With short, practical chapters, this book helps readers learn to think critically about themselves and the world at large, read carefully and get the necessary literary support, write clearly and persuasively, stay on point, and finish their work as cleanly and compellingly as possible. Drawing on years of teaching critical thinking and writing, including almost a decade of teaching Harvard's freshman expository writing course, the authors invite readers to consider the intimate relationship between thinking and the creative, critical, self-actualizing act of writing.