Ah, essays. Like communal bathrooms, spotty Wi-Fi, and regret, essays are fixtures of the college experience. But luckily, writing essays doesn’t have to be awful. It’s a skill just like any other, and with practice and the help of these seven tips, you’ll be writing your way into your professor’s heart in no time.
Prewrite. While it may seem quicker and easier to write an essay straight through from the beginning to the end, this is a strategy for disaster. It’s much easier to write when you’ve made a plan ahead of time. Figure out what works for you—whether you like outlines, webbings, or free writing, anything you do ahead of time will serve you well when it comes to organizing your paper.
Find a thesis you believe in. There are two parts to this statement. One is to figure out a thesis—basically, the argument that you set out to prove. Professors won’t like you if you don’t have a clear thesis. It’s sometimes tempting to choose a thesis based on what’s easy to argue, or what you think the professor wants to hear. Don’t. Your paper will be better if you’re passionate about what you’re saying. I know this is easier said then done when your topic is relations between Lithuania and Germany before WWII, but there’s always a way to take a topic that seems dry and open it up, finding hidden avenues that connect to your interests.
Write by hand. Once you’ve come up with some sort of outline, try writing your essay by hand. We all know how tempting Facebook can be when we’re trying to write in a different window, the cursor blinking impatiently. When you write by hand, you can doodle; your thoughts can coalesce into ideas at their own pace, with neither the pressures nor distractions you get when you write on a computer. Rekindle the joy of putting pen to paper you got when you first learned to write. Invest in nice pens too—a smooth line makes the process that much more enjoyable.
Have fun. As awful as essays can be, there’s always that one sentence you write that makes you smile. Latch onto these parts, remembering that formal does not mean humorless. I often start with an audacious title and work around it, just for the challenge. My essay “The Sexual Awakening of Richard Wright” was a blast to write, and it still makes me laugh three years later.
Write as soon as you think about it. It’s easy to fall into the trap of thinking you have to carve out a three-hour block of time to even start writing. It isn’t true. Writing can happen in spurts, and if you’re thinking about an essay and have a spare five minutes, start writing. Don’t underestimate those five minutes of work. They’ll make the final piece so much easier.
Edit. Once you’ve written your awesome essay, print it out and read it aloud to yourself. You’ll notice lots of little errors that you didn’t see before, as well as larger issues, like holes in your argument. Something to keep in mind while editing? Adverbs. Chances are they’re not necessary, so delete them. There’s something cathartic about going through a paper and cutting out twenty-five variations of “really,” “very,” “so,” and “necessarily.”
Don’t worry if you’re over the word limit. So you’ve written a paper and edited it down to perfection, but you’ve got a problem: it’s two hundred words over the professor’s word limit. Don’t panic. Unless your professor has emphasized the word count, the chances are good that it doesn’t matter. I’ve never gotten penalized for going over, and I always write hundreds of words more than the supposed limit. Professors care that you write a good paper. They don’t so much care about the length.
Well, there you have it—seven hard-won tips from a junior English major.