Keeping the audience reading is often the most difficult task of writing an essay. Therefore, the first thing you must learn in order to craft a good paper is how to start an essay.
The Importance of Knowing How to Start a Narrative Essay
A narrative essay is a story. In most cases, this is a story from your life and experiences. This may sound very simple since telling a story about yourself does not require a lot of research, but there are many tricks on how to start an essay about yourself. After all, not every story in your brain makes for a perfect topic of your narrative essay.
The question here arises – how to write a narrative essay about yourself?
A great narrative essay is both fun to write and read, but also carries some meaning. And most importantly, it should always start with a good hook. After all, the main goal of every writer is to make people WANT to read their content, which is why every essay must engage the reader.
If the reader is not engaged by your essay to start with, they are very unlikely to continue reading it. Therefore, this is your biggest opportunity to make the essay fun and interesting to read, especially when it comes to a narrative essay where the main idea is to tell a story.
A good beginning to an essay sets the tone for the rest of the story. This will guide you through the writing process and grab the audience, forcing them to keep reading.
Fortunately, there are myriad ways to get your reader’s attention and your task is to pick only one. To help you out, we have selected a list of the best tips for your narrative essay’s beginning.
Tips and Tricks on How to Begin a Narrative Essay
In order to provide you with a helpful list on how to start a narrative essay about yourself, we have gathered the team of xpertwriters.com and asked them to share their secrets. According to them, the following are the best tricks for writing a narrative essay:
- Use Quotes
If there is something you read or heard that is closely related to your story, you can always start the essay with a quote. This will allow you to connect the reader to the source of your story or your narrative.
Perhaps you found your inspiration in the life or experience of someone famous. Famous people often share their stories and opinions with the public, which means that you may have been inspired or guided by them.
If this is the case, tap into the connection. Use the quotes from that person to begin speaking of your own journey. If you are lucky, the reader may also have a connection with the same person, which can even increase the existing effect you will achieve with the hook in the first place.
- Pick an Intriguing Anecdote
An interesting, intriguing anecdote from the story you are telling is a perfect way to raise some questions in your reader. If you find the best anecdote to use, the reader will become instantly interested in reading the remaining of your essay.
- Ask a Question
If you do not have an anecdote in mind or the story is not related to a quote of some kind, you can always go for the more direct approach – asking a question.
While an anecdote and quote stir up questions, you can simply use a question and get straight to the point. The whole ‘looking for an answer’ thing can keep the reader on the page until the very end.
- Shock the Reader
For those who cannot think of a question or simply want to be more direct, try hitting the reader with a shocking answer. Use a shocking statement that motivates them to find out the question for this answer and how you got to it.
However, remember not to reveal the most important parts of your story. After all, you will want to present this further in your paper for better effect.
- Introduce Interesting Facts
There are many interesting facts, but you are actually looking for equilibrium between something your audience does not know and something related to your story. If you can think of such fact, this can certainly help the reader relate to you and become more interested in the content.
- Pull the Reader into the Story
The most distinguishing characteristic of narrative essays is that this type of paper’s main goal is not to get a message across. Actually, the main idea of this paper is to get the reader interested in the story.
Of course, the best way to do this is by allowing the reader to envision the setting. Once you achieve this, it will be difficult for them to get out of your story’s setting.
- Use Statistics
Statistics are rarely used in a narrative essay and their usage should be chosen only in cases where this provides an important insight into your particular story. If you have statistics that are interesting and important for the story in mind, start your essay by saying things like ‘60% of all addicts are men, so why did X only happen to me?’
Of course, this list is far from complete. However, these examples can lead to inspiration and understanding on how to use a good hook for your narrative essay.