Essay 3: Narrative

Directions: Blending the elements of description and analysis within a narrative framework, this essay calls on you to write about yourself or someone close to you.  You will tell the reader a story, but one that goes beyond a simple personal profile of your likes and dislikes.  You could relate an important event in your life, recreate a vivid time period, recover lost family history, or explore your identity in some other way.   As you compose your essay, remember that a good narrative does more than tell a story for its own sake: it has a clear purpose–perhaps, even, a thesis statement.  You might think of your goal as taking the individual and making it universal:  ask yourself what you are trying to tell the reader and why that message is important.

A successful narrative, even more so than most essays, depends upon good style and grammar.  Two points to keep in mind: first, since the topic of this essay is you, you can of course use “I” and other personal pronouns.  Be careful, however,  not to overuse these words: my handout on “Too many I’s front” offers strategies for achieving a balanced style, one that does not overpower the reader with I’s and me’s.  Second, while a personal essay invites a kind of casual, easy-going style, remember that this tone may not be appropriate to the subject of your essay.  If your subject is a humorous or light-hearted one, a conversational tone–one that even includes contractions!–could be quite effective.   With other subjects, however, such a tone could inadvertently diminish the seriousness and authority of your voice.

The minimum length of the essay is 3 ½ pages, and you should have a draft of at least 3 pages completed and saved on a disk for our peer editing session on Friday, Oct. 26, in the computer lab (HC 3116).   The final draft is due Friday, Nov. 2, unless you wish to turn it in earlier.

 Topics

1.  Write an essay that grows out of an epiphany, a moment when the meaning of the world, a life, or a relationship suddenly changed.  You could write about almost anything that has happened to you, but be careful to avoid basing your essay on trite or relatively insignificant observations like “I really had fun at the beach last summer” or “My new iMac is really something” (unless, of course, you can somehow coax a larger meaning out of such events).  Remember also that the essay should focus on a specific event, not a long-term process such as “my senior year” or “playing soccer.”

2.  Expand upon the memory that you recovered during our recent in-class writing exercise.   Describe the memory in more detail and analyze its significance.  Of course, you don’t have to limit yourself to this specific memory: for instance,  you could write about another memory that came to you during our class discussion or afterward.

3.  Describe an interesting toy, game, or other type of play that you engaged in as a child.   Why was this form of play so important to you?  How did it help to shape the person you are today?

4.  Are only children more likely to become executives?  Do you play the cello instead of the violin because you were the fourth of six children?  Analyze the importance of your birth order on the development of your personality.  As you formulate your paper, it might help to consult a psychology textbook or other source to gain a basic understanding of the current research into this topic.

5.  Interview an older relative or friend and write an account of his or her childhood.