A student sits alone in a darkened dorm room, the student’s face bluish white in the glow of the only light in the room, a laptop screen. The student’s t-shirt sports a small trail of nacho chip crumbs. As we move closer, we can see that the laptop screen is blank, a single blinking cursor staring back at the student from an empty word processor document. Our student is trapped in an academic prison, waiting for inspiration that may never come. This is what essay desperation looks like. However, you don’t have this problem and won’t stare blankly at your screen because you’ve read this article and now understand how a dramatic and compelling hook can draw the audience into your paper.
Are You Going to Write a Hook for an Essay?
This article will help you to create a great hook for your next essay. But, before we teach you how to open your essay, a quick word of advice: You can write your essay a lot faster if you wait to write the hook last.
Hold on, you might be saying. Should I be writing my paper from beginning to end? As it turns out, that isn’t really the case. Instead, if you write your body paragraphs first, you can then put yourself in a stronger position to determine the most effective opening strategy to draw the audience in from the very first line. It can be especially beneficial to use your conclusion to guide you to clues for the best way to hook the audience. After all, the introduction and conclusion should work together to promote your thesis.
Now it’s time to start thinking about some of the most effective hooks for drawing in your audience. There are a few key strategies that often work best:
Open with an Illustrative Anecdote
Research finds that readers remember stories better than they do facts. It’s also true that readers prefer stories to dry data. That’s one reason that ancient people encoded so much information into myths. Stories are just more interesting. When you begin with a compelling anecdote, you can draw the audience into your essay easily. But what makes for a great anecdote? It turns out there are a few elements most share: First, a good anecdote needs to tell an interesting story. It’s probably obvious at this point that your opening has to interest the reader! Beyond this, an anecdote needs to relate to your essay topic. Even the world’s most interesting anecdote won’t save your paper if it doesn’t relate to and support your thesis. Finally, your anecdote must be short. It can’t overwhelm the body of the paper or take so long to read that the audience can’t understand the point.
Open with an Interesting Quotation
Beginning with a quotation that grabs attention is a great way to open an essay to intrigue the reader and draw the reader in. A quotation can draw a connection between your essay and a famous person or perhaps provide a different point of view that nobody else could say better than the person who first said it. However, when using quotations, there are some things to be careful about. First, the quotation you use has to be interesting to the reader. You can’t select any random bit of boring text and expect engagement. Second, you shouldn’t use a dictionary definition as your opening quote. Not only is it boring, but it’s also a cliché that marks your essay as beginner-level work. Remember, if a quote doesn’t interest you, it won’t interest your readers.
Open with a Compelling Fact or Dramatic Statistic
Using a dramatic fact or statistic is another great way to command attention from your opening line. Starting with some compelling data can shock your audience out of their complacency and make them want to learn more. For example, think about the difference between a generic statement about a topic and specific factual evidence for a claim. Saying that there are a lot of drunk drivers and many get into accidents is generic and not very memorable, but saying the average drunk driver drove drunk 80 times before their first arrest is shocking and much more memorable. When you use specific research and powerful facts, you will not only command your audience’s attention but will also remind your readers that you are a potent researcher who deserves to be listened to.
The type of opening you use will vary depending on the topic of the paper and how you wrote it. The goal should be to choose an introductory approach that works with the topic and the structure of your essay. For example, an English essay might benefit from an anecdote, while a science paper may work better with a compelling statistic.
When you’re stuck on the opening to your essay, or any other section of your papers, you can hire professional academic writers from essay writing services to help you with your essay. Having someone to help can be a major stress reliever and a great way to get an expert’s perspective on your essay’s most challenging parts. Reading an expert’s take on the most effective introduction for your paper can help you to create a compelling and effective essay that will make sure your paper will be the absolute best it can be—and keep your readers interested and ready to read more.
Wrapping Up about Writing a Hook for an Essay
A well-written hook, unfortunately, doesn’t cover the entire essay. If, after coming up with a quality beginning, you go down the road with research and argumentation, the artistically composed hook won’t work. Still, when you invest time and effort to compose a quality intro for your essay that will attract your reader, you will have a much better understanding of the topic and what you want to say about it. Make sure that the essay hook answers your topic not only in content but in form as well. If you choose a quotation, make sure it doesn’t sound like something you would find in a fortune cookie.
Now you know how to give your essay a great start that will define the entire content flow. Save these recommendations for further usage, as it is impossible to remember all the tips for every essay part you need to follow in order to come up with an excellent paper on time.
