An outline is a bare-bones precursor to your essay that gives a high-level view of the topics it will cover.

Step 2: Make an outlineĪfter you’ve explored your ideas and gotten a clear sense of what you’ll write, make an outline. You can change these later if they don’t mesh with your first draft, but playing with these ideas in the idea-generating stage can help you craft multiple drafts. You might map out the topics you want to mention in the essay or think through each point you’d like to make to see how each will fit into the allotted word count (if you’re given one).Īt this stage, you can also start thinking about the tone you’ll use in your essay and any stylistic choices you’d like to incorporate, such as starting each paragraph with the same phrase to create anaphora or leaving the reader with a cliffhanger ending. Sometimes, your topic is chosen for you in the form of a prompt. The first step in writing a narrative essay is to determine the topic.

5 steps to writing a narrative essay Step 1: Topic choice (or prompt given) You can be creative in a narrative essay because you’re writing a story rather than presenting and dissecting others’ statements or work. Unlike most other types of essays, narrative essays have room for literary devices, such as metaphor and onomatopoeia. They’re often personal essays that detail specific episodes in their authors’ lives, which is why they’re popular for college essays. Rather than presenting and defending a position, as in an argumentative essay, or analyzing another text, like in an analytical essay, a narrative essay tells a coherent story. Narrative essays, perhaps unsurprisingly, are defined by the presence of a narrative in the text. You can format a fictional story as a narrative essay. Grammarly helps you communicate confidently Write with Grammarly What is a narrative essay?Ī narrative essay typically tells a true story that may have a few elements changed for clarity or dramatic purposes.

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