What is an essay and how to write it?
An essay is a prosaic genre of small volume and free composition. In simple words - this essay-reasoning. The first of all began to write them journalists. From newspapers and magazines short notes gradually moved to the pages of fiction.
The great French thinkers D. Diderot and Voltaire turned the essay into an original genre of philosophy. An example of how to write such things, became the famous book M. Montaigne "Experiments".
Every student should know the rules of writing an essay. Short exam essays help answer the questions of the text proposed for analysis, unleash creativity, demonstrate the ability to think independently. Next, we look at the main types of essay and the chief editor of https://essaysonline.net/ will tell us about this. By the way on this website you can read examples of ready-made essays on different topics.
Types of essay
An essay is a type of literature suggesting that such an essay is determined by its theme and purpose. Depending on this essay is:
- literary critical;
- historical;
- philosophical;
- spiritual and religious.
In form, this small genre is close to a personal diary, a letter, a sketch (what is this?), Reviews, a review.
Plan and structure of an essay
The main signs of the essay, which allow us to understand that this, for example, is not an article or a sketch:
- Small volume. The author writes capaciously, the reader quickly runs through the eyes.
- Free structure (composition). In pure form, works of this genre have no strict structure. It is allowed to start right away with the arguments, then move on to the problem statement. Or make a conclusion at the beginning, and leave the conversation about the reasons "for sweets". At school, for the convenience of the reviewers and the writers themselves, it is proposed to adhere to a certain essay structure. It is as follows: the statement of the problem - the arguments (1st, 2nd, 3rd) - conclusion.
- Having a problem. In spite of the fact that the plan for writing an essay has a free composition, the idea of the writer must unfold around one problem stated at the beginning of the text. All the arguments voiced in the main part are obliged to illustrate it and smoothly bring the reader to the resolution. In conclusion, you must explicitly or indirectly voice your thoughts.
- Individual style. It doesn't matter what essay you write: historical or philosophical - a bright and rich language, an original style should be its obligatory feature. This tradition takes root in journalism. The author of a newspaper article risks being forgotten immediately after reading it, so the journalist tries to make his speech memorable. Every experienced newspaperman has a company reception, a “highlight”. When writing an essay, it is important to “include” personal charm and make your text live, not like others.
- Figurative and aphoristic. The essay covers the best features of artistic and publicistic styles. Both are characterized by figurativeness and metaphoricity. On the verge of these two styles, aphorisms, new non-standard expressions (neologisms), and a curious language game are most often born. To use all this is not only possible, but necessary! True, this luxury is not so easy to afford, if you write an essay in English. But in foreign languages there is a mass of figurative expressions that adorn speech.
- Proximity to colloquial speech. Do not overdry the text. Scientific turns, multi-part sentences, clericals, stamps are contraindicated in such a genre as an essay. The simpler the narrative language, the shorter the sentences, the easier the content is perceived. True, this does not mean that the bar should be lowered to the level of slang, jargon and abusive vocabulary.