Writing Essay (1)

Based on my own experiences, writing literary essays are frustrating. It happens due to our inadequate writing skill such as in grammatical structures, dictions or organizing ideas. Actually such problems can be solved by forcing ourselves to read and write ideas before-after reading a text. It takes time but in the end we will find no difficulties when we have to write a report about a literary work, or any report, analysis. 

The important thing is we have to know the topic that we will discuss, then we have to clarify the focus after making list of ideas about the topic. Reshaping and refining both your sentences and word choice, so that our ability in organizing and writing ideas will improve. There are three stages during the writing process: planning, drafting, also revising and editing (1997: 22). Here I try to sum up those stages:

1.       Planning an essay

a.       Considering our audience

As students in any level, we are demanded to compose essays concerning any topic. Some topics perhaps have already told by others and some haven’t, if we discuss the already told topic then we can make it as samples for our writing. We can see how writers make their writing format. Next we can decide whether those were written for public, certain community or academic audience.

Most of us are writing in order to fulfil academic assignments; this means we have to consider that our audiences are our teachers, lecturers and peers. Therefore, we have paid more attention when we write for our teacher or lecturers. Most of them are representatives of a larger academic audience whom expect accuracy in delivering information with specific information, preciseness on grammatical structures, writing mechanism, and stating logical arguments. Actually those requirements are given to see how clearly we think and arrange our ideas into a well-organized coherent essay. 

b.      Understanding our purpose

In general terms we may write for any of the following reasons (1997: 22):

-          Writing to respond

When writing to respond, our purpose is to discover and express our reactions towards a work of literature, or any kind of text. Here we engage our respond with informal activities such as brainstorming, listing and journal writing. These will help us to explore our scattered ideas and form-reform them in coherent sentences.

-          Writing to interpret

This is purposed to explain a work’s possible meanings by summarizing, identifying samples or making compare and contrast the work to other works or our own personal experiences. Then analyzing and studying each element, putting complex statements, defining difficult concepts or placing ideas in concept.

-          Writing to evaluate

Our purpose is to assess a work’s literary merits by not only consider its aesthetic appeal but also ability to retain it beyond space and time. As we write, we should use our own critical sense and opinions of experts in the field to help us make judgements about the work. However, we should mention the source of the opinion so that we will be assumed as doing plagiarism.