Introductions and Opening Sentences

1. Ms. Talmage English I September 2008 Introductions and Opening Sentences

2. Introductions • A startling statement • Example: Cancer isn't deadly. That is...if you don't catch it. • An anecdote • A funny story or joke

3. Introductions • A quotation related to the topic • Example: “The ring works hard now to get back into the hands of men.” (The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien) Why men? That's simple. In the past, the ring found that men were easy to control....

4. Introductions • In media res – beginning “in the middle of” the action • The beginning of XXX with Vin Diesel...Vin steals the Senator's car and drives it off a bridge to prove a point. • The beginning of Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers

5. Introductions • A dialogue • Example: “Off there to the right – somewhere – is a large island,” said Whitney. “It's rather a mystery–” • “What island is it?” Rainsford asked. • “The old charts call it 'Ship-Trap Island,'” Whitney replied. “A suggestive name, isn't it? Sailors have a curious dread of the place. I don't know why. Some superstition—” (“The Most Dangerous Game” by Richard Connell)‏

6. Introductions • A vivid scene • Example: A woman I don't know is boiling tea the Indian way in my kitchen. There are a lot of women I don't know in my kitchen, whispering, and moving tactfully. They open doors, rummage through the pantry, and try not to ask me where things are kept. They remind me of when my sons were small, on Mother's day or when Vikram and I were tired, and they would make big, sloppy omelets. I would lie in bed pretending I didn't hear them. (“The Management of Grief” by Bharati Mukherjee)‏

7. Introductions • A question or problem • Example: Doctor Menlo was having a problem: he could not sleep and his wife – the other Doctor Menlo – was secretly staying awake in order to keep an eye on him. (“Dreams” by Timothy Findley)‏

8. Introductions • A personal reflection about the topic • Example: The thousand injuries of Fortunado I had borne the best I could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge. (“The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allen Poe)‏

9. Introductions • A description of the topic that does not name it • Example: The bowl was perfect. Perhaps it was not what you'd select if you faced a shelf of bowls, and not the sort of thing that would inevitably attract a lot of attention at a crafts fair, yet it had a real presence. It was as predictably admired as a mutt who has no reason to suspect he might be funny. (Here, the description of the bowl also describes the topic of the short story, a woman named Janus.) (“Janus” by Ann Beattle)‏

10. Introductions • A dramatic incident • Example: When Miss Emily Grierson died, our whole town went to her funeral: the men through some sort of respectful affection for a fallen monument, the women mostly out of curiosity to see the inside of her house, which no one save an old manservant – a combined gardener and cook – had seen in at least ten years. (“A Rose for Emily” by William Faulkner)‏

11. Introductions • A contrast • Example: • The minute our train leaves the Hong Kong border and enters Shenzhen, China, I feel different. I can feel the skin on my forehead tingling, my blood rushing through a new course, my bones aching with a familiar old pain. And I think, my mother was right. I am becoming Chinese. • “Cannot be helped,” my mother said when I was fifteen and had vigorously denied that I had any Chinese whatsoever below my skin. I was a sophomore at Galileo High in San Francisco, and all my Caucasian friends agreed: I was about as Chinese as they were. (“A Pair of Tickets” by Amy Tan)‏

12. Introductions • An explanation of the thesis • Example: In “Sonny's Blues,” James Baldwin employs water as a symbol that enables him to concentrate more clearly on the lack of and the crucial need for a real sense of communication among members of society. (From the student essay: “The Struggle to Surface in the Water of 'Sonny's Blues'” by Geoffrey Clement)‏

13. Introductions • A brief historical background • Example: I've never really done much with my life, I suppose. I never had a television. Grandma Kashpaw had one inside her apartment at the Senior citizens, so I used to go there and watch my favorite shows. For a while she used to call me the biggest waste on the reservation and hard back to how she saved me from my own mother, who wanted to tie me in a potato sack and throw me in a ditch. Sure, I was grateful to Grandma Kashpaw for saving me like that, for raising me, but gratitude gets old. (“Love Medicine” by Louise Erdrich)‏

14. Introductions • An idea to be refuted • Example: We have curious ideas of ourselves. We think of ourselves as a body with a spirit in it, or a body with a soul in it, or a body with a mind in it...It's a funny sort of superstition.

15. “Marley was dead, to begin with.” A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens Opening Sentences

16. “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.” The Hobbit, J. R. R. Tolkien Opening Sentences

17. “It was the best of times; it was the worst of times.” A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens Opening Sentences

18. “When Menolly, daughter of Yanus Sea Holder, arrived at the Harper Craft Hall, she came in style, aboard a bronze dragon.” Dragonsinger, Anne McCaffrey Opening Sentences

19. “Mr. And Mrs. Dursley, of number four, Privet Drive, were proud to say that they were perfectly normal, thank you very much.” Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J. K. Rowling Opening Sentences

20. “Once upon a time . . .” Opening Sentences