The Development of an Essay - brought to you by Emily Chase

Ms. Emily Chase constructs her essay, Warping Time with Montaigne, with a time consuming process to strengthen her essay to make her points clear to her readers.

The essay began as a literary nonfiction essay Chase began in her Graduate Composition class. The research paper was focused upon the works of Montaigne and with that introduction to the writer, she began to take up a further interest in Montaigne's writings.

With this now built-in interest, Chase decided to write a better essay that compared and contrasted the similarities between Montaigne and (essayist) Rodriguez writings. But how did she come about writing her essay?

• She developed a cluster web with a central idea of literary nonfiction
• Did a lot of freewriting
• Loved the image of metaphors, so used them
• Read essays by Early and Tompkins. Chase loved the way Early used words and was influenced by her. Even though Chase didn't necessarily understand the point Tompkins was trying to make in her essay, she didn't want her own essay to come off the same way.
• Journal entries. With the journal entries, she was able to flesh out where and what she wanted to do with her essay. By using her journal, she was able to organize her thoughts thoroughly. It was a place for her to write down ideas and by seeing them, was able to work out whether or not they would work.
• Peer critique. The peer critique she received was one that made her realize that her draft was actually readable and not a bunch of jargon slapped together to form an essay. By having your peers read your work and critique it, it gives a valuable insight. It's wonderful to get feedback from their point of view.
• The connection between Star Trek and warping time. By letting her mind drift to the final frontier, she tagged on the central point of her essay. A time warp = warping a loom with her loved weaving. She can now have a personal connection to the essay. This is the connection she had before writing her essay and with this connection, she had a hook that followed throughout Warping Time
• The editing group Chase was apart of gave her important feedback and suggestions so that Chase could give each draft a more polished look.
• Chase made a list between the points she wanted to make in her essay between Montaigne and Rodriguez.
• Chase also wrote a TON of drafts. Even though the beginning was what she kept, she flushed and re-did the middle until it became polished.

According to Chase, this was the first time she really settled down and focused on the artwork of forming an essay. She re-wrote and re-wrote until she finished with a polished essay ready for publication. She didn't look at the assignment as something she had to do, but found a personal interest in the topic at hand, included her own personal hobby of weaving for the hook in the essay and found joy in writing it. Once you find joy in your writing, you can almost write anything.