<p>D is about to start a scholarship essay about a book. The wild thing is that is it supposed to be 500-750 words long - the length of the “big” CA essay. Anyway, although I assume that the folks reading the essay have read just about every book an 18 year old could suggest, how much of the essay do you think D should spend telling about the book, as opposed to her thoughts about the book/why it is important? It’s not a super-common book like Catcher in the Rye; it’s non-fiction, but it’s the type of book that most educated adults (esp those with a liberal bent) would have read.</p>
<p>Any idea as to what percentage of the essay should summarize the book?</p>
<p>Having read lots of these essays in my career, I’d suggest spending as little space as possible recounting the book. If it’s something that the scholarship members have probably read, a sentence or two summarizing the main thesis will suffice.</p>
<p>missypie, speaking as somebody who’s served on such committees, I’d advise your D to avoid too much summary and paraphrase, because if she’s only got 500-750 words, she needs to use most of them sounding smart–using the book, in other words, implicitly to turn the focus onto herself, rather than channeling the book. However, if she is too oblique or obscure in her references to the text, the reader will not be able to understand what she is driving at. Even somebody who’s read the book at one time might not have it right in the forefront of his/her mind. So, maybe a sentence in the first para describing the book’s main thesis, and a quick summary of any specific points with which your D might be taking issue at the appropriate points in the essay. The best way to do this is to incorporate the information into the analysis, almost as if it were a reminder rather than a straightforward “you’ve never heard this before” sort of summary. For a novel or short story, which I realize this is not, I would recommend briefly identifying the characters’ relationships: “Paul X, the teenage hero and narrator,” “Charlotte X, Paul’s mother,” “Geena Y, Paul’s best friend,” etc. It’s very hard to understand a detailed analysis of something one hasn’t read without this kind of information.</p>