English 120 Responses

Arianna Pincay

Chapter Four Response


        Having gone to a Journalism school for the past six years, I've done a 

lot of different types of writing. And over the course of those years, I had 

found that narratives were my favorite read and write. This chapter is 

particularly interesting to me because it pinpoints the things that you don't 

think of when writing a narrative. When I write narratives, I just let the 

words come and flow out onto the paper. I hardly even give the finished 

paper a second glance because I feel that it is good enough, and usually it 

comes out to be. But this chapter literally maps out how to write a good, 

compelling narrative, in a way that anyone can write it. My favorite part of 

the chapter is the quote by John Steinbeck on page 67, "Then try to 

remember it so clearly that you can see things: what colors and how warm or 

cold and how you got there. . ." I like this part the most because that's what I

do whenever I write anything; I visualize. Whether it is bringing back a 

memory or imagining myself doing something in the near future. The one thing

that I've always had trouble with in writing is including the right transitions. 

Especially with long papers, there are only so many transitions in the English 

language that one could use. 

        I really enjoyed the narrative by Lynda Barry. From the beginning it was 

captivating and entertaining, which is what a narrative should be. It had the 

right amount of mixed emotions to make the reader connect to the story. It 

had sadness, anger, neglect, drama, but most of all, relief and happiness. 

That's what I feel a narrative should be able to do, to connect with many 

different types of people. To teach lessons, to encourage readers to do 

things, to ward them away from trouble. To me, narratives are the most 

powerful form of creative writing, because they can seem so simple, yet do so 

much. 
     

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