Writing Dialogue in The College Essay
When a college or university application invites you to tell your story, you should take that opportunity to write an essay using time-tested narrative techniques. Setting the scene, introducing characters, giving them action, and establishing narrative conflict are all essential storytelling methods that work together to captivate the attention of readers. When writing about your own life, you become the main character of the story. The reader sees the world through your eyes and from your unique perspective. Other characters, such as a mentor, boss, family member, coach, teammate, or friend, will likely appear somewhere in your story.
Bringing a character to life on the page requires endowing them with plausible gesture, action, and dialogue. Performing a task is an example of action, whereas a facial expression or certain way of carrying oneself would be an example of gesture. Dialogue offers one of the best ways to animate a character. Dialogue clues the reader into the character’s thoughts and attitudes while also communicating more subtle and implied aspects of human social interactions.
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Dialogue comes in two varieties, external and internal. External dialogue happens when a character speaks out loud to another person. Internal dialogue happens when the character expresses their inner thoughts, silently. External dialogue is ideal when used as a hook at the beginning of the essay to capture the attention of readers. It is also great for relating a parent’s or mentor’s favorite sayings or memorable words of wisdom. Internal dialogue works perfectly when you as the main character want to illustrate a moment of doubt or disbelief or when you encounter a scenario that challenges an assumption or expectation. Inner dialogue is often presented in the form of a question. It may be written in normal prose, but is easier to read if it appears in italics.
When writing a college essay, use dialogue sparingly. At Seneca, we advise our clients to edit dialogue down to short, punchy statements and single lines of text, both for impact and to save space. Always start a new paragraph when a new speaker speaks, use dialogue tags to help the reader know who is speaking, and keep your punctuation inside the quotation marks. Snippets of dialogue also create sharp transitions between passages of storytelling and personal reflection, so consider adding brief dialogue to the conclusion of your essay as you return to storytelling mode at the end.