Write What You Know
People keep asking me how they should get ideas for their writing. This question boggles my mind a bit because frankly, as a writer, I have more things rattling around in my head than I can ever hope to write. Of course, what they mean is how can I get ideas to write something right now that fulfils a certain objective. Ah, that’s trickier.
Getting Ideas for Writing
Ideas for what you want to write are not hard to come by. Good ideas can be tougher. It always helps to go back to the basics. In this case, the basics is: Write What You Know.
This may sound like strange advice especially if you don’t “know” the topic you are writing for. But, we all know stuff and it is from there that your ideas will come. Let’s say, for example, that you are writing a piece on microeconomics, a topic which I know very little about, other than it was a college course I may or may not have taken.
Without Googeling, or looking anything up, I already know something. I know some things about economics, and I know what micro means. I also know that micro is a modifying word which means there is such a thing as economics (without the word micro) and maybe even macroeconomics (the opposite of micro). There may even be some in between ground (smalleconomics?). There is idea one: The difference between micro and the other kinds of economics.
Not what you are looking for? Probably not, but from there we can carry on. Is microeconomics the kind of thing you can support and oppose? Is it the kind of thing that you can believe in or not believe in? Has it been in the news recently? Should it be? And so on.
Bringing In Outside Ideas
Now, add in the knowledge you have from the rest of your life. Are you a chef? How does microeconomics affect you? Is it killing the restaurant business? How about your suppliers? Would either on of them be more efficient if they took heed of microeconomic concepts, and so on.
The idea is to keep spinning your mind around this track until you hit on an idea that makes you think you’ve got something good.
Idea Generating Tips
Here are some good questions to ask regarding your topic to help generate ideas.
- Is this good or bad?
- Does anyone know about this?
- Should more people know about this?
- What would people do if they knew about this?
- How long has this been going on?
- Who does this affect?
- Who cares about this but shouldn’t?
- Has it been in the news?
- Can this be spun?
- What happens if I take the opposite?
- Would my mom care?
- Would my kids care?
- Is the government involved? (Helping? Messing it up?)
Keep working with your concept. Eventually you’ll have something you care enough about to research it. When you get there, you’ve got your idea. Chances are that as you do your research your idea will change or become completely different. That is good. It doesn’t matter if a good idea was your first one, only that it is a good one.
Deal for Freelance Writers
I don’t know how widespread this is, but a couple of the Barnes & Nobles around Denver have the nice trade paperback sized Associated Press Stylebook on the shelves in the clearance section for $5.98 which is a heck of a deal. If you are a freelance writer, sooner or later you are going to need the AP Stylebook and at this price, it is cheaper than buying used. So, if you find yourself in Barnes & Noble in the next week or two, swing over to the clearance section and look for it.
It looks like this (its at Amazon for $12.98 )
Greatest Web Developer Tool Since Sliced Bread
Ok, that’s a really mixed metaphor. I’ll ask you to let it slide today.
I stumbled across something called Firebug. It is a plug-in for Firefox and it does all of these things to help web developers. For the most part, I don’t use too many of them because I haven’t had the time to figure out most of what it does, but it does do one thing so perfectly, that I must share.
I’m a freelance writer. But, I also do many other things for our clients. We do so much, in fact, that I’m looking into to re-branding as business consultants. (The catch is how to do that without losing those who love us because we are freelance writers…) One of the things we do is websites – building them, fixing them, designing them, and so on.
Often, we use templates, or we are called upon to work with something that is already in place. Either way, understanding the code is paramount to getting things done. One area that this can be difficult is in the CSS. With inheritance and so on, it can be difficult to find the right spot to make changes. Even worse, it can be difficult to know what those changes might end up looking like.
Firebug is Great
Enter Firebug. Firebug allows you to right click on any thing in any webpage (yours or otherwise) and do something called Inspect Element. When you do, you get this:
Click on that picture to make it bigger and you’ll notice that in the webpage displayed above the Firebug panel I’m looking a some text gone awry. Specifically, it is too big and blocky. I have right clicked it (you don’t have to highlight, I did that to make it easier to see) and chosen Inspect Element.
I can see that this text is wrapped in <h2> tags. So far, no big deal, but in the other panel, we have GOLD, Baby!
(Yes, I am aware that using the h2 tag here is not optimal, but that is for a later day.)
As you can see, the element that is giving me the wrong text is not the main <h2> tag, but rather the .post h2 tag. Now, I won’t spend a bunch of time editing the wrong thing, or searching back through DIV tags to try and figure out which h2 tag I need manually. I’m already sold. But, wait, there is more!
The Firebug panel also tells me exactly which line in the style.css file this tag is at so I can jump into notepad++ and scroll with reckless abandon until I get to line 264 and make my quick easy edit.
Wait! There is still more. If I click where it says “font-size” and change the value in the Firebug panel, it will preview it for me instantly on the webpage panel. So if I want to see what 1.5em will look like instead of 2.5em, I just change it in Firebug to get a preview. No actual code was changed, no files were saved, and I don’t have to remember what I did in order to back it out! I can play with the numbers all day until I get what I want and then edit line 264 just once!
How great is that?
What is AP Style
Spend even a modest amount of time around the world of professional writing, and you will come across the term AP Style. However, many people aren’t aware of what AP Style actually is.
What people usually forget is that The Associated Press is a real organization. It has buildings and employees and computers and sells products to produce a profit. The AP’s main product is news feeds or wire stories which are reprinted in newspapers all over the country. Take a look at your local paper and you’ll notice the author of each story is usually listed. For local stories or coverage that was actually researched and written by the newspaper’s staff you will see a name and maybe a location. The stories that say either AP or Associated Press were not actually written by anyone at the newspaper. They were bought by the newspaper from AP.
AP Style In Professional Writing
AP Style is actually a specific kind of writing. It is writing for news stories. However, many people, both freelancers and clients use the phrase AP Style as a way to describe a more formal writing style. AP Style is like what you read in the newspaper. For example, this article is not written in AP Style. All of the “you” makes this article informal.
But, AP Style is so much more than just formalization. There is an entire book called “The Associated Press Stylebook” that contains all manner of writing rules regarding terminology, phrasing, and punctuation.
Many otherwise knowledgeable professionals ask for AP Style to be used in writing for publication on non-news websites. Ironically, AP Style requires the use of spelling and punctuation that is opposite of what most websites want both for SEO purposes, and for what their readers want. For example, AP Style requires the use of a space between web and site for the term web site. However, most websites and blogs use the word website without a space. The same thing goes for email which AP requires to be written as e-mail (also for e-commerce, e-book, and e-business).
However, the AP Stylebook is a great resource for the professional writer. There are a million issues that come in writing everyday that may have never been considered before. For example, should part time be hyphenated? AP has a rule for that. It is hyphenated when used as a modifier as in part-time job. It is not hyphenated otherwise as in the waiter is part time.
Basically, the AP Stylebook is a reference for any writer who comes across those little nuances that just don’t seem to have solid answers grounded in even advanced grammatical knowledge. Everyone knows what NASA is, so do you have to spell it out the first time you use it? You probably know that it is President George Bush, but what about other politicians? How do you reference the Speaker of the House? What about other congressmen? When should it be capitalized? Should you say congresswoman? If so, is there such a thing as congresswomen if you are speaking about multiple female members of Congress? And, by the way, when should Congress be capitalized?
There are a million examples like this. The point is, that these aren’t the kinds of things you learned in English classes even if you went to graduate school. In fact, for every other person in the world except a professional writer, these are the kinds of things that no one cares about.
Want to know more about AP Style?
Writing Great Essays – Conclusion
In Writing Great Essays – Introduction, we looked at how to start off your essay. In Writing Great Essays – Middle, we looked at the construction of the essay body. Now, it is time for the conclusion.
Like the introduction, the conclusion is not a place to introduce new evidence. Your case should already be laid out by now in the body of your essay. Your quotes and examples coupled with the surrounding sentences should have led your reader down the proverbial primrose path to the only logical conclusion which is the one you proposed in your thesis statement. Now, it is time to bring it home.
If you’ve ever watched an event that determines the winner via judges scores or voting, you may have noticed that contestants who go last seem to have a bit of an advantage sometimes. This is because we tend to remember what we have most recently seen or read. Much in the same way, your reader may have begun to fade on some of your earlier points. The conclusion is your chance to refresh these points, and connected them to your other points.
Start your conclusion by walking back through your essay map in the tone of, “This is what I said I would show you, and I did.” Our essay map was:
When the king arrives, she plants the seed of greatness in her husband’s head, then when the king names his heir, she plants the seed of murder, and following the murder, she plants the seeds of both their doom.
Our conclusion might start something like this:
Upon the king’s arrival at the castle, Lady Macbeth stoked Macbeth’s desires by reminding him of what the witches said. Later, when the king named his own son as heir, Lady Macbeth added fuel to the fire by…
Once we’ve restated our case, it is time to finish up our closing arguments. In movies, closing arguments often ask the juror to put themselves in the defendant’s or victim’s shoes. This is actually a terrible tactic in real life. Sympathy is one thing, but the last thing you want a juror doing is thinking for themselves. You want them to think what you tell them to think. The same thing is true for essays. You don’t want your reader thinking about how he would have stood up to Lady Macbeth, or how she would have encouraged her husband too, so maybe Lady Macbeth isn’t the problem. Instead, go for the throat by telling your reader what they think. This is the real world application of the old, “When I want your opinion I’ll give it to you,” line.
Lady Macbeth’s own selfish desire for power and prestige caused her to lead her own husband down a path of ruin. When things went badly, she fell apart, partly out of guilt at the king’s death, but even more out of her inability to cope with the knowledge that the tragic events were a result of her own greed.
Don’t thank the reader or say that you hoped they enjoyed reading your essay. Just leave your powerful closing statement on the table and walk away. Remember, whenever you do something cool, it is even cooler to walk away like it wasn’t cool to you. After all, you write top-notch essays all the time. No need to thank someone for reading the best paper in the bunch!
Writing Great Essays - Middle
Ok, we talked about writing the basic five part essay, and the intro paragraph in Writing Great Essays Introduction. Now, it is time to write the middle paragraphs.
In an essay, the middle paragraphs are the meat. This is where you get to show how much you understand the material. All the flash, all the dazzle, and all the great things you want to put in your essay go in these three paragraphs. The introduction and the conclusion are basically rote, so this is where you get your creativity on if you are going to do it. So, go through your note or outline and highlight all the really great things you have come up with that show how clever, insightful, or creative you are. Keep referring to your list, because you have to cross everyone of these off before you get to your conclusion or you don’t get to put them in your essay. Ready?
Writing Great Essay Paragraphs
If you are thinking that the first step is to decide what to write these three paragraphs about, you’re wrong. You’ve already decided. Look at your introductory paragraph again. The bottom sentence is your essay map. Those three comma separated items are the topics of your three middle paragraphs. If you don’t want to write about those three things, then you need to change your introduction first. When you are done, you can come back here. Assuming you are ready and willing to write about your three essay map topics, it is time to write your topic sentences.
Topic Sentence
The topic sentence isn’t really all that special. It works like a movie trailer for your paragraph. It says, “Here is what this paragraph is about.” That is it. To refresh your memory, here is the example we worked on in part one.
- Lady Macbeth’s manipulation of her husband’s emotions is the cause of both their tragedy. When the king arrives, she plants the seed of greatness in her husband’s head, then when the king names his heir, she plants the seed of murder, and following the murder, she plants the seeds of both their doom.
The purple part is our thesis statement (what we are proving) and the orange is our essay map (what we will be saying to prove our thesis).
So, in our case, the first paragraph is about Lady MacBeth planting the seeds of greatness in her husband’s head when the king arrives. The topic sentence should basically write itself:
When the king arrives, Lady MacBeth sets her plan to place her husband upon the throne by planting the seeds of greatness into MacBeth’s head.
Simple, huh?
Now, for the next paragraph you will write about how Lady MacBeth plants those seeds in Macbeth’s head. Strong essays depend upon examples. Strong examples depend upon quotes. A direct quote from the text is the most powerful weapon at your disposal for writing a solid essay.
A+ Tip
In order to make your essay its most powerful, you should introduce the quote, and then afterwards, highlight the quotes applicability to your essay. Here is where smarter students actually can go wrong and write weaker essays. As an intelligent person studying MacBeth, you don’t need someone to draw you a picture. But, that is exactly what a good essay does! Remember, the essay should demonstrate the same level of knowledge that a multiple choice question test would. So, to get a good essay, answer the multiple choice question:
Select all of the answers which show Lady MacBeth planting the seeds of greatness in her husband’s head before the king announces his heir.
The reason we want to stick with before the king announces the heir is because our next paragraph will be about what happens after.
Now, pick your favorite Lady MacBeth line in between when MacBeth comes home from the witches and the King announces his heir. The sentence before the quote will be something like, “Lady MacBeth plants the first seed of greatness in MacBeth’s head when…” Then, type in your quote. Then, connect the dots, “Lady MacBeth’s deliberate attempt to influence her husband’s thinking…”
Pick your next favorite quote, and do the same thing.
If you don’t have a direct quote that works, then use the scene. Just make sure that the reader knows exactly which scene you are talking about. Generalizations are the cornerstone of a weak essay. So, when Lady MacBeth and MacBeth are speaking in their bedchamber on the night the king arrives is good, when Lady MacBeth is whispering to MacBeth is not good (it happens several times.) Even worse is when Lady MacBeth is trying to convince MacBeth to become the king because that could be anything. (Did you even read the book? Don’t you know that this happens tons of times?) Don’t be the person at a hat convention saying “He’s the guy in the hat.”
Now, all you have to do is fill the paragraph in. Make sure that your writing flows smoothly from one example to the next. This will require one or two sentences to make the transition. These sentences are a good place to get those highlighted ideas into your essay!
Then, repeat the process for the next two paragraphs.
Up Next…Writing Great Essays Conclusion…
Writing Great Essays - Introduction
As a writing professional, I occasionally get asked to help someone’s child nail an important essay. Whether it is for College or High School, the type of essay that succeeds is the same.
Nailing the Essay
One of the most important things to remember when writing an essay in the academic world is that academic writing does not necessarily conform to what is considered good writing elsewhere. In fact, the kind of writing that succeeds well in academia is generally not the kind of writing you want anywhere else. Newspapers need a grabbing headline followed by the necessary who, what, when, with a lot less emphasis on how and why. Fiction writing is very much about pacing and keeping reader interest. Magazine writing requires “writing to size” which means either cramming information into too short of article, or bloating too little information into a bigger article. None of these will win you any A+ marks in school.
The Five Paragraph Essay
As a writer, the temptation to be creative is a powerful one. However, this impulse should be resisted unless you are well into graduate school. Most high-school teacher and many college professors are experts in their subject area, not in writing. They understand and expect a specific style of essay. When you get creative, they may not see that you have written everything necessary for a high mark because the format is distracting.
Keep in mind that you are writing to prove subject mastery, not to prove writing ability. You wouldn’t answer the questions on a multiple choice test by singing limericks. Yes, it is very creative and very original, but it isn’t how you answer test questions. The same concept applies to writing an essay. Even if the teacher expresses an interest in originality or creativity, do so within this structure or risk a lower grade.
The standard academic essay is the Five Paragraph Essay. In a nutshell, this format is an introductory paragraph, followed by three proving paragraphs, and finished with a conclusion paragraph.
The Introduction Paragraph
The most common flaw from students writing an essay can be traced to an incorrect introduction paragraph. Problems here lead to issues throughout the essay, so it is important to hit all the points before moving on.
The first thing to write (though it does not come first in the final product) is your “thesis statement.” This is a fancy way of saying what your essay will be about. The key to a thesis statement is that it must be a supportable opinion. The number one mistake is not stating an opinion. An opinion is not a fact. To verify that you have chosen an opinion, ask yourself, what is the opposite opinion? If there isn’t a reasonable one, then you have not stated an opinion.
For example, in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, teachers and professors love dissecting the role of Lady Macbeth. Stating that Lady Macbeth is an influential character, or central character is not an opinion. Any statement to the contrary is false. She obviously is both. Stating that she is more responsible than Macbeth for the tragedy that befalls them both is an opinion. One could just as easily argue that she is doing nothing more than supporting her husband’s ambitions, and that Macbeth is responsible for his own actions. One could even argue that the witches are more to blame.
Once you have your opinion, turn it into a thesis statement. In our example above, a good thesis statement is something like, “Lady Macbeth’s manipulation of her husband’s emotions is the true cause of both their tragedy.”
The next thing you will need is your “essay map.” This is a fancy way of saying what proof you have to support your thesis statement. Since, your essay will have five paragraphs, you need three “locations” on your essay map. All three of these points must be directly supportive of the thesis statement. If you want to write about something that is not going to support the thesis statement, then you need to change your thesis statement. In other words, if you want to go down Main Street, then pick a location that requires travel in the direction of Main Street. You cannot be a bad taxi driver and take a longer route just because you like Main Street.
In our example above, your essay map might include a discussion of what happens before the king arrives, what happens after the king name’s his heir, and what happens after the king’s murder.
Now that you have your thesis statement and essay map, you are ready to write your introductory paragraph. Ready?
First, write a sentence that would clue someone who did not know the assignment in. For maximum grade points this sentence should also praise the subject matter.
- Shakespeare’s Macbeth is a masterpiece of tragedy that fully explores the both the depths of human depravity in the name of ambition and the related consequences.
- Harry Potter is a fascinating look at the life of a young boy who suddenly finds that he is capable of so much more than he ever imagined.
Notice how these sentences both state the subject matter (This essay is about Macbeth or Harry Potter) and praise the subject matter (masterpiece, fascinating).
Second, write a sentence that moves toward your point and acknowledges that there were other equally wonderful topics.
- Although Macbeth provides a wide exploration of the human condition, the manipulation of Macbeth by Lady Macbeth is perhaps the most powerful example of human interaction.
Now, insert your thesis statement. No editing required.
Next, insert your essay map. This should be one sentence stating how you will prove your thesis statement by examining your three points. It must be one (and only one) sentence and it must name all three points.
Never ever use the words “this essay will prove” or “this essay will show”. In fact, the words “this essay” should NOT appear anywhere in your paper. If they do, re-write.
- Lady Macbeth’s manipulation of her husband’s emotions is the cause of both their tragedy. When the king arrives, she plants the seed of greatness in her husband’s head, then when the king names his heir, she plants the seed of murder, and following the murder, she plants the seeds of both their doom.
Orange=Essay Map
Done! Move on to paragraph two. At this point, many students want to write about other things they want to say. The answer is NO. If your introduction paragraph has anything other than these five sentences, I guarantee you it is weaker, not stronger. You don’t need anything extra. In fact, if you have something else in your introduction, the reader has a right to expect that you will further address it in your essay. Since you will not deviate from proving your thesis, this is a problem. Do not offer any proof in your introductory paragraph. Like a lawyer at a trial, this is your opening statment. You can say, “The evidence will show that my client is innocent.” You do not say, “The picture on the desk proves that my client has never been to the conservatory and has never even picked up a candlestick.” This is not evidence time, this is coming attractions time.
Introduction Paragraph Summary
- Write thesis statement.
- Write essay map.
- Write one praising introductory sentence.
- Write one “there were many wonderful things but I chose this one” sentence.
- Insert your thesis statement.
- Insert your essay map.
- Move on to paragraph 2.
- If you followed the above, you will only have 5 sentences in your intro paragraph. Don’t get cute.
Bonus A+ Tips
If you really want an A, pick a topic that your professor or teacher has raised and had the class discuss. Obviously, you don’t want something that has been covered ad nauseam, but you do want something that came directly from the professor. If your professor made only a passing reference to Lady Macbeth’s influence, then that means he or she doesn’t believe in its importance.
It is easier to prove something the other person already believes. So, pick something your professor believes. If instead, he or she has discussed the powerful use of imagery (river of blood) or the role of the witches (would he have done any of this if they hadn’t said those things?) then write about that. The time for writing what you want to write is when you are not writing for grades. Until then, write for grades (which means writing what the professor wants to hear).
Up Next - The Proving Paragraphs
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