History of English Essay

An essay is undoubtedly one of the ancient blocks of English writing. Ever since essay writing came into existence, constant efforts were made to improve its structure and format in order to give it a writing-friendly touch.

If you go through the history of essay writing, you will find that it has passed through many phases and has attainted this form as we see it in today. Research suggests that there is a mighty difference between literature and essay writing. The reason being some historical accidents, this writing has gotten mixed up with the literature. Going way back around 1100 AC, Europe tried to regain its peace and great amount of importance was finally given to drama and literature. This era was name as ‘the classics’. Great writers and poets play their role in the advancement of literature and language. These golden civilizations are considered to be very sophisticated in terms of their heritage and culture. Therefore, literature gained decent momentum.

Classic texts were included in the curriculum of institutes to keep the legendary work in safe hands and to make the upcoming generations familiar with the heritage. Prestigious colleges start teaching students about how to compose literature. At that time, research on literature was not in great momentum. However, it was adopted by English professors. There begins a series of writing quality piece of work. Essay is basically a French word meaning ‘to balance’. A real essay was defined to be the one that strongly explains what the writer wants to say. No ambiguity is allowed in the writing. It should sound solidly convincing with correctly quoted facts.

Research shows that in the year 1580, famous writer Michel de Montaigne, wrote a book named ‘Essais’. Later the word ‘essay’ derived from it. An essay should put forward questions regarding some phenomenon and then explaining its answers. Writing an essay is in a way similar to getting known about the history of the particular subject. You go through the matter from the very beginning to understand the concepts clearly. It helps you in a positive way to evaluate how the subject is being changed as the time flew and the type of changes that it has bore. Looking at the latest side of the matter, one comes to the conclusion that change is the only thing to stay constant in life. However, what doesn’t change is the basic principle or the driving force. Same is the case with essay writing history. It has gone past very many eras and many changes are being induced in it with the course of time but it has some how retained its original body. It is certainly different in terms of formats and patterns from the ancient text, but the basic principle has remained unaltered. It still demands clarity of mind and strong writing skills. It is still supported by authentic facts and figures and is still being read by an educated sophisticated class.

Looking back at the history of literature, we conclude that it is important to keep things in the place they deserve and follow a standardized pattern. Changing formats for the sake of trending things is not a mature thing to be implemented. It is always nice to retain your classic literature and try to improve its weak points.

Author Bio: Flash Term Papers provides custom term paper and research paper writing services.

Category: Education
Keywords: term papers, essays, research papers, thesis, dissertation, book report

Leave a Reply