Composing and RevisingWriters make paragraphs under two slightly different sets of circumstances: when they are composing and when they are revising. When writers are composing, they organize the ideas that come into their head or the material that they have gathered from research into paragraphs as they go along, though many writers, in fact, plan their work in such a way that their material is organized into potential paragraphs, or sections of paragraph length, before they even begin to draft the text. When writers are revising, they reshape existing paragraphs or, if they are in the habit of drafting text in lengthy sections, they divide up what they have written into proper paragraphs. In general, therefore, writers usually find themselves making paragraphs either from notes or from existing text.Both of these procedures will be dealt with here. First, however, let us recall the concept that is key to successful paragraphing, under whatever circumstances paragraphs happen to be made: coherence. According to most experts, coherence can be most easily achieved when a paragraph contains what is known as a "topic sentence." The next subsection briefly outlines the nature and function of this vital element.The Topic SentenceA topic sentence, also sometimes referred to as a "thesis sentence," is a sentence that encapsulates the subject matter of the paragraph. The golden rule, remember, is One idea, one paragraph. The topic sentence is the sentence in which that one basic idea is set forth most explicitly. It thus forms the nucleus of the paragraph. The material contained in all the other sentences in the paragraph should in some way relate to the idea encapsulated in the topic sentence, elaborating on it, illustrating or exemplifying it, commenting on it or arguing with it. Material that does not relate to the topic sentence in some way is irrelevant and should be cut or transferred to another paragraph.The topic sentence in the previous paragraph is the first sentence. It contains a definition of the term topic sentence. The remaining sentences expand on that basic definition. The topic sentence of the first paragraph of "Composing and Revising" is likewise the first sentence—"Writers make paragraphs under two slightly different sets of circumstances: when they are composing and when they are revising"—the rest of the paragraph builds on that statement and explains in more detail when and how writers make paragraphs.Consider this paragraph, however:The days dragged on wearily toward Christmas. Despite having been brought up in a Christian household, Daniel did not know of any reason why he should celebrate December 25 more than any other day of the year. Its main advantage was that he did not have to go work on that day; its main disadvantage was that he had to spend it with his family going through a series of meaningless rituals and pretending to enjoy them. He did not enjoy giving gifts, nor did he particularly enjoy receiving them. Even if he made a list of what he wanted, his friends and family would invariably choose an article that was the wrong brand or the wrong color. No one had ever seemed able to match a gift precisely to his needs or desires, and, as far as Daniel was concerned, God was as much at fault in this as any of His creatures. Here, the topic sentence is the second sentence. The paragraph is about Daniel's attitude toward Christmas and gift giving. The first sentence establishes the time of year and hints at Daniel's feelings in the verb phrase "dragged on wearily," but its function is merely introductory. It is only in the second sentence that the writer presents us with the idea that is to be developed further in the remainder of the paragraph.A topic sentence can, in theory, be placed anywhere in the paragraph. There are obvious advantages, however, to letting the reader know early on what the substance of the paragraph is. Consequently, the topic sentence is often the first sentence and is usually positioned close to the beginning.A topic sentence has a good deal in common with a main clause, leaving aside the latter's grammatical function. (There are no grammatical rules, incidentally, that apply specifically to paragraphs.) The main clause is usually the heart of the sentence, and the subordinate clauses are grouped around it. The relationship of the topic sentence to the subsidiary sentences is similar. Likewise, just as it is possible to construct a sentence that does not have a main clause, so it is also possible to construct a paragraph that does not have a topic sentence. Transition paragraphs, for example, do not require a topic sentence, because their main function is to be the hinge between different topics. It is also possible to construct perfectly acceptable body paragraphs that do not have topic sentences. This is especially so in narrative, where you might, for instance, write a paragraph describing a sequence of events or a set of character traits, none of which is necessarily more important than the others. In these circumstances, it would be inappropriate to try to encapsulate the substance of the paragraph in a single sentence. Such is the case in the example that follows:Taggart felt in his jacket pocket for a pack of cigarettes. He kept the gun pointing in my direction. He felt again for his lighter. The gun wavered slightly. I could see he was trying to figure out how to extract his cigarette and light it while still keeping his pistol trained on me. The cops would be here in minutes. As he tapped the top of the pack on the edge of the table, his eyes went down, and the muzzle of his pistol went sideways. In that fraction of a second, I leaped forward, grabbed his arm, and wrenched it upward. The bullet went into the ceiling. The cigarette dropped to the floor. The above example is a genuine paragraph. It has unity, not simply because it deals a single moment in an ongoing story, but because it concentrates on the gun and the cigarette and the relationship between the two, and uses them to provide focus and, in a way, to tell the story. But there is no topic sentence. It is possible to imagine how this same event might have been recounted in a paragraph with a topic sentence. The writer might have begun with a sentence such as this:I guess I would never have gotten out of there before the cops arrived if Taggart hadn't been such a heavy smoker. I could see that he was dying for a cigarette. He felt inside his jacket pocket for a pack…. That first sentence sums up the action that the rest of the paragraph describes in more detail. This approach has one disadvantage, however: It removes the element of suspense.Although there is no rule that each paragraph must contain a topic sentence, most paragraphs, especially in work that is primarily concerned with discussing ideas or providing information rather than telling a story, do contain them and benefit from containing them. It is often helpful to write a topic sentence first and then construct the rest of your paragraph around it. If you start writing a paragraph, and no sentence emerges that could function as its nucleus, then you probably need to clarify what precisely it is that you are trying to say. Similarly, if you look back at a paragraph that you have written and cannot identify a topic sentence, then the chances are that you need to rewrite the paragraph so that a central idea emerges more clearly.Constructing Paragraphs from NotesThe procedure for constructing a paragraph from notes is very similar to the procedure for constructing a sentence from ideas, which was discussed and exemplified in the preceding chapter. First, group together the notes that belong together; second, identify the core idea that will be expressed in the topic sentence; third, arrange the remaining material in an appropriate order around the topic sentence.Let us assume that you are writing a review of an amateur performance of Arthur Miller's famous play The Crucible. You scribbled down as many notes as you could in the theater and added to them after you returned home, while the performance was still fresh in your memory. You clearly want to devote at least one paragraph in your review to the performance of the actor playing the leading role of John Proctor. Your notes read as follows:John Proctor (Peter O'Brien) doesn't look the part—too thin? too slight?—looks more like an intellectual than a Massachusetts farmer—costume too neat?—has good voice—delivers lines well—understands what he is saying, unlike, e.g., Giles Corey—terrible—hasn't a clue—JP badly positioned behind table in scene with Abigail—good chemistry with Abigail—less good with Elizabeth—plenty of passion—positioning poor in examination scene with Elizabeth—JP too far downstage—very good at end—very moving—very dignified. The rule is One idea, one paragraph. The first task, therefore, is to remove any material that does not relate to the actor's performance as John Proctor and to reassign it to another paragraph. From the above, you might omit, for example, the note you made on the bad performance of Giles Corey, unless you particularly wanted to compare Proctor favorably with Corey. You would probably also not need to mention the fact that Proctor was badly positioned in certain scenes. The positioning of the actors on stage is essentially the business of the director, and your assessment of the director's skills—or lack of them—would normally belong in another paragraph.The next task is decide your overall impression of the performance. This, obviously, will inform what you say in the paragraph as a whole and, in particular, determine what you say in your topic sentence.Whether or not the topic sentence will be the first sentence in the paragraph, it is, as has been said, usually a good idea to construct it first—in your head, if not on the page—since it gives the keynote to the paragraph. In framing the topic sentence you make a decision as to what the paragraph is actually about. On that basis, you can then sift your material further, perhaps again rejecting some of it as irrelevant or reshaping it to fit in with the main theme.In this instance, you would probably decide that on balance Peter O'Brien has given a good performance as John Proctor. There were certain matters that you were not entirely happy with—for example, his appearance—but he got many important matters right. You might, therefore, decide to frame your topic sentence like this:Despite certain physical disadvantages, Peter O'Brien gave a very powerful performance as John Proctor. or like this:Peter O'Brien's fine speaking voice and intelligent delivery of the lines made him a very powerful John Proctor, despite his physical disadvantages. or even like this:In Peter O'Brien, this production had a John Proctor who was fully equal to the part in passion, in dignity, and in his intelligent delivery of the lines throughout. Each of these three keynote sentences encapsulates a slightly different attitude toward the performance. The importance of the way you construct your topic sentence becomes obvious when we consider the sort of paragraphs that you might build upon them. There is no doubt which of them Mr. O'Brien would prefer to read in the local newspaper on the day after his first night, but your choice would obviously depend on your particular assessment of his performance and on the tone of your review as a whole.Because the topic sentence is the nucleus of the paragraph, its logic determines the logic of the paragraph as a whole. Its emphases and its attitude, we might say, demand to be carried over into the rest of the paragraph. If, therefore, you chose to write the first of these sentences, which highlights the fact that O'Brien did not look the part by referring to it first, even if only in a subordinated phrase, you would be committing yourself to a full description of his physical inadequacies. Any praise you went on to award him would nevertheless be seen against the background of this basic failing:Despite certain physical disadvantages, Peter O'Brien gave a very powerful performance as John Proctor. With his slight build, his intellectual air, and his overly neat costuming, Mr. O'Brien looked anything but the very model of a 17th-century Massachusetts farmer, but his vocal talents and his intelligent delivery of the lines enabled him to overcome this handicap. He was particularly convincing in his scene with Abigail and in the final scene, where he achieved real dignity and was very moving. He was less convincing in his scenes with Elizabeth, where he was sometimes not helped by bad positioning. All in all, it was a very commendable effort at a very difficult part. But what if you selected the second example sentence? This sentence strikes a rather more positive note insofar as it relegates the chief criticism to a closing phrase. Nonetheless, that criticism still features in the topic sentence. Logically, therefore, it has to be given due weight in the paragraph as a whole. Let us this time place the topic sentence second:Any production of The Crucible is likely to stand or fall by its John Proctor. Peter O'Brien's fine speaking voice and intelligent delivery of the lines made him a very powerful performer in this part, despite his physical disadvantages. He conveyed all the passion and the torment of the man in the scene with Abigail and was particularly dignified and moving in his final scene. His achievement was all the greater, because he did not really look the part, being slighter and more intellectual in appearance than one would normally expect John Proctor to be. His vocal talents more than made up for any physical deficiencies, however, and this was the rocklike central performance that the play needed. Choosing the second of the proposed topic sentences gives you the cue perhaps to add "spin" or "finesse" to the actor's physical disadvantages. They still must be mentioned, but they can be presented in the most positive possible light: "His achievement was all the greater because …" Choosing the third topic sentence, meanwhile, would enable you to avoid mentioning them altogether or to give them very little prominence:Any production of The Crucible is likely to stand or fall by its John Proctor. In Peter O'Brien, this production had a John Proctor who was fully equal to the part in passion, in dignity, and in his intelligent delivery of the lines throughout. The audience was immediately gripped by the tormented power of his first scene with Abigail. In his scenes with Elizabeth, despite sometimes being poorly served by the director, he was scarcely less convincing, and his final moments were intensely moving. This was indeed the rocklike central performance that the play requires. Mr. O'Brien could scarcely ask for anything more.The need for a logical relationship between the topic sentence and the rest of the paragraph can perhaps also be demonstrated if we take the first of the keynote sentences and attach it to the body of the third paragraph.Despite certain physical disadvantages, Peter O'Brien gave a very powerful performance as John Proctor. The audience was immediately gripped by the tormented power of his first scene with Abigail. In his scenes with Elizabeth, despite sometimes being poorly served by the director, he was scarcely less convincing, and his final moments were intensely moving. This was indeed the rocklike central performance that the play requires. Here, an important part of the first sentence has no follow-up at all in the remainder of the paragraph. The reader wonders why the writer bothered to mention the actor's "physical disadvantages," the first sentence effectively loses its status as a topic sentence, and the paragraph as a whole loses the logicality and shape that the previous three examples possessed.The same set of notes can be made into several different paragraphs, as this exercise has shown. The crucial point, as always, is to decide precisely what you want to say. On that basis you construct your topic sentence, and from that the rest of the paragraph should logically flow.Constructing Paragraphs from TextLet us suppose that you have drafted a piece of work on the pleasures and problems of retirement and that you are now setting out to revise it. Part of it reads as follows:At last the day you have been waiting for arrives. You've cleared your desk, you've been to all the parties, you're richer by several fishing poles or clocks or loungers, you've said a fond farewell to all your colleagues and accepted all their good wishes, and you've finally walked out of the old place, probably with a good deal of sadness. All that was yesterday. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. So what are you going to do? There is so much you want to do, so much you could do, so much you never had time to do while you were a working man or woman. At the same time, there's nothing to do. At least there's nothing that you have to do. And maybe that's the greatest thing of all. You're free and you're going to enjoy your freedom more than anything else. And maybe the best way to enjoy your freedom is just to sit comfortably and think about all the wonderful things you're going to do with the time you have left. You'll go on vacation more often, take that trip to Europe or Peru or China you always promised yourself, and see more of the kids and the grandchildren. Great! Except it doesn't take very long to think this and suddenly you realize you're bored. Suddenly you're walking up and down looking for jobs to do. Suddenly you miss the old place like hell, and this whole retirement thing feels like a big mistake. So, what are you going to do now? You cannot fault what you have written as far as liveliness goes, and you have deliberately chosen to write in an informal style. But there is informal and there is formless, and this, as it stands, falls into the latter category. It needs breaking into paragraphs.Breaking text into paragraphs—that is, into text without a lot of crossing out and overwriting—should be a fairly simple task. Even when you are in the flow and drafting speed, you will naturally tend to arrange your ideas in a reasonably logical sequence. It is essentially a question of finding the best places to break the sequence, and then doing a little shaping to make the resultant sections into satisfactory paragraphs.In order to find the best points at which to begin new paragraphs, you will first need to isolate the different ideas that are contained in the passage. If you are lucky, you may find that you have already written sentences that will serve as topic sentences on which to base the new paragraphs.The example passage above seems to fall into three basic sections: first, a retrospective look at the day before the first day of actual retirement; second, the retiree's thoughts; third, the retiree's second thoughts, as it were, when he or she finds that thinking of things to do is no substitute for actually doing something. So, we might roughly chop the passage up like this:At last the day you have been waiting for arrives. You've cleared your desk, you've been to all the parties, you're richer by several fishing poles or clocks or loungers, you've said a fond farewell to all your colleagues and accepted all their good wishes, and you've finally walked out of the old place, probably with a good deal of sadness. All that was yesterday. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. So what are you going to do?
There is so much you want to do, so much you could do, so much you never had time to do while you were a working man or woman. At the same time, there's nothing to do. At least there's nothing that you have to do. And maybe that's the greatest thing of all. You're free and you're going to enjoy your freedom more than anything else. And maybe the best way to enjoy your freedom is just to sit comfortably and think about all the wonderful things you're going to do with the time you have left. You'll go on vacation more often, take that trip to Europe or Peru or China you always promised yourself, and see more of the kids and the grandchildren.
Great! Except it doesn't take very long to think this and suddenly you realize you're bored. Suddenly you're walking up and down looking for jobs to do. Suddenly you miss the old place like hell, and this whole retirement thing feels like a big mistake. So, what are you going to do now? This is a start, but it looks like one of those starts where the partially improved passage looks, if anything, slightly worse than the unimproved passage. Making rough divisions can leave rather rough edges. That, however, is something you can work on.Since this is a passage in an informal style, it may be a good idea to think in terms of short paragraphs, even really short paragraphs. For example, the middle paragraph might benefit from being split again. The first sentence ("There is so much you want to do …") could be a topic sentence for a short paragraph of five sentences. The present sixth sentence ("And maybe the best way to enjoy your freedom …") perhaps introduces a different thought. It is also, incidentally, constructed on a very similar pattern to the next-to-last sentence and others preceding it. There are instances where, as we shall see in the next subsection, parallel construction is an asset. But there is parallelism by design and parallelism by accident, and this looks like the latter.Furthermore, there is the question that hangs onto the end of the first paragraph. The previous sentence ("Today is the first day of the rest of your life.") makes a rather nice conclusion and has the additional advantage that it harks back to the opening sentence. You could detach the question and reattach it to the front of the following paragraph, but it does not altogether fit there either. Perhaps you could take advantage of the freedom offered by the comparative informality of tone and structure and leave it isolated as a separate one-sentence paragraph. And if you can be so bold with the question at the end of the first paragraph, might it not be a good idea to be equally bold with the question at the end of the present third paragraph and, possibly, with the "Great!" that introduces it?A final version of the original text, reparagraphed along the lines herein suggested and otherwise generally tidied up, might look something like this:At last the day you've been waiting for arrives. You've cleared your desk, you've been to all the parties, you're richer by several fishing poles or clocks or loungers, you've said a fond farewell to all your colleagues and accepted all their good wishes, and you've finally walked out of the old place, probably feeling pretty sad. But all that was yesterday. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. So what are you going to do? There is so much you want to do, so much you could do, so much you never had time to do while you were working. At the same time, there's nothing to do. At least, there's nothing that you have to do. And maybe that's the greatest thing of all. You're free, and you're going to enjoy your freedom more than anything else. The best way to enjoy your freedom may be just to sit comfortably and think about all the wonderful things you're going to do with the time you have left. You'll go on vacation more often, take that trip to Europe or Peru or China you always promised yourself, and see more of the kids and the grandchildren. Great! Except that it doesn't take very long to have these thoughts, and suddenly you realize you're bored. Suddenly you're walking up and down looking for jobs to do. Suddenly you miss the old place like hell. Suddenly this whole retirement thing feels like a really big mistake. So, what are you going to do now? The original text was lively; the revised text is even livelier. There is a real sense that the writer is speaking directly to the reader and, indeed, having fun with the reader. The questions have an almost teasing quality, now that they are separated out from the rest of the text.This example in particular is intended to show that making paragraphs need not be—ought not to be—a humdrum task undertaken simply for reasons of literary or academic propriety. When you divide your work up into well-constructed paragraphs, you add value to it. You not only clarify it, you often enliven it; you not only make it easier for the reader to read, you usually make it look better on the page; you not only give your thoughts distinctness, you put them in a context designed to show them to best advantage. A writer's stylistic skills are shown as much in the way he or she makes paragraphs as they are in the way he or she chooses words or constructs sentences.
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