The key difference is that a narrative essay is designed to tell a complete story, while a descriptive essay is meant to convey an intense description of a particular place, object, or concept.
A narrative essay is a way of testing your ability to tell a story in a clear and interesting way. You’re expected to think about where your story begins and ends, and how to convey it with eye-catching language and a satisfying pace.
Narrative essay assignments vary widely in the amount of direction you’re given about your topic. You may be assigned quite a specific topic or choice of topics to work with.
Don’t worry too much if your topic seems unoriginal. The point of a narrative essay is how you tell the story and the point you make with it, not the subject of the story itself.
Choosing a topic
The best kind of story for a narrative essay is one you can use to reflect on a particular theme or lesson, or that takes a surprising turn somewhere along the way.
When you are prompted to tell a story about your own life or experiences, a narrative essay is usually the right response.
Narrative essays are usually assigned as writing exercises at high school or in university composition classes. They may also form part of a university application.
If you’re not given much guidance on what your narrative essay should be about, consider the context and scope of the assignment. What kind of story is relevant, interesting, and possible to tell within the word count?
The key difference is that a narrative essay is designed to tell a complete story, while a descriptive essay is meant to convey an intense description of a particular place, object, or concept.
A narrative essay is a way of testing your ability to tell a story in a clear and interesting way. You’re expected to think about where your story begins and ends, and how to convey it with eye-catching language and a satisfying pace.
Narrative essay assignments vary widely in the amount of direction you’re given about your topic. You may be assigned quite a specific topic or choice of topics to work with.
Don’t worry too much if your topic seems unoriginal. The point of a narrative essay is how you tell the story and the point you make with it, not the subject of the story itself.
Choosing a topic
The best kind of story for a narrative essay is one you can use to reflect on a particular theme or lesson, or that takes a surprising turn somewhere along the way.
When you are prompted to tell a story about your own life or experiences, a narrative essay is usually the right response.
Narrative essays are usually assigned as writing exercises at high school or in university composition classes. They may also form part of a university application.
If you’re not given much guidance on what your narrative essay should be about, consider the context and scope of the assignment. What kind of story is relevant, interesting, and possible to tell within the word count?
There you have it. For those students bothered with questions such as “what is a narrative essay” or “what is narrative writing” the information provided above will assist you to know what a narrative essay, as well as descriptive essay, is and what is involved in writing it. You are supposed to narrate a story that has a specific point to be made. Your audience has to get a vivid idea or learn a lesson from your paper. Also, make use of emotional language.
While writing your essay, you need to be driven by passion and utilize concrete details. Narrative writing offers students a great opportunity to score highly by telling a good story with passion, without having to concentrate on areas like persuasive writing and literary analysis.
The main story develops in this section. It generally contains three paragraphs. The first one involves the engaging action (a catalyst of the event talked about in the reflective essay). Moreover, the second paragraph concentrates on the middle stage (the advancement of the story and hints to its significance). Finally, the third one describes the end action (what has been done to arrive at a resolution and the lessons learned from that experience).
- Narrative writing guidelines recommend beginning your narrative essay examples with an interesting quote, fact or even a question. Your readers will be intrigued and thus have the urge to read the rest of your story.
- Refrain from long-winded sentences in your introductory paragraph.
- With this kind of essay, you are supposed to write from your own viewpoint. Therefore, make use of suitable words that will express your mindset.
- Narrative essay examples are written in the first person narrative – follow this for your essay too.
Seven Steps for Writing Successful Narrative Essay Examples
In this section, the writer presents his or her thoughts and analysis of the situation and also highlighting the reason why these experiences are important to the readers.
- A Memorable Journey
- A Significant Misunderstanding
- An Embarrassing Event
- Your First Day At Work
- An Unexpected Encounter
- An Encounter With Someone You Were Afraid Of
Selecting a topic may be the most challenging thing to do. Here are a few ideas to assist you to brainstorm topics:
During the process of narrative writing, it’s essential to list any sounds, feelings, tastes that the writer experienced in the story. The writer ought to draw the reader while refraining from making the narrative story sound like another summary. Make use of transitional words in order to make the flow and easy to perceive.
- The words and sentences of your narrative essay must be clear. Use different colors to highlight the main points.
- Factors in your essay must be supported with relevant details and mention the references for each point.
- If there is a need to write the conflict, put it without hesitation as it makes your narrative essay more realistic.
- Flash-forwards and flashbacks can help you to direct the narrative story to an exciting ending.
- Besides the first person, you can use the third person perspective also.
It is best to go through them carefully to understand what your professor expected from you. Also, see if there is any question you require to answer.
After choosing a topic, you need to choose a good story. The story must be related to the topic or theme you choose. It should not hurt anyone’s sentiments, and it must relate to the reader so that they can enjoy the narrative essay more.
Writing a narrative essay does not need much research. It is because it is related to your personal experiences. But some topics are there which requires research to add extra information to the content.
Describe the scene
You also need to describe the scene in detail. It is important because by this you can make readers imagine the scene properly.
When it comes to estimating the time a narrative essay will need to write even an introductory essay, students have to examine research time and various other factors. Almost a 1200 word paper might take from four to five hours to complete the narrative essay.
We have discussed all the important aspects of writing a narrative essay. But still, if you find any difficulty in writing it, feel free to seek our help.
A narrative essay is meant to narrate a whole story, whereas a descriptive essay communicates a description of a specific object, place, or concept.
Introductory background – introduction would also typically contain additional information that helps take readers into the author’s world and help them visualize, imagine, or recreate narrated facts. This could be information about this story’s relevance for you or for everybody else. For instance, it could be mentioning that this story is about your first encounter with a negative manifestation of human nature and describing how shocking this was for you as a child, adolescent, young adult.
- Restatement of thesis. Even if my interlocutor was an absolute stranger and not the most pleasant company, he was not afraid to follow his reasoning wherever it took him, without any imaginary self-imposed taboos.
- key lessons: one needs to always stay open-minded and think beyond self-imposed limits
Below is narrative outline template that reveals the structure and key elements required in a narrative essay. Use it as an example or checklist while working on your outline.
- setting: where I was going with the bus and with what purpose, when this happened, what the weather was like
- characters: description of my interlocutor, complete stranger, with very unremarkable and even somewhat unflattering appearance.
- unfolding of action: how my interlocutor entered the bus and sat next to me
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Main body, as a part of narrative essay outline, should have such constituents:
Examples, recommendations, and structural template should make writing an outline for a narrative essay less challenging. However, if you are out of time or struggling with a complex task, feel free to place an order for an essay so that our professional academic assistants take care of it. With, Edubirdie, after placing the order, you and can transparently choose your preferred writers by reviewing their bidding prices, performance statistics, and even by chatting with them.
Verdict – it comes as a final critical decision: an interpretation of the story from author’s or protagonist’s perspective, why everything happened as it did, who was wrong (if applicable), what would have been the implications if participants had behaved otherwise or if things had unfolded otherwise.