The advent of photomechanical reproduction in the 1890’s posed a challenge to the essay as great as that posed by photography to painting in the 1840’s. This seminar will explore the range of formal possibilities available to the essay (and essayism) in twentieth-century prose fiction and non-fiction and in photo essays and phototexts. While the seminar will focus primarily on German material (Sander, Renger-Patzsch, the Bechers, Musil, Benjamin, Adorno, Brinkmann, Goetz), essays from other traditions (Valèry, Williams, Evans, Frank) will provide comparative focus.