narrative essay topics and examples

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How to Write a Narrative Essay or Speech (With Topic Ideas)

• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

A narrative essay or speech tells a story, often one based on personal experience. The narrative is a genre of writing that comprises works of nonfiction, stories that stick closely to facts and follow a logical chronological progression of events. In narratives, writers often use anecdotes to relate their experiences and engage the reader. In doing so, writers give their stories a level of emotional appeal. A narrative can be serious or humorous, but some kind of emotional appeal is essential to provide an audience with a way to connect to the story.

Below is an overview of how to construct a narrative essay or speech and some topic ideas for your next piece of narrative writing.

The most successful narrative essays usually share these three basic traits:

• They make a central point.
• They contain  specific details in support  of that point.
• They are clearly  organized in time .

Constructing the Essay

Magazines like the New Yorker and websites like Vice are known for the pages-long narrative essays they publish, sometimes called long-format journalism. But an effective narrative essay can be as short as five paragraphs. As with other kinds of essay writing, narratives follow the same basic outline:

• Introduction: This is the opening paragraph of your essay. It contains the hook, which is used to grab the reader's attention, and the thesis or topic, which you'll detail in the next section.
• Body: This is the heart of your essay, usually three to five paragraphs in length. Each paragraph should contain one example, such as a personal anecdote or noteworthy event, that supports your larger topic.
• Conclusion: This is the final paragraph of your essay. In it, you'll sum up the main points of the body and bring your narrative to an end. Writers sometimes embellish the conclusion with an epilogue or a takeaway.

Narrative Essay Topics

Choosing the topic for your narrative essay may be the hardest part. What you should be looking for in a topic is a particular incident you can recount in a well-developed and organized essay  or speech . Here are a few ideas to help you brainstorm topics. They're quite broad, but something should spark an idea.

• An embarrassing experience
• A memorable wedding or funeral
• An exciting minute or two of a football game (or another sporting event)
• Your first or last day at a job or new school
• A disastrous date
• A memorable moment of failure or success
• An encounter that changed your life or taught you a lesson
• An experience that led to a renewed faith
• A strange or unexpected encounter
• An experience of how technology is more trouble than it's worth
• An experience that left you disillusioned
• A frightening or dangerous experience
• A memorable journey
• An encounter with someone you were in awe of or afraid of
• An occasion when you experienced rejection
• Your first visit to the countryside (or to a large city)
• The circumstances that led to the breakup of a friendship
• An experience that showed that you should be careful of what you wish for
• A significant or comic misunderstanding
• An experience that showed how appearances can be deceiving
• An account of a difficult decision that you had to make
• An event that marked a turning point in your life
• An experience that changed your viewpoint on a controversial issue
• A memorable encounter with someone in authority
• An act of heroism or cowardice
• An imaginary encounter with a real person
• A rebellious act
• A brush with greatness or death
• A time that you took a stand on an important issue
• An experience that altered your view of someone
• A trip that you would like to take
• A vacation trip from your childhood
• An account of a visit to a fictional place or time
• Your first time away from home
• Two different versions of the same event
• A day when everything went right or wrong
• An experience that made you laugh until you cried
• The experience of being lost
• Surviving a natural disaster
• An important discovery
• An eyewitness account of an important event
• An experience that helped you grow up
• A description of your secret place
• An account of what it would be like to live as a particular animal
• Your dream job and what it would be like
• An invention you'd like to create
• A time when you realized your parents were right
• An account of your earliest memory
• Your reaction when you heard the best news of your life
• A description of the one thing you can't live without

Other Types of Essays

Narrative essays are one of the major essay types. Others include:

• Argumentative: In argumentative essays , the writer makes the case for a specific opinion on a topic, using research and analysis to persuade the reader.
• Descriptive: This kind of writing relies on detail to describe or define a person, place, thing, or experience. Writing may be either objective or subjective.
• Expository: Like argumentative essays, expository writing requires research and analysis in order to expound upon a subject. Unlike argumentative essays, the intention is not to change the readers' opinion but to inform the readers.
• Angelli, Elizabeth; Baker, Jack; and Brizee, Allen. " Essay Writing ." Perdue.edu. 9 February 2018.
• Beck, Kate. " Instructions to Write a Narrative Essay. " SeattlePI.com.
• Santa Barbara City College staff. "Structure of a Personal Narrative Essay." SBCC.edu.
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