How to write an Analytical Essay

All Ins and Outs That You Need to Know About Writing Analytical Essays

“How do I know what I think until I see what I say?”
― E.M. Forster

Analysis!!

It is all about breaking a complex topic into smaller and easier parts to gain a better understanding and this is what an analytical essay does.

For writing a good analytical essay, first, write an introduction to give an insight into the background information, and then you can introduce the thesis. After that, an entire body is to be written in paragraphs in support of that thesis. The main aim of an analytical essay is to analyze the text and present evidence systematically to support the analysis.

Tents of Writing Analytical Essay:

Prior to learning how to begin with a critical essay, you need to begin a few fundamentals of writing. To put it in other words, before writing you need to understand what a good analysis is. When you write an analytical essay, you are expected to understand the heart and soul of that topic. Begin only when the essence of the topic has gone down to your gut.

The Basic Steps to Follow:

• Explain the meaning of the topic in detail first.
• Analyze the topic thoroughly without being biased.
• Draw parallels. Compare the topic with some related thing. This will help you justify, draw pros and cons and do more.
• Finally, close with a punch. You can provide an argument and defend your opinion with facts and figures to endorse.

If you are writing a thesis, you need to compose a thesis statement.

How to Begin?

When you are writing an analysis paper, you need to defend an argument. So, you should begin with an argument that needs to be defended throughout the paper. A thorough analysis of that specific topic needs to be done. An argument should focus on a thesis statement.

A critical analysis is done to draw conclusions finally and hence if you have the opportunity of choosing the topic of your comfort, you would be in a win-win situation. If not, just research a lot and read about it thoroughly. You will find material in abundance. Think of a thesis statement and make it the most impactful because this is what matters really.

This is just an initial step to writing a great essay. Once you have the thesis statement with you, you need to do more systematic work. As a next step, gather thoughts on how to approach your analysis and how to prepare a systematic flow.

What is to be done for a systematic flow?

• You need to specify the main goals of your analysis. Just keep in mind that you cannot address each and every fact related to the topic as you may have a certain word limit given. So, good preparation matters. You can conduct thorough research and take out the aspects you feel are most important and you are comfortable in discussing them at length. Your goal should be clear to you as you need not get diverted from it.
• Locate the main parts of issues by looking at those parts separately and see how well you can justify them.
• You need to understand how each of these parts works.
• Locate links between the various parts of the topic and see how each part of that topic works actually.
• If you have found plenty of information, you need to solve it.

Get a clear understanding of the topics and thesis statement first as this is the junction, to begin with. If you have a clear direction of the analysis paper planted firmly in your mind you can do perfect justice with your essay.

Framing an outline

The standard essay comprises five paragraphs in general. So, you can draw a rough idea about an introductory paragraph, followed by the second paragraph of the body (this is where you need to write elaborately. So, you can strike a contention, justify it, and so on. You can write several paragraphs but keep those paragraphs short yet meaningful and full of information. 100-120 words are good enough for a paragraph. Do not make them too short or too long.

All you need to do is to gather important information and arguments that you have decided for the purpose of figuring out how to express those ideas in the analysis of the essay. If you have a critical bent of mind, you can write exceptionally well.

You can Choose Arguments of Your Comfort:

The introduction is easier as you need to strike a thought with initial quotes or proverbs but to write the body effectively without making it sound monotonous is a real challenge. People tend to make repetitions, fill clichés and destroy the entire essay. So, be very careful with this part especially. You need to have enough material to support and justify the arguments you are making. You can pick the ones that you feel at ease with and have adequate material.

How to Write an Influential Introduction?

To put a great first impression is very important and hence an introductory paragraph is like a showcase to your essay which can either invite or shoo away the readers depending on how well or poorly it is being written. There has to be a punch to it that can motivate the readers to read further.

• Provide a lead-in for the readers by introducing the topic in an effective manner.
• This is the place to incorporate your thesis statement that shifts the readers from generalization to the specific topic. You can be peppy and informative at the same time for discussing the topic.
• Present a general outline of what readers are going to get in the essay.

Key to remember here:

You need to remember that the readers are to be hooked right from the beginning. You can draw them in by portraying issues in a tempting way so that they crave to know more. If you do so, the purpose of your introductory paragraph would be solved.

How to write a body of the essay?

The body of the essay is equivalent to the soul of the essay as it contains the entire bulk. Obviously, this is more difficult but you can show your capabilities here. When you have adequate information with you, you can begin crafting your paper.

These are to be kept in mind:

• Even if you have multiple arguments to discuss, you need to be coherent. So, take care to discuss one thought at a time.
• Remember to write in an unbiased way, justify your statements with adequate facts, figures and statistics. When you are making judgments, just be careful to be fair and correct.
• Introduce an opposing point of view as well. This will create a balanced perspective.

The bottom Line is…….

Presenting an opposing view can make your essay effective but adhere to your arguments also Create a balancing act and do not let any opposing views counter your argument. You need to pose your arguments strongly.

Follow these steps to create the body of your essay to be at ease:

• Keep the sole focus on the thesis statement. Choose that to present your argument and do not sound weird by talking about something that is not directly related to the topic or introductory thesis statement.
• You need to provide a good context for each topic whether the topic is related to a quote, any specific incident, or something else. Just be prepared to give adequate evidence on who, what, where, when, and how.
• Give an analysis of the argument and how it would prove your thesis appropriately.
• With a closing sentence summarizing your paragraph so that you can have a smooth transition to the next.
• Keep in mind to write in a simple and lucid way. Avoid jargon and anything that can strike a controversy. Your paragraphs should be well framed and should not talk about more than one thought or argument.

Write a Conclusion:

Your conclusion should be short and crisp. It should be able to leave a thought in the minds of readers. Some people choose to summarize everything that they write. You can also choose to wrap the entire essay with a punch but make sure that you are able to provoke thought at last. This will make your essay simply the best! A poorly written closing paragraph can ruin your essay and leave a bad taste in the mouth of readers.

Edit and Proofread:

This is the most important part so do not forget to do this lest your essay will render non-influential no matter how well you may have written it. Give your essay a finishing touch. You can check grammar, spelling errors, punctuation, and more. Read and re-read it to make it impeccable.

If clichés and repetitions are there in the essay it is good to get rid of them to give a better shape to your essay. If there are some parts that are not making any sense, just check them out and delete them. If you have tried hard for your masterpiece, have some more patience to make your essay read seamless.