DESCRIPTIVE NARRATIVE ESSAY

  • Your first essay is a combination, amalgamation of 2 rhetorical strategies you have practiced thus far in your journal writing:
  • Description + Narration.
  • Imagine, then, that we will take the traits of both to create this essay:

DESCRIPTION: / NARRATION:
  • Relies upon SENSE DETAILS
  • Sights
  • Sounds
  • Smells
  • Tastes
  • Touches (tactile impressions)
  • And FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE
  • Similes
  • Metaphors
  • And DICTION
  • Keen word choice
  • The “right” (descriptive) words
  • adjectives, adverbs
  • nouns, verbs
  • To support a DOMINANT IMPRESSION
  • The atmosphere, setting
  • A unifying impression or controlling aspect
  • Links all of your sense details
  • The first adjective that comes to mind when you think about a particular place, object, person, or event
  • Details are arranged SPATIALLY
  • By space (as opposed to chronology, reason, logic, or emphasis)
  • Left to right or right to left
  • Top to bottom or bottom to top
/
  • Relies upon STORY ELEMENTS
  • Plot
  • Characterization
  • Theme
  • Setting
  • And DESCRIPTIVE ELEMENTS
  • Sense Details
  • Figurative Language
  • Diction
  • Dominant Impression (related to theme)
  • To relate a STORY
  • Narrative
  • Account, chronicle
  • Tale, myth, legend
  • With a MORAL
  • Message
  • Point
  • Meaning
  • Theme
  • Details are arranged CHRONOLOGICALLY
  • By TIME (as opposed to space, reason, logic, or emphasis)
  • Beginning, Middle, End
  • Linear progression
  • No flashbacks, no circling, no juxtaposition

Thus, regardless of your choice, you must include the following:

DESCRIPTIVE NARRATIVE
Description:
  • Sense Details
  • Word Choice: Adjectives & Adverbs, Similes & Metaphors, Exact Nouns, Descriptive Verbs
  • To support the Dominant Impression
Dominant Impression:
  • Atmosphere, mood, setting
IllustrationDiscussion of Lessons Learned (moral):
  • Hinted in the Introduction
  • Discussed in full in the Conclusion
  • Illustrated by the story (the story should = the lessons)
Chronological Order:
  • Time sequence of events
  • Beginning, middle, end
POV:
  • Speak from the “I”
  • Either as the cop-character or as yourself
  • I saw, I learned
  • No “you”
  • You learned the lessons, not the reader
/ Essay Basics:
  • Title
  • Concise
  • Introduction
  • Opening generalization regarding the type of lessons or type of experience
  • Deductive narrowing toward your story
  • Brief background for the story (concise)
  • Thesis Statement:
  • What kind of experience?
  • What kind of lessons learned?
  • Body
  • Chronology
  • Story
  • Conclusion
  • Refer back to your Introduction (bring the essay full-circle)
  • In-depth discussion of those lessons learned that were implied in the Introduction
FOCUS:
  • A FROZEN MOMENT IN TIME
  • NOT a “life story”
  • NOT multiple days
  • 3-4 pages in length
  • with sufficient detail
  • no room for extraneous material
  • PART of a chapter in your autobiography
  • neither a FULL CHAPTER
  • nor an ENTIRE BOOK

  • Because CORE 110 is an effective writing course and not a creative writing course, I must give you two choices when it comes to approaches:

(1) CREATIVE

(2) AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL


(1) CREATIVE

TOPIC:

(a police story)

  • I want you to pretend that you are one of the police officers dispatched to the crime scene in Poe’s “Tell-Tale Heart.”
  • Your story concerns the night in question.
  • Thus, you may begin at the precinct OR on the way OR at the house.
  • You may also end at the house OR at the station OR at your own home after-shift.
  • You will tell a descriptivestory with a moral.
  • You will use details in and implied by Poe’s original story.
  • Most certainly, you may add your own creative ideas – I even encourage it –
  • but you must adhere to the plot, setting, and atmosphere of the source.
  • Remember, you are a police officer, trained in the art of keen observance.
  • You may be at any time in your career and at any age.

______

(2) AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL

TOPICS:

(a significant event in your life)

  • Tell the story of a major event in your life.
  • Tell the story of a major change in your life, an event that changed your life or your way of thinking about a person, place, object, religion, institution, ….
  • Below are some topic ideas:

  • Achievement
  • Mistake
  • Deaths
  • Divorce
  • Pregnancy
  • Abortion
  • Rape
  • Responsibility
  • Graduation
  • Heart Break
  • Bad Vacation
  • Sweet 16
  • School activity (play, game)
  • Firsts:
  • Apartment
  • Job, job interview
  • Solo drive
  • Day at college
  • Heart break
  • Realizations
  • Bad friends
  • Crime does not pay
  • Behind the 8 ball
  • True friendship
  • No Santa
  • Faith, religion, God, ….
  • True meaning of … (holiday, family, )

INTRODUCTION

Opening Generalization:

  • Introduce the type of story or type of lessons learned from the experience.
  • Frightening experiences, near-death experiences
  • The true meaning of family or love
  • What kind of story is it? What does it deal with? What kinds of lessons did you learn?
  • Answer these questions AND then get us readers prepared for a story that deals with such ideas.
  • For example, if your narrative deals with the death of a loved one, then get started by generalizing about death or the death of loved ones.
  • Most of us have unfortunately lost someone close to us.
  • If your story relates a particularly harrowing case from your law enforcement career, then begin with a statement concerning those kinds of cases.
  • All police officers have one case that sticks with them throughout their careers.
  • Of course, you may use a relevant quotation or statistic, instead of an opening generalization
  • as long as it serves the same purpose.

SEQUE:

  • Narrow from that opening to your story.
  • Some, Others
  • Some of us have lost friends from high school, while others have lost family members. Sadly, I, too, have lost a close and special relative.
  • For some cops, that case involved their first car crash or their first burn victim. Others might never forget the first time they were forced to deliver a baby in the backseat of a taxicab. For me, my unforgettable case concerned my first and only brush with true insanity.

Brief Background:

  • Clearly identify your event and then
  • Briefly, concisely give us some background
  • By supplying some of the following:

  • Who
  • What
  • Where
  • When
  • How
  • Why
  • Location, city
  • Date, year, season
  • Your age
  • Your rank/status in school or on the force

  • Name of the high school or police department

THESIS:

  • End with a strong, clear Thesis Statement
  • One that answers the following:
  • What kind of experience?
  • What kind of lessons learned from it?

______

BODY

  • Follow a clear and consistent chronology.
  • Follow a linear progression
  • Beginning, middle, end
  • Use no flashbacks or flashforwards
  • No “Quentin Tarantino” directing
  • Be consistent with your characterization, plot, and setting.
  • Remain in the story.
  • Once the story begins (which is immediately after the Introduction), do not interrupt it or step out of it in order to explain some point that should have been made in the Introduction (usually in the “Brief Background” part).
  • No stopping the story
  • No hitting “pause” on this movie
  • No “Rod Serling/Twilight Zone” monologue
  • No epilogue
  • Be consistent with your verb tenses.
  • Remain in the past tense (simple past)
  • Stay out of 2nd person POV throughout.
  • No “you”
  • Select only those narrative details that relate to your lessons.
  • Omit details, descriptions, or events irrelevant to your purpose, to your moral, to the types of experience and lessons you mentioned in the Intro

______

CONCLUSION

  • Refer to your opening and how you introduced this narrative.
  • Discuss in detailthe lessons (plural) you learned from this experience.
  • As you do:
  • Remain in 1st person POV (speak from the “I”)
  • Refer to parts of the plot
  • Make sure that the story and the lessons must match – that is, the lessons must naturally flow from such events
  • Remember that insincerity is obvious
  • End the paper with an appropriate Clincher Sentence
  • One that sums this entire experience
  • One that looks to the future and the way you will live it
  • One that captures the essence of the story you just related

TRAITS for BOTH CHOICES

DESCRIPTIVE NARRATIVE
  • DESCRIPTION
  • DOMINANT IMPRESSION
  • NARRATION
  • LESSONS LEARNED (moral)
  • CHRONOLOGY
  • 1ST-PERSON POV
  • FOCUS
  • A FROZEN MOMENT IN TIME
  • NOT a “life story”
  • NOT multiple days
  • 3-4 pages in length
  • with sufficient detail
  • no room for extraneous material
  • PART of a chapter in your autobiography
  • neither a FULL CHAPTER
  • nor an ENTIRE BOOK
/ Essay Basics:
  • Title
  • Concise
  • Introduction
  • Opening generalization regarding the type of lessons or type of experience
  • Deductive narrowing toward your story
  • Brief background for the story (concise)
  • Thesis Statement:
  • What kind of experience?
  • What kind of lessons learned?
  • Body
  • Chronology
  • Story
  • Conclusion
  • Refer back to your Introduction (bring the essay full-circle)
  • In-depth discussion of those lessons learned that were implied in the Introduction