A narrative essay uses a point of view to tell a story. It is an engaging way for an author to tell his reader about an experience they have had or a personal story. Descriptive writing is a description of something. It could be a person, place, thing, emotion or experience. The author is allowed more artistic freedom when writing in descriptive form. While both descriptive and narrative essays are similar in many ways, the descriptive essays use of language fully immerses the reader into the story and allows the reader to feel the intended emotion. Descriptive writing is painting a vivid image. When reading I want to be able to lose myself in the writing doesn’t everyone?
Both narrative and descriptive writing include similar structural components. Both styles should include an introduction, body and conclusion. Similarly, both styles should include a thesis statement. The narrative thesis is built to tell the reader the main point or object of the story while the descriptive thesis is pointing out the main elements of the event, a sense, a person or experience. If the narrative is telling a story it should also include character, plot, setting, and climax. On the other hand, a descriptive essay does not have those requirements but must stay organized in a way that allows for a logical description of the topic. The author must be careful not to ramble. Either way, both styles should include details in the body of the paragraphs to support the thesis statement.
The narrative and descriptive styles of writing are both effective ways for a writer to get their point across. Both styles of writing rely on the effective use of language. Descriptive words and concrete language are very important for both ...
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... author’s point was. I may be missing it entirely. I find the descriptive style of writing much more enjoyable to read. This style allows me to immerse myself into the details. I am drawn to the character, time or place because of the language the author is using. My senses and emotions are stirred which cause me to be invested in the story. I am not left second guessing what the author’s point of the story was. I am able to just enjoy it.
Works Cited
Connell, C. M., & Sole, K. (2013). Essentials of college writing (2nd ed.). San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc
Sedaris, D. (2007, July 9). This old house: The heart is a lonely managerie. The New Yorker. Retrieved from http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/07/09/070709fa_fact_sedaris
Tan, A. (2013). Fish cheeks. Retrieved from http://redroom.com/member/amy-tan/writing/fish-cheeks
Wardle, Elizabeth and Doug Downs. Writing about Writing A College Reader. Boston: Bedford/St.Martin's, 2011. Print.
This type of "narrative" writing gives believability to the people, and a sense of realism to the story.
In Downs and Wardle’s article, they argue and identify the flaws in teaching writing in college. Demonstrating the misconceptions that academic writing is universal, but rather specialized in each case. Citing studies and opinions from esteemed professionals, Downs & Wardle state their points and illuminate the problem in today’s many colleges.
We compared the settings, characters, and authors of both stories, but we still didn’t compare between the types of writing both stories are. “The Sniper” was a descriptive writing, because it described the mood, setting, and characters of the story. “The Most Dangerous Game” also described the mood, setting, and characters of the story. This means that both stories are descriptive writings.
...Academic Writing. Ed. Gerald Graff. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2012. 179-189. Print.
The vivid sensory detail of a text is the perfect way to wrap the reader’s senses around the story. A descriptive narrative allows the audience to connect with the story through its visuals and narration. Therefore,
The first narrative I’ve chosen Is “The Look” by Larry Lehna. One part in the book where the author uses descriptive language (From “The Look”) “The burning pain of bullet wounds (they really do burn). The agony of stitches going into a fresh knife wound. The nearly immobilizing ache of broken ribs.” (196) The image of the “the burning pain of a bullet wound” and “the agony of stitches going into a fresh knife wound.” appeals to the sense of touch and feeling. I selected this particular passage because the author was able to describe the physical pain of a bullet wound and also the pain of the healing process. This passage gives me the reader a more personal experience to the story and connects you to the character, I had a feeling of empathy for the character and the experiences he had in prison.
By starting this essay with narrative writing he captures the reader’s attention, especially the readers with the same literary repertoire. This is what happened in my case. I have a certain fascination for cars, so when I noticed it was about a car it just grabbed my attention and kept it.
Transitioning from high school to college can be overwhelming. Before English 1301, I thought that I did not have to worry about being prepared for college. I quickly realized that my little background in writing essays was not going to be enough for college. Writing is not just something that I will use in English classes. In college, I will have to use effective writing skills in all my classes to complete research papers, essay tests and communicate to professors. Throughout my education, writing strategies persisted to be something that did not come easy to me. I dreaded writing because I could never find ways to get my thoughts down on paper. Ironically, a class that petrified me due to the amount of writing that was required ended up helping me in so many ways. English 1301 and my professor prepared me so much for college and real life.
Personal narratives allow you to share your life with others and vicariously experience the things that happen around you. Your job as a writer is to put the reader in the midst of the action letting him or her live through an experience. Although a great deal of writing has a thesis, stories are different. A good story creates a dramatic effect, makes us laugh, gives us pleasurable fright, and/or gets us on the edge of our seats. A story has done its job if we can say, "Yes, that captures what living with my father feels like," or "Yes, that’s what being cut from the football team felt like."
Students have been writing essays since education was formalized centuries ago. There are several formats that they are taught throughout the course of their formal education, two of the most common being; Narrative, and Descriptive. Both of these have distinct characteristics that define them, and while they share many similar qualities and are developed to make the reader immerse themselves in the story. Narratives tend to have the power to capture and persuade on a deeper level than most descriptive papers. Two prime examples are the narrative I Want a Wife by Judy Brady and the descriptive essay Fish Cheeks by Amy tan. While they both do an exceptional job at delivering a lesson Brady’s causes you to think from the beginning, her use of the rhetorical devices such as pathos, ethos, and logos are incorporated with a heavy use of sarcasm and harsh remarks that claws for the reader’s attention.
A narrative is specified to amuse, to attract, and grasp a reader’s attention. The types of narratives are fictitious, real or unification or both. However, they may consist of folk tale stories, mysteries, science fiction; romances, horror stories, adventure stories, fables, myths and legends, historical narratives, ballads, slice of life, and personal experience (“Narrative,” 2008). Therefore, narrative text has five shared elements. These are setting, characters, plot, theme, and vocabulary (“Narrative and Informational Text,” 2008). Narrative literature is originally written to communicate a story. Therefore, narrative literature that is written in an excellent way will have conflicts and can discuss shared aspects of human occurrence.
There are a lot of ways to present the story which the author wants to share with the audience. It can be a book, a poem, a song, a music item, a film, a play, a dance, anything that the author may imagine. But each form is unique and one and the same story told using different forms will look different. Sometimes a bad story in verses may look perfect in a dance and vice versa. The form in which a story told is important, because it can highlight those important features, which another form may avoid.
Lerych, Lynne, and Allison DeBoer. The Little Black Book of College Writing. Boston, New York:
An example of descriptive grammar can be explained using the following sentence. "We have unfinished business to take care of, He and I. Descriptivist 's will accept this form of the sentence, as well as the form "He and I have unfinished business to take care of" Prescriptive grammar is a set of rules for using language that are taught, or enforced, so that people will use the language in a particular way. Prescriptivists will often include schoolteachers, copyeditors, and others charged with correcting people 's use of the language. Prescriptivists start with the assumption that there is one "correct" way to use the language, and many incorrect ways. The "correct" version is actually the language 's prestige dialect, especially its written version--for example, Standard American English. To oversimplify a bit, the "prestige dialect" of a language is generally the one used by educated people in the big cities. There are different examples of the rules used by Prescriptivists. The most common rules used are to never use a double negative, never end a sentence in a preposition, and never split infinitives. While descriptive and prescriptive grammar may have their differences they share similarities in the fact that they influence how people use their choice of grammar as well as