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How To Succeed at Essay Writing

All students experience what is described as "student's block", so they should not be unduly alarmed if they find that they have an essay to write and they can't even bring themselves to sit down and begin it. The time will come, nonetheless, when the deadline has to be met and if you have left your preparation to the night before you are hardly going to do either yourselves or the essay justice.

  • I like this topic---it branches away from what we normally see on The Artifice and displays an academic and practical side to the magazine. Be sure to include, possibly, some research relating to procrastination, common causes for "student's block," and speak with a constructive air. – Dominic Sceski 6 years ago
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  • Definitely a pertinent topic; also, one that tends to strike students, educators...everyone! There's numerous insightful tips on how to combat writer's block. As a literature professor, I first advise students to not fall trap to the blinking cursor of self doubt and to get up from their laptop and take a mental break. Suggestions also include formulating the essay to match the thesis, not the other way around; encouraging the shifting of paragraphs; if one paragraph is not coming along, but the next point is bustling, just put the troublesome paragraph in a different color font to return to later; also suggesting switching the closing paragraph as the introductory paragraph tends to helps some students. But, all of these suggestions detail the writing process, not the pre-game strategy. So, one of the best suggestions--I think--is to free write all ideas as they come to mind while disregarding sentence structures, spelling, but just jotting ideas as presented through a stream of consciousness. Hope this helps! – danielle577 6 years ago
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  • The topic seems to be good as these types of tips are given by the services providers which are banned in all over the world. – mohsinrafiq80 6 years ago
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  • A good topic. How do you give advice on writing? For forty years of teaching I've been addressing this question and always feel frustrated with the advice I give. Basically, I try to get students to realize you need to write daily. Writing daily can consist of nothing more than a few sentences about what they are looking at while sitting there thinking about writing. The point is you need to see something on the page. You need to get students to realize they can play around with words and create different images. Writing is something that is not done infrequently. – Joseph Cernik 6 years ago
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  • I really like this essay topic because it’s a struggle I see often times in students I work with as a writing tutor. I advise students to think about the essay sooner rather than later. The deadline may give a student the pressure they need to get an essay done, but the stress isn’t worth it, especially when the student has multiple assignments for other classes, too. It’s important for students to remember that they don’t have to sit down and finish an essay in one sitting. It’s good to space out the writing process – maybe brainstorm today, pull out quotes tomorrow, and begin working on an outline or first draft over the weekend. For myself, I try to brainstorm ideas for an essay as soon as I get the assignment – if not the day I get the assignment, then over the next couple of days. I also write everything that comes to mind. Sometimes I’ll think an idea is stupid, but if I decide not to write down one idea, who’s to say I’ll stop writing down all ideas altogether? Often times it can also help to look at materials from the class. I know that sounds obvious, but a lot of students I work with don’t think about looking at the book they’re trying to write about or they don’t think about class discussions that may spark inspiration. – Heidi 6 years ago
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When You’re Too Scared to Start Freelance Blogging

When you’re trapped between something you must do (like write that blog article) and something you can’t do (like write that blog article, because of a variety of reasons), it causes stress. It feels like any action that you can possibly take is the wrong one; if you do manage to work on your article, you second-guess your work and that feeds right back into the stress.

The mind is tricky and likes to avoid stress when possible. Which is when you find your attention sliding away from your article and back to social media, games, even housework…anything to put off the complex problems ahead of you.

However, this vicious cycle of can’t-do/must-do can usually be stopped.

  • A good idea, maybe expand this a bit. It isn't that a blog is one article, but a series of entries. Doing a blog requires that it be updated or refreshed or kept new. So how does one commit themselves to being consistent or have perseverance? – Joseph Cernik 6 years ago
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  • A pretty straight forward focus, I assume the following discussion would be on ways to avoid procrastination or to motivate writing. Actually as you are looking specifically at blog posts it may be interesting to explore what are some great stimulus for developing blog posts. – SaraiMW 6 years ago
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Is there no originality left in the world?

When reading books or watching movies, it's rare that plot twists or events will catch people by surprise anymore. Almost every plot twist has been done in multiple books or movies. Is there any originality left in the world? What does everyone else think? Has humanity run out of ideas? There are thousands upon thousands of books and movies in circulation, so have we exhausted all possible ideas?

  • Some would suggest that we have always been telling the same tales, this is why Joseph Campbell's The Monomyth is still so relevant and Jung's character archetypes. I think this is an interesting topic to discuss, and in that talk about tropes, generic features and the previous works that have been done in genre study - however, this should not be discussed as a negative. We tell the same tales as the same things matter to us regardless of time and place - we love, we live, we grieve and we die - nothing will change this, it is not the originality of a new story that matters, but the inclusion of a new voice within the world. – SaraiMW 6 years ago
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  • I would love to see this topic discussed. I think this has a lot to do with how far we allow a writer to veer from the expected path (Campbell's heroic journey for example). If they veer too far, they lose the audience, if they follow it too faithfully, it's boring. How can a writer meet the "requirements" yet still be novel? – tclaytor 6 years ago
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  • There is a book, The Seven Basic Plots: Why We Tell Stories (by Christopher Booker) which can be woven into an essay on this topic. – Joseph Cernik 6 years ago
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Killing main characters

One of the most dramatic but equally difficult acts is to kill off a main character. From a viewer's experience this is traumatic, dramatic and endlessly memorable – I will always remember when Buffy killed Angel at the end of Season 2. However, it is a very difficult task for a writer to engage in, we spend so much time building our character and imbuing them with a level of personality that becomes real to us. Yet it can be such a powerful tool to engage the reader. On the other hand, it can also be detrimental to a reader's engagement, some may check out in frustration, others will become less engaged emotionally with the characters – for example, the developing death-exhaustion of those following 'Game of Thrones.' So what are the pros and cons of killing a main character? Should it be done at the start or end or midway in the book? When is the right time to kill a main character? What are the pros and cons of the "return" (as in Angel coming back in the next season), or leaving it as permanent? So many questions: Discuss.

  • Something to also consider is the general idea of these "fake-out deaths" in media. I mean, Eren's "death" at the start of Attack on Titan is a powerful scene that gives the world real stakes (for the time) but it kind of feels pointless when it turns out he survived. I mean, the same can be said with Angel. When Angel came back after Buffy sacrificed so much to send him to hell in Season 2 of Buffy, it felt kind of un-earned that he just suddenly showed up again. Fake deaths, even at their best in Attack on Titan, can give us mixed feelings as we wonder if the story could be better if they stuck with a character's death. Then in Buffy, it can feel unearned and manipulative as the show gets the viewer to care about a character's death/plight before kind of just correcting it with minimal explanation. It's an interesting topic, for sure! – Dimitri Adoniou 6 years ago
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  • For some cinematic examples of killing main characters, consider looking at Hitchcock's "Psycho," which is probably the most famous main character death of all time. "The Place Beyond the Pines" is another very effective one. It would be interesting to look at how audience reaction to these deaths effects the consumption of the rest of the narrative. – BradySimenson 6 years ago
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The pen is mightier than the sword

'The pen is mightier than the sword' was first said by Edward Bulwer-Lytton. This saying sounded strange to me at first until I began to think about some more and realised how true it was because a pen has the ability to murder someone or to save someone, to hate someone or to love someone. Many wars have been started with just a signature so this saying still rings true today. Bringing this saying into the 21st century and we see the true power that written (or typed words) can have on someone.Many people are now basing their whole life around what someone may have or have not typed about them on FaceBook and sometimes the hurt things that are being said are being led to our younger generation having mental health issues and parents having to attend the funerals of their very young children. So even though this saying was written over 150 years ago it is still as relevant in today's climate and I do not think that it will ever loose its meaning because it has just as much value in the fiction world as it does in the non-fiction world.

  • While I would like for the pen to be mightier than the sword, I would have to disagree. Violence in itself overpower cultured civilisations, look at what happened to Carthage, but educated violence is the cocktail. Commanders are trained in the educated distribution of violence, – RedFlame2000 6 years ago
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Promoting Healthy Relationships

Pop-culture is infamous for questionable portrayal of romance. What does a healthy relationship look like and what pieces of fiction do a good job at portraying it? A recent good example I can think of is Violet and Tony in The Incredibles 2. While we have yet to see the relationship take off, the fact that he is attracted to her for her confidence sends a positive message. By working on herself first and being strong and independent, Violet was able to attract a nice guy. I think we need more media that sends that message of self-fulfilment being an important ingredient in a healthy relationship.

  • Good. The usually is girlfriends fighting or couples yelling, since it fits an image of TV drama. A normal relationship where friendship or love matter in healthy ways is an interesting topic. Can TV handle this and find it interesting enough to attract and hold viewers? – Joseph Cernik 6 years ago
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  • Love this. Love the idea that relationships do not need to be abusive, unhappy, or negative in any way to be interesting. Hollywood's frequents portrayal of unhealthy relationships--what kind of message is that really sending to kids and young adults? – Eden 6 years ago
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Writing Trauma Sans the Drama

Traumatic pasts are de rigeur across mediums, perhaps especially books. Many, if not all, of our favorite protagonists have traumatic pasts. They've been orphaned, bullied, imprisoned, raped, or had any number of other tragedies visited upon them (sometimes a combination of many). Trauma is often a good tool in the hands of the writer, as it incites sympathy for characters and explains some motivations.

However, trauma in fiction is often handled poorly. When this happens, you tend to get one of two reactions. The first is what TV Tropes calls "Angst? What Angst," wherein a character seems to function entirely separately of trauma, never mentioning it or letting it influence his or her life. Sometimes, the character suppresses the trauma so much, he or she finally has a melodramatic breakdown, or two or three.

But on the other side of that coin, you have characters defined by trauma. This can be extremely obvious, as in the character who acts like a victim and wallows in self-pity, or it can be a bit more subtle. See, for instance, the abused person who grows up to be an unrepentant abuser, or the military veteran who gives up on life and people after losing a limb or sense.

The question becomes then, how can writers write trauma, and do it justice? What is the best way to write a victim who incites sympathy, yet also incites true likability? How much trauma is too much or too little, and in what situations can/should it play a part? Discuss.

  • I think part of the success of writers who write trauma well are those who have directly experienced it themselves, or have those in their lives who have, it is always a little obvious when something is being used to provide a "unique flavour" to a story rather than a legitimate portrayal of a genuine experience. – SaraiMW 6 years ago
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  • When I read A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara, I was struck by the impact of trauma on the protagonist and how difficult it was to read such a difficult subject. Perhaps there was too much as it was so traumatic to the reader - and yet, the novel opened up the discussion on childhood sexual abuse and the impact on the adult. I think it is a fine line to walk and one that needs careful consideration. – Sara 6 years ago
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  • Atomic Design of Nashville, TN is an Internet marketing service provider that provides exceptional web design, SEO, and graphic design. Our digital agency has been providing search engine optimization and website development since 1996. – atomicdesignash 6 years ago
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Goats, gossip, hats and hulla-hoops

What is it about the use of simple poetic techniques that appeal so much to a reader? Is it the rhythmic simplicity that reminds us of our past oral traditions? It might be as storytellers, bards, and oral lore-keepers often learnt their stories in a ballad/poetic form that helped ensure they remembered the story based not only on narrative progression, but also on the rhythmic systems of the form. Could it then be memory based? Many studies cite the use of mnemonic devices to help memorise details – so are we already pre-designed to engage mentally with rhythmic sounds? Or is it the nostalgic appeal of childhood? A recollection of nursery rhymes and foolish riddles that coloured our childhood books and memories, perhaps?

Alliteration is only one such commonly used poetic device. Many are exercised in today's literature for children and adults alike. We still see the use of imagery, allegories, metaphors, similes, personification, and so much more. So how about a discussion of these simple, yet effective poetic devices and what they can add to a developing writer's repertoire.

  • A fascinating topic suggestion. What immediately leapt into my mind upon reading this is the oral tradition of story telling, still in use amongst the so-called 'primitive' peoples of the world. An oral tradition helps to discipline and train the mind, as well as being a memory aid. I often try to find a rhythm in the lines I learn for a role as it helps to get into the mindset of the character I play. I'm also fascinated by the Australian Aboriginal tradition of 'singing' their way across a landscape - the song acts as both a representation of a physical realm and the metaphysical realm - and since I've never heard of an Aborigine getting lost in the outback then it obviously works! – Amyus 6 years ago
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