Essay is a rather formal piece of writing and the issue of style appears to be of utmost importance if you want your essay to be awarded with a positive mark. We will try to help you with this interesting task and make its stylistic aspect as clear as possible.
Below you will find useful tips on the stylistic aspect:
- Avoid contractions and non-standard words: the way we speak or express our ideas in a piece of informal writing differs considerably from the standard form; it is shorter and seems to be easier and more efficient, but when used in a formal essay, such words make your writing style look childish and immature, if not offensive for the reader.
- Avoid elliptical sentences: being another peculiarity of colloquial speech, they depend much on the context and non-verbal means of communication, which are often exploited in every day communication. However, when used in writing, they can hinder the reader’s understanding and the text will fail to convey the author’s idea.
- Avoid too long sentences: although they are often considered to be characteristic of a formal style, too many long sentences can make the idea seem vague; moreover, they are tiring for the reader, because they do not allow to enjoy reading, as he/she is supposed to follow the sentence structure very carefully to understand the meaning.
- Avoid very short sentences: although they are an effective means of attracting the reader’s attention, their extensive use makes the style look simplistic and boring.
- Avoid archaic words and sentence structures: many students in their desire to formalize their language fall into extremes and use outdated words and constructions, which create an artificial impression.
- Try to be realistic: think about your essay in a real life context and use the appropriate style of the modern language without making it either your great-grandmother talk or a chit-chat of a five-year-old child.
- Get rid of unnecessary repetitions: try to use synonyms if one issue is described in several sentences in a row and it is necessary to mention it in each of them.
We recommend to look through the most common stylistic mistakes in order to know how to avoid them.
