The Art of Beginning and Ending an Essay

Introductions, conclusions, and titles are often the most difficult parts of the essay to write. I've known people who can't write a single word until they have the perfect title. I've known people who labor intensely until the introduction is perfect, and then they continue writing. But most writers, myself included, write the bulk of the essay before worrying about such things as the introduction or conclusion. Whatever your process is, here are some tips that might help.

Introductions:

An introduction can do a lot of things, but at the very least, it needs to hook your reader and offer your thesis statement. Even an implied thesis statement is fine--just as long as your reader knows the general point or direction of the essay. Some writing instructors will also tell you to include some forecasting (the main points of your essay), definitions, context, history, and so on--but that usually results in a huge first paragraph that no one wants to read. I recommend you keep it short: grab your readers’ attention, make sure your main point is clear, and move on.

Hooking Your Reader

We live in an age of endless, bite-sized online distractions, and people just don't read long compositions anymore. In the olden days, when I were but a wee lad, folks would tend to read about 50 to 100 words of an article before moving on--a paragraph or two. That's all they needed to feel they had gleaned everything they needed--or to get bored. Now days, the average person will only read 18 words before moving on. 18 words! That's barely a couple of sentences. But it makes sense given our constant bombardment of links and headlines and webpages. So if you want to get someone to read your essay--or at least someone who isn't contractually obligated to read it, like your boss or professor--then you need to make those first 18 words count. You have to grab their attention.

Deciding what will actually hook your reader can be tricky, but it's worth the effort. No one will ever read the second sentence, let alone the entire essay, if that first line is a dud.

Some things that grab the readers' attention and makes them want to keep reading:

• • Interesting Quote

  • Scary Statistic

  • Anecdote (short story)

  • Vivid Description

  • A Hypothetical Situation

  • A Joke (appropriate to the audience, of course)

  • A Controversial Statement

Compare these "first lines" of an essay. Which one grabs your attention more?

Hot dogs contain ingredients that some people might find unappealing.

OR

I’ve often wondered what goes into a hot dog. Now that I know, I wish I didn’t.

***

For my paper, I interviewed Eustace Conway who told me some interesting stories about his childhood.

OR

By the time Eustace Conway was seven years old, he could throw a knife accurately enough to nail a chipmunk to a tree.

Here are some other first lines that hook the reader:

It was so quiet, one of the killers would later say, you could almost hear the sound of ice rattling in cocktail shakers in the homes way down the canyon.

***

Imagine the brain, that shiny mound of being, that mouse-gray parliament of cells, that dream factory, that petit tyrant inside a ball of bone, that huddle of neurons calling all the plays, that little everywhere, that fickle pleasuredome, that wrinkled wardrobe of selves stuffed into the skull like too many clothes into a gym bag.

***

At exactly fifteen minutes past eight in the morning, on August 6, 1945, Japanese time, at the moment when the atomic bomb flashed above Hiroshima, Miss Toshiko Sasaki, a clerk in the personnel department of the East Asia Tin Works, had just sat down at her place in the plant office and was turning her head to speak to the girl at the next desk.

***

We were somewhere outside of Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold.

Stating Your Thesis

Whether it's a question or a claim, a thesis statement is found somewhere near the beginning of an essay and states what your essay is about. Usually, but not always, a thesis statement is only one sentence long, it is specific, and it contains the topic and your position on the topic.

Example: "Even though they cost the same and offer similar features, the iPhone 6 is far more superior than the Samsung Galaxy."

If you need help coming up with a thesis statement, finish one of the following statements:

“In my paper, I am arguing that _______________”

-- or --

“In my paper, I am showing that _______________”

When you are done, erase the first part of the statement (i.e. "In my paper, I am arguing that"), and everything that follows should be a decent thesis statement.

After you write your thesis statement, evaluate it by asking the following:

• • Is it narrowly focused (or is it still too general)?

  • Is it debatable (or is it too obvious)?

  • Is it something you can substantiate or prove?

  • Does it contain the paper’s topic and your stance on the topic?

Too General:

“Since the dawn of time, people have needed religion.”

“Wind farms are good for the environment.”

“College students don’t know how to study.”

Revised to be More Specific:

“For millennia, organized religion has been the driving force behind technological, cultural, and personal advancement.”

“Federal subsidies for wind farms may initially seem like a burden to taxpayers, but ultimately they will save the country billions of dollars while ensuring a healthy future.”

“Even though most community-college freshmen claim to have good study skills, the reality is that less than half know how to effectively prepare for exams.”

Non Debatable

Othello is a play about love and jealousy.

Revised to be Debatable

Although Othello appears to attack jealousy, it actually supports the skepticism of the jealous characters over the naïveté of the lovers.

Un-provable

God is real.

Revised to be Provable

American citizens who believe in a higher power, such as God, tend to be happier and more civic-minded than those who don’t.

Un-provable

My Little Pony is the greatest cartoon ever.

Revised to be Provable

Creators of television cartoons could learn a few things from My Little Pony, which has developed a cult-like following of males and females of all ages.

Unclear on Topic and/or the Writer's Stance

I’m going to write about Darwin’s concerns with evolution in The Origin of Species.

Revised to be Clear on Topic and/or the Writer's Stance

Darwin’s concern with survival of the fittest in The Origin of Species leads him to neglect a potentially conflicting aspect of his theory of evolution: survival as a matter of interdependence.

Conclusions:

At the very least, a conclusion should provide your reader with a sense of closure. This can be accomplished by doing such things as restating your thesis statement, summarizing your main points, giving a final call to action, or linking back to the introduction. A simple framework I have mentioned elsewhere is the concept of a snake eating its tail. If you started your essay with a story, consider breaking it up and then ending the essay with that story.

Avoid introducing new points or arguments in your conclusion. If you want to make a new claim or argument, then put it in the body of the essay, but the final paragraph isn't the place to be starting something new. Use it to wrap up what you've already said.

Also, I would avoid verbal markers, such as in conclusion, in summary, or in closing. These are great for public speeches, when your listeners might not know the speech is ending soon, but when someone is reading your essay, they can tell it's about to end, so there's no need to announce it. If you need to write in conclusion to help you get the conclusion going, that's fine. But when you're done, erase it. I guarantee that your conclusion will be much better without it.

Titles:

Every essay or piece of formal writing in college needs a title. If it's only a paragraph or a short piece of informal writing (like a journal entry or reading response), you can probably forego including a title. On everything else, though, be sure to include one.

Titles shouldn’t simply state the topic

Example: "John Smith"

Titles shouldn’t be the name of the assignment

Example: “Profile Essay”

Titles shouldn’t be the name of the assignment and the topic

Example: "Profile Essay of John Smith"

Titles should be succinct, interesting, informative, and non-misleading

Succinct:

“31 ways to lose weight fast”

Non-Succinct:

“31 Ways for People Over 30 and On a Tight Budget to Lose Weight Quickly without Having to Diet, Plus a Few Tips on How to Save Money on Gym Memberships”

Interesting:

“John F. Kennedy: American Fraud”

Non-Interesting:

“A treatise on John F. Kennedy and his political controversies from 1954 to 1958”

Informative:

“The Brilliance of the 2013 Ford Focus”

Non-Informative:

“Ford Focus”

Formatting Titles

You own your own title, so you don’t need to underline, italicize, or use quotation marks. When using other-people’s titles in your work, you need to italicize the title if it represents the whole work, and quotation marks if the title represents part of a larger work.

Example: Last night, I listened to “Whispers in the Dark” on Mumford & Son’s new album, Babel.