MLA Descriptive Essay: Basic Components Of A Good Paper

A descriptive essay asks the writer to describe something. Why would you need to describe something? Perhaps your instructor wants to evaluate your writing skills or observational skills. Descriptive writing has useful applications in the real world, such as writing advertisements or product descriptions for catalogs. Regardless of what applications this kind of writing has, you’ve been tasked to write a descriptive essay, and you want to make sure it’s a good one. Here are the basic components you need to write a good descriptive paper, as suggested by experts.

1. Focus on the thing to be described. This can be a person, place, or object. It can also be emotional like a memory or an experience you may have had. Flesh out the details of whatever it is you must describe. Brainstorm about every aspect of whatever it is you are describing. Make sure you use sensory details to immerse really the reader.


2. When you come to describe something, there should be a reason for it. If you describe a person maybe you want the reader to know just how much you admire, or, despise that person. If you are writing about a place or experience, you should let the reader know what that means to you and describe it in such a way that it is evident.


3. Structure your paper in a way that is easily read. Start with what or who you want to describe. Let the reader know right from the start what your paper is going to be about. Next, let the reader know your reason for writing a descriptive piece about this particular person or thing. Without a reason as to why he/she/it is being described, the reader may get lost in your writing or lose interest. Lastly, highlight the qualities of the person, place, or thing you are describing that most appeal to you, and are the reason that you wrote on this subject in the first place. Use an outline to keep all these ideas organized in the proper order so that you can write your paper more smoothly.

Revise your essay and make sure that what you have chosen to describe can be conjured easily in the reader’s mind. If you can’t see, hear, taste, feel, or smell whatever it is you have described, then go back and write it so you can. Otherwise, you would have failed at writing a winning description. If you aren’t fully immersed in the description, then your reader won’t be either.