How to Write a Winning College Application Essay, Revised 4th Edition: Revised 4th Edition by Mason Michael James

Author:Mason, Michael James [Mason, Michael James]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Three Rivers Press
Published: 2011-02-02T16:00:00+00:00

Tell Us a Story

EVERYONE LOVES stories. They entertain us, captivate us, capture our imaginations like nothing else. The cultures of every people on earth are tied to their stories. If we lose our stories we lose our connection to our legacy as humans, both as members of our tribes and as individuals. The entire history of the planet is nothing more than a collection of stories, and the great books are all stories. Let’s face it. If your college application essay doesn’t tell a story in one way or another, you’re sunk. It’s a fact. What this means is that you must use the techniques of good stories in your essay.

Good story technique involves several key features that you’ve probably heard a great deal about from your literature teachers. For our purposes, we should look at the absolute necessities for a good story. Setting is vital—always tell us where the story is occurring and with as much sensory detail as is needed to make it “come alive” for us. Characters are always crucial. Tell us who is with you in your story and describe them—by name and with some identifying characteristics. You would be amazed at the number of times that students write a narrative paragraph in their essay and neglect to tell us who else is in the story. Stories should have action—important events that we can see and feel and that move the story along. Ernest Hemingway had a good piece of professional advice for young writers of narrative that can help any college application essay writer. He said, “Never confuse movement with action.” In our application essay narratives, that can mean using an editorial touch to depict only the most important plot points of the story, avoiding unimportant events that fail to move the tale along. Every good story has a voice—the storyteller’s voice that should be carefully crafted. When you tell a story in your essay, think of yourself as an actor narrating the tale that you are in or have witnessed and make certain that your voice has an attitude—a tone of respect, excitement, or mystery, amusement, perhaps, or even self-deprecation or incredulity. Whatever it may be, your story should have attitude. Finally, your story should be strategic—it must have a thematic truth that becomes evident by the close of the essay. (See chapter 7 for some samples of essays that succeed or fail to use story in an effective manner.)

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