Where to Begin?

One of the most daunting and intimidating things about writing--especially for students--is just getting started. Crafting that first sentence can feel, at times, like pure torture! In A Moveable Feast, Ernest Hemingway says, "All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence you know." Once he had that first true sentence down on paper, his writing took on a momentum of its own.

That's great, but what if your one true sentence isn't the start of your essay? That's okay! There's no rule that says a paper must be written straight through, beginning to end. I say start where your ideas are and write from those. Don't worry about that first paragraph--the introduction--when you're starting out.

There is an advantage to not immediately drafting the opening of an essay. If you wait until either all or a portion of the essay's body is written before crafting an introduction, you are more likely to end up with an introduction that accurately reflects the focus of the essay's body. It is not unusual for a student to write an engaging, well-reasoned introduction only to wander away from its main idea as the body paragraphs unfold. Chances are you'll have a better grasp of what your strongest ideas (those that need to be introduced in your first paragraph) are, if you've done some extended drafting of the essay's body.

Try it and see what happens!