Summary Essays
A summary essay is usually written for others. It is supposed to give an overview of the main ideas the author puts across in an original text. When writing a summary essay, you should provide relevant descriptions and present your sources comprehensively and accurately to avoid misleading the readers.
Summary essay writing can be challenging for many students. This guide provides guidelines and tips for writing excellent papers on various summary essay topics.
What is a summary essay?
This type of essay concisely summarizes all the main ideas in a piece of writing. Unlike paraphrases which closely mirror the original text's presentation, summary essays omit extended quotes, analogies and rhetorical strategies used in the original text. A summary essay is typically about a third of the length of the text being summarized.
Most summary essays present the author's main points in the order that he/she has made them. They continually reference the article being summarized and use direct quotations of the author's statements. The essay does not cite the supporting details or examples made by the author unless they are important to the main idea. It relies on using standard signal phrases.
Summary essay writing
Here are the steps you should follow to write an excellent summary paper:
1. Study the text being summarized thoroughly to identify the author's main ideas and get a feeling of his or her tone, style and mood.
2. Make an outline dividing the text you are reading into several sections. Read each section as you highlight the key points that you should include in your summary.
3. Once you have an understanding of the information in each section, write a short overview that conveys the author's main ideas.
4. Expand on the main ideas you've chosen by including examples from the original text. Your summary essay should only include the necessary information. Avoid describing minor points that are insignificant to the main plot.
5. Link your sentences together using transition words to give flow to your summary essay.
Summary essay structure
For a better understanding of your comprehension of the text being summarized, you should organize your summary essay in the recommended format.
Introduction
A summary essay introduction should give a brief overview of the main ideas presented by the author in the original text. The introduction broadly features a thesis statement that summarizes the main point in the source text.
The first sentence in the introduction should give the reader a glimpse of what the essay is about. In addition to introducing the main point of the source text, it should include the author's name, the title of the work and background of the author.
Author tag: Start your summary essay with the name of the author and the title of the work you are summarizing. Using author tags informs the reader that you are paraphrasing the author's words and not giving your own ideas.
Body
The body of your summary essay condenses and paraphrases the original piece being summarized. Use your own words to highlight the main point that the author is trying to put across. Include the examples and illustrations that the author uses to support the main points.
Use fewer words to repeat what the source text says without introducing your metaphors, ideas, illustrations or interpretations.
Summary essays do not have conclusions since you do not provide a point of view in the body. You should only include a conclusion paragraph if your teacher explicitly asks you to.
Key points to consider when writing a summary essay
Do not present opinions of your own
While writing a summary essay requires you to give the gist of the story or author's argument in your own words, you should avoid including commentary or opinions of your own. Provide a subjective overview of the author's work as it is not as you imagine it to be.
Do not provide an explanation or interpretation and instead focus on highlighting the plot, the essence of the story and the main characters.
Be informative
A summary essay is supposed to provide readers who have not read the original work a glimpse of its content. It should be informative to be beneficial to the reader. Writing a summary essay with competence usually requires doing the required reading and understanding. Instructors look at how informative a summary essay is to test whether a student has read and understood the material being summarized.
Do not criticize
A summary essay is not a critique of the original work. When writing a summary essay, your focus should be summarizing the original text. Your essay should be a summarized substitute for the original work. It should give the reader an understanding of the source.
Have a complete understanding of the source
Your interpretation of the original work in the summary essay is critical. The wrong interpretation can distort the author's original meaning and mislead your readers. If you have doubts about your understanding of the source, make necessary clarifications before you start writing.
Break down the text
Summarizing a huge text can seem daunting. Breaking down the text can help you organize your ideas and get started on your summary. You should answer questions like; what kind of text are you summarizing? What message did the author want to pass across? How effective was the author at passing the message across? What is the context of the text?
Final thoughts
A summary essay tests a student's comprehension of a text and conciseness in summarizing the main points. Summary essay topics can cover a novel, scientific work, research paper or an interesting article. If you are not sure about writing a summary essay, you can use the pointers included above as guidance. There are numerous summary essay topic examples written by experts that you can consult to get a better idea of what is expected when writing a summary essay.
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