Elijah LoBoen
Writing the Essay 8:00 AM – 9:15 AM
Professor Kellum
November 28, 2011

Exercise Three

Throughout the many essays that Geoff Dyer has written as a journey for his readers to embark on, I have learned that his purpose in written is add dimensions to a situation that seems one sided. How does he do this? Well, for example, in his essay “Sex in Hotels,” Dyer humorously expends on the action of having sex in a hotel. Immediately, those three words have the connotation of cheap and sleazy, however, Dyer pushes his readers to not think of it as a one-dimensional situation. One must see the action of having sex in a hotel as something classier by examining each and every step of the process. Masturbation, for example, is something that is done in peace in a hotel because it a safe haven where one can do such an action. Normally, it is looked down upon because one is doing it in a setting where is not accepted, however, in the “luxurious hotel,” Dyer comments, is fine.

The tension within this author’s writing is less of something I have read, but more of something I have seen on television. For example, on various TV shows like Saturday Night Live, and the Soup, they insert humor into a serious situation in order to explain them and add a new dimension to something that seems like it only has a singular meaning. Dyer, in his collection of essays “Otherwise Known as the Human Condition” attempts to challenge his readers to see past it. Personally, it seemed ridiculous for any author to somehow make it okay that masturbation and sex in hotels were fine, but like the writings of Dyer and the episodes of SNL, the audience sees a new way to look at something that only seemed to have one