Writers Who Endure

I've been taking part in an online discussion on writing with originality and authenticity, and I think part of learning to write with one's own authentic voice comes in part, ironically, from reading enduring (classic) works of writers who have found their own authentic voices. And many of these authors whose works have endured have written essays full of good thinking about how and why they write as they do. Here's a quick sampling of good essays by writers who endure:

**Flannery O'Connor's "The Element of Surprise in 'A Good Man is Hard to Find'" from the book On Her Own Work (excellent explanation of why she uses violence to explore grace)

T. S. Eliot's essays in Selected Prose of T. S. Eliot, especially "Tradition and the Individual Talent" and "Religion and Literature"
I have a link only to the first of these two: http://www.bartleby.com/200/sw4.html

Nathaniel Hawthorne's preface to The House of Seven Gables
http://ibiblio.org/eldritch/nh/sgpf.html

(And the Cliff's Notes commentary on that preface:)
http://www.cliffsnotes.com/WileyCDA/LitNote/The-House-of-Seven-Gables-Critical-Essays-Hawthorne-s-Preface.id-18,pageNum-35.html

D. H. Lawrence's essay on "Why the Novel Matters"
http://individual.utoronto.ca/amlit/why_the_novel_matters.htm

Emerson's two-part Eulogy of Thoreau, which appeared in Atlantic Monthly, 1862
http://www.rwe.org/pages/eulogy_of_thoreau.htm