DESCRIPTIVE WRITING, Exercises of Literature

Download DESCRIPTIVE WRITING and more Exercises Literature in PDF only on Docsity! DESCRIPTIVE WRITING Pilar Aguado Jiménez Lengua Inglesa IV The descriptive essay is a genre of essay that asks the student to describe an object, person, place, experience, emotion, situation, etc. This genre encourages the student’s ability to create a written account of a particular experience. What is more, this genre allows for a great deal of artistic freedom (the goal of which is to paint an image that is vivid and moving in the mind of the reader). guidelines for writing a descriptive essay: •Take time to brainstorm •Use clear and concise language. •Choose vivid language. •Use your senses! •What were you thinking?! •Leave the reader with a clear impression. •Be organized! Drafting your descriptive essay: •What sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and textures are important for developing your description? •Which details can you include to ensure that your readers gain a vivid impression imbued with your emotion or perspective? •What details should be left out? Focus on the Five Senses •Sight •Sound: If you are describing a person, remember to include dialogue. •Smell •Touch •Taste Adding details to sentences Details tell what something looks like, or how it sounds, feels, tastes, or smells. We can use nouns, adjectives, adverbs, and verbs to add details. The more specific the detailsare, the more effective and interesting the writing will be. Clear, specific details allow the reader to create a picture in his or her mind of what is being described. Compare the general sentences below with ones that have specific details. General sentences Sentences with Specific Details The crabs were good. The crabs were tender and sweet with a salty taste. He bought some fruit He bought some sweet, juicy strawberries. She walked to the door She tiptoed to the door. She walked to the door She walked quickly and silently to the door. Similes Descriptive writing may use similes to make something seem more familiar or more creative. Similes make ideas easier to understand, and they can also express feelings. Similes are often used in literature and poetry. Look at the famous examples below: The sun was like a glowing ball of fire. -Shakespeare My love is like red, red rose. -Robert Burns I was young and easy… and happy as the grass was green. -Dylan Thomas Simile Structure A simile can use the preposition like + noun or noun phrase The stars looked like diamonds A simile can also use as … as + noun or noun phrase. This kind of simile also uses an adjective He is as clever as a fox Descriptive organization In a descriptive essay, a writer uses details to tell how a subject looks, sounds, smells, tastes, or feels. The essay should make the reader feel like responding to what he or she is reading. Introduction • The hook introduces the object or event of description • The middle sentences provide the background • The thesis statement tells why the object or event of description is important to the writer. Body paragraphs • Most of the description is in the body paragraphs. • Adjectives and adverbs make the experience more vivid. • The scene is often described with prepositions and prepositional phrases that specify location or position in space. • Comparisons, such as similes, can make the writing more descriptive, familiar, and expressive. Conclusion The conclusion gives the writer’s final opinion about the description. Tips for Organization •Try moving your reader through space and time chronologically. •Use a then-and-now approach to show decay, change, or improvement. The house where you grew up might now be a rambling shack. The variations on this strategy are endless. •You may also use a topic-by-topic approach, especially if you are describing a person. Remember to come up with a clear thesis statement/focus. However, this thesis does not necessarily have to come at the beginning of the essay. In this case, you may come to your overall statement about the value of the object(s) in your conclusion. It is at least twenty years later and I can still remember my first visit to Lou’s Café. Stopping in to see if anyone could tell us where to locate the turn we had missed, my husband and I received a large dose of culture shock. It seemed as if we had opened the door to the decades: a place where generations came and went, a place where time stood still and passed by at the same time. Miss Lou Dixon owns and runs that restaurant in the middle of the town of Sunbright, Tennessee. Miss Lou has been in business at that location since 1954. Even though the place looks a little squalid, it is not for lack of care; in fact, Lou is proud of how clean she keeps her place. She has often been heard to say, with the strongest East Tennessee accent, “It don’t matter how pore a body is.They can be clean.” She is proud of her “A” rating and prominently displays it. It is not a fancy restaurant. The hundreds of booted loggers, railroad workers, and oil field roughnecks trekking through have worn the carpet thin. Chunks are missing from the carpet at the favorite tables of the workers. The hardened veneer on some of the tables is missing a notch here and there. The paint on the walls has cracks and there is a perennial smell of hamburgers permeating the air. The casual observer could be forgiven for thinking the place is about to fold financially; instead, what we found that night was a well camouflaged center of social activity and the finest, most accurate, information available. When entering the door at Lou’s, two things are immediately noticeable: the place is rarely empty and seems to consist of a maze of rooms. The first room, lunch special, a cake someone asked Lou to make, the spices of an apple pie, or the ever present odor of hamburgers, it is a well known fact, it will taste as good as it smells. The best part of being at Lou’s is not her food, however; it is the feeling of being part of her extended family, being part of a tradition, when traditions are hard to come by. The last time I was in Lou’s, I experienced another trip through time’s door; it was as if nothing had changed, nothing, except the amount of gray in her hair. Some of the old men had passed on; they have since been replaced by two or three of the “young ‘uns” they used to keep their eyes on. The phone still rings constantly, the women still gather their news, and a new bunch of kids take over at night. Everything is the same, everything is different. WRITING TASK 1 DESCRIPTIVE ESSAY Write an essay where the description of one the the main characters’ mood could be used to support your thesis