don't feel up to their potential?

    You should join if:

    This might not be for you if:

    You care about quality, you see writing as a creative exploration, and you know great work takes time.
    You're in a rush to grow an audience and willing to take shortcuts to get there.
    You want to build a reading habit that sharpens your judgment, taste, and voice.
    You'd rather skim feeds and summaries than sit with a long essay.
    You want to get better at editing your first drafts, sharpening your thesis, and integrating the Essay Architecture patterns.
    You're writing fiction, poetry, or a book manuscript. Many of us dabble, but essays are what we work on together.
    You want to build a network of craft-focused writers to support you and challenge your ideas.
    You'd rather write alone, and you aren't looking to give feedback or have your ideas challenged.
    You're curious how AI can augment your process without letting it automate your prose or replace your thinking.
    You want AI to write your essays for you, or you won't consider it in your process at all.
    Membership includes
    • 40 live readings a year, Mondays 7pm ET
    • Lesson plans for each reading
    • An annotated essay for each reading
    • A monthly deadline and publish party
    • Friday feedback calls + online draft exchange
    • Access to our community forum
    • Margin Muse software, 3,000 credits (~15 full analyses)
    • The full Essay Architecture textbook (40 chapters)
    • 1-on-1 calls to troubleshoot your writing practice
    Fall enrollment discount
    $650$500/yr

    Fall price through Oct 25 · your rate never goes up

    Enroll on Substack

    Or join one session free to try it out

    Refund policy. Try it for a month, and if it isn't for you within 30 days, I'll refund you in full.

    Fall enrollment discount
    $650$500

    per year · rate never goes up · 30-day refund

    Enroll on Substack
    ItemSpecBought separately
    01 Monday readings40 live co-readings / yr · 7pm ET · recorded$1,200
    02 Margin Muse3,000 credits · ≈15 full reports · 27 patterns$360
    03 TextbookEssay Architecture · 25,000 words · 40 chapters$120
    04 Friday feedbackStanding call · 3pm ET · breakouts—
    05 The deadlinePublish by the 1st · publish party · streaks—
    06 The forumDrafts, feedback exchange, member site—
    TotalBefore items 04–06$1,680

    Frequently Asked Questions

    Questions

    Michael Dean at a typewriter
    • Started writing online2020
    • Worked as editor-in-chief of Write of Passage2021–2024
    • Awarded an O'Shaughnessy Fellowship2024
    • Winner of the Cosmos Institute Essay Prize2024
    • Announced the $10,000 Essay Architecture Prize2025
    • Published The Best Internet Essays 2025 anthology2026
    About the founder

    Hey, I'm Michael Dean, and I'm in the trenches publishing with you.

    I built this club around everything I want to practice as a writer. The live readings make me deconstruct a classic every week. The Friday calls make sure I always have a draft to share. The deadline is why I've published every month for five years. I figure a structure that helps me stay accountable would also help anyone else who wants to get started. I'm also building software for essayists. Most writing tools are made for the average user, not for someone working an idea through many revisions and using AI in ways that protect their process. You show me what you need, and I build it. There are 70 of us now, reading the same classics, sharing a pattern language, invested in each other's ideas. My vision is for this to grow into an academy of sorts with a few hundred people, a kind of incubator where writers come to sharpen their craft and just generally be surrounded by others who find this process fun and fulfilling and worth all of the effort. Michael

    michael@michaeldean.site

    Read my essaysSubstack →Personal website →

    M. Dean · educated as an architect · essays since 2020

    About Michael
    01Editor-in-Chief, Write of PassageBuilt a team of 15 editors. Thousands of drafts. Redesigned the curriculum.2021–2024
    02O'Shaughnessy Fellow$100,000 to write Essay Architecture and build the software on top of it.2024
    03Cosmos Institute Essay PrizeWinner, "Essay Writing as Personal Sovereignty."2024
    04Essay Architecture Prize$10,000 open essay prize. Eight judges. Winner Tommy Dixon.2025
    05The Best Internet Essays 2025Edited the finalists into a pocket anthology.2026
    06A million wordsPublished every month for five years without missing one.2020–
    Michael Dean at a typewriter
    • Started writing online2020
    • Worked as editor-in-chief of Write of Passage2021–2024
    • Awarded an O'Shaughnessy Fellowship2024
    • Winner of the Cosmos Institute Essay Prize2024
    • Announced the $10,000 Essay Architecture Prize2025
    • Published The Best Internet Essays 2025 anthology2026
    About the founder

    Hey, I'm Michael Dean, and I'm in the trenches publishing with you.

    I built this club around everything I want to practice as a writer. The live readings make me deconstruct a classic every week. The Friday calls make sure I always have a draft to share. The deadline is why I've published every month for five years. I figure a structure that helps me stay accountable would also help anyone else who wants to get started. I'm also building software for essayists. Most writing tools are made for the average user, not for someone working an idea through many revisions and using AI in ways that protect their process. You show me what you need, and I build it. There are 70 of us now, reading the same classics, sharing a pattern language, invested in each other's ideas. My vision is for this to grow into an academy of sorts with a few hundred people, a kind of incubator where writers come to sharpen their craft and just generally be surrounded by others who find this process fun and fulfilling and worth all of the effort. Michael

    michael@michaeldean.site

    Read my essaysSubstack →Personal website →
    What changes

    Most members notice the reading first. After a few Mondays you start seeing the architecture in everything: where an essay turns, how a writer earns the ending, why one paragraph moves and the next one doesn't.

    Then it shows up in your drafts. You find the thesis faster. You cut with more confidence. You stop asking whether a piece is done and start knowing.

    Writing is a long game. Things didn't click for me until year three. The club exists so you don't have to spend those years alone.

    this is the Baldwin turn — see how he waits
    Didion does this with one word. Which?
    Emerson: "trust thyself" — earned or asserted?
    13 writing groups dissolved on me. This one didn't.

    Read.
    Write.
    Together.

    Eight classics this fall. A deadline every month. A room of writers who care how sentences work.

    Join Essay Club — $500/yearOr come to the first session free · Oct 12
    The reading year

    Deeply reading forty classic essays a year will change you as a writer.

    Four syllabi a year: summer, fall, winter, spring. Twelve, eight, ten, ten. Fifty-two Mondays, forty essays, and a few weeks off to write.

    Summer · 12 readFall · 8Winter · 10Spring · 10Breaks, to write
    The reading year

    Deeply reading forty classic essays a year will change you as a writer.

    12

    Summer

    Wallace, Jamison, Emerson, Sontag, O'Gieblyn, Montaigne, Woolf, Orwell, White, Beard, Didion, Chesterton. Done.

    8

    Fall

    Wallace, Dillard, Montaigne, Seneca, Le Guin, Voltaire, Zadie Smith, Baldwin. Starts Oct 12.

    10

    Winter

    January to March. Syllabus announced in December.

    10

    Spring

    April to June. Forty a year, every year.

    Essay Club · Mondays 7pm ET · next: Wallace, Oct 12