Description:

Description- an account that creates a vivid mental image.

Descriptive Essay- Its purpose is to write about what a person, place, or thing is like. Sometimes the writer may
describe where a place is located.
The writer uses sensory details such as sights, sounds, smells, tastes, feelings, and textures to create vivid images
in the readers mind.

Example of a Descriptive Essay prompt: Write a paragraph describing what a Sphinx cat looks like.
Describe where the Mayagez town square is located.
The writer uses Spatial Order to create clear visual images of a person, place, object or scene.
Location arrangement in space can be from:
*top to bottom

*near to far

*bottom to top

* far to near

*right to left

*inside to outside

*left to right

*outside to inside

Description also may include or suggest time order, because a person, a place, or object usually appears in a
situation, or an incident and usually occurs or suggests a scheme.

Making a point with description in an essay:

Main Idea: What is the point that the author is trying to make with his or her description?
Ex. Cheesecake is an alluring dessert desired by many people.

Relevant Details: These describe the elements of the scene to support the point of the essay.
Ex. Cheesecake can be served from bite size portions to large wedges the side of a shoe, it all depends on how
much the person wants to eat.
Effective Expression: Use sensory details.
Ex. Cheesecake is velvety and fluffy.
Cheesecake is best served cold.
Strawberry cheesecake is sticky and oozing with red syrup.
Cheesecake crust is sweet and salty and crumbles when you bite it.

Spatial Order: Do not jump around. Use a specific sequence that guides your reader from point A to Point Z.

Helper words for the Descriptive Essay:

Properties
Size
Color
Shape
Purpose

Measurements
Length
Width
Mass/weight
Speed
Height

Location
In
Above
Below
Beside
Near
North/east/west/south

Analogy
Is like
Resembles

Transition words for visual description:

Above
Across
Adjacent
Around
At the bottom
At the side
At the top
Back
Behind

Below
Beneath
Beside
Beyond
By
Center
Close to
Down
Far Away

Farther
Front
Here
In
Inside
Left
Middle
Nearby
Next to

Outside
Right
There
Under
Underneath
Within

**Transitions words used to show time order:

After
Afterward
As
Before

Currently
During
Eventually
Finally

First
Last
Later
Meanwhile

Next
Now
Often
Previously

Second
Since
Soon
Then

Ultimately
Until
When
While

** These are mostly used in Narrative Essay but sometimes can be integrated in the use of description of a time frame.

The transitions in the two charts above signal that the details follow a logical order based on one or
more of the following elements: (1) Arrangement in space of a person, place object or scene. (2) The
starting point from which the writer chooses to begin the description. (3) The time frame as relevant
to the description.

Cartolina Postale
Dear Mom:
Its Market Day here in Cortona. The Piazza is an
ongoing party and everyone is invited. Clichs
converge in this navel of the world. You almost want
to laugh, but you cant help feeling that these
Italians know more about having fun than we do.
I eat a hot Grape from the Market. And the violet
sweetness breaks open in my mouth. It even smells
purple. I wish I could stay longer, but the bells of
the campanelio reminds me of time. Ding-Dang
Dong the bells say instead of ding-dong.
I wish you were
here.
Love,
Rodney

Mrs. Ruby Reyes

1274 Palm Tree Dr.
Sunny Dale
California, U.S.A
90264

Here is another example from the novel Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel:

Martel, Yann. Beatrice and Virgil: A Novel. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2010. 44-51. Print.

(Virgil and Beatrice are sitting at the foot of the tree. They are looking out blankly.
Silence.)

VIRGIL: What Id give for a pear.

BEATRICE: A pear?
VIRGIL: Yes. A ripe and juicy one.
(Pause.)
BEATRICE: Ive never had a pear.
VIRGIL: What?
BEATRICE: In fact, I dont think Ive ever set eyes on one.
VIRGIL: How is that possible? Its a common fruit.
BEATRICE: My parents were always eating apples and carrots. I guess they didnt like pears.
VIRGIL: But pears are so good! I bet you theres a pear tree right around here. (He looks about.)
BEATRICE: Describe a pear for me. What is a ear like?
VIRGIL: (settling back) I can try. Lets see To start with, a pear has an unusual shape. Its round and fat on the
bottom but tapered on top.

BEATRICE: Like a gourd?

VIRGIL: A gourd? You know gourds but you dont know pears? How odd the things we know and we dont. At any
rate, no, a pear is
smaller than the average gourd, and its shape is more pleasing to the eye. A pear becomes
tapered in a symmetrical way, its upper half sitting straight and centered atop its lower half. Can you see what I
mean?
BEATRICE: I think so.
VIRGIL: Lets start with the bottom half. Can you imagine a fruit that is round and fat?
BEATRICE: Like an apple?
VIRGIL: not quite. If you look at an apple with your minds eye, you will notice that the girth of an apple is at its
widest either in the
middle of the fruit or in the top third, isnt that so?
BEATRICE: Youre right. A pear is not like this?
VIRGIL: No. You must imagine an apple thats at its widest in the bottom third.
BEATRICE: I can see it.
VIRGIL: But we must not push the comparison too far. The bottom of a pear is not like an apples.
BEATRICE: No?
VIRGIL: No. Most apples sit on their buttocks, so to speak, on a circular ridge of four or five points that keep them
from falling over. Past the buttocks, a little ways up, theres what would be the anus of the fruit is fruit were a
beast.
BEATRICE: I see precisely what you mean.

VIRGIL: Well, a pear is not like that. A pear has no buttocks. Its bottom is round.
BEATRICE: So how does it stay up?
VIRGIL: It doesnt. A pear either dangles from a tree or lies on its side.
BEATRICE: As clumsy as an egg.
VIRGIL: Theres something else about the bottom of a pear: most pears do not have those vertical grooves that
some apples have. Most
pears have smooth, round, even bottoms.
BEATRICE: How enchanting.
VIRGIL: It certainly is. Now let us move north past our fruity equator.
BEATRICE: Im following you.
VIRGIL: There comes this tapering I was telling you about.
BEATRICE: I cant quite see it. Does the fruit come to a point? Is it shaped like a cone?
VIRGIL: No. Imagine the tip of a banana.
BEATRICE: Which tip?
VIRGIL: The end tip, the one you hold in your hand when you are eating one.
BEATRICE: What kind of banana? There are hundreds of varieties.
VIRGIL: Are there?
BEATRICE: Yes. Some are as small as fat fingers, others are real clubs. And their shapes vary too, as do their taste.
VIRGIL: I mean the regular, yellow ones that taste really good.

BEATRICE: The common banana, M. sapientum. You probably have the Gros Michel variety in mind.
VIRGIL: Im impressed.
BEATRICE: I know bananas.
VIRGIL: Better than a monkey. Take the end tip of a common banana, then, place it on top of an apple, taking into
account the differences
between apples and pears that Ive just described.
BEATRICE: An interesting graft.
VIRGIL: One last detail. At the very top of this apple-banana composite, add a surprisingly tough stalk, a real tree
trunk of a stalk. There, you have an approximation of a pear.
BEATRICE: A pear sounds like a beautiful fruit.
VIRGIL: It is. In colour, commonly, a pear is yellow with black spots.
BEATRICE: Like a banana again.
VIRGIL: No, not at all. A pear isnt yellow in so bright, lusterless and opaque a way. Its paler, translucent yellow,
moving towards beige, but not creamy, more watery, approaching the visual texture of a watercolor wash. And the
spots are sometimes brown.
BEATRICE: How are the spots distributed?
VIRGIL: not like the spots on a leopard. Its more a matter of areas of shadowing than of real spots, depending on
the degree of maturity of the pear. By the way, a ripe pear bruises easily, so it must be handled with care.
BEATRICE: Of course.
VIRGIL: Now the skin. Its peculiar skin, the pears, hard to describe. We were speaking of apples and bananas.
BEATRICE: Yes.

VIRGIL: They have smooth slippery skins.

BEATRICE: They do.
VIRGIL: It is so. A pear has a rougher skin.
BEATRICE: Like an avocados?
VIRGIL: No. But since you mention avocados, a pear is somewhat shaped like an avocado, although the bottom of a
pear is usually
plumper.
BEATRICE: Fascinating.
VIRGIL: And a pear becomes thinner in its top half in a more pronounced way than an avocado does. Nonetheless,
the two fruits are more or less similar in form.
BEATRICE: I see the shape clearly.
VIRGIL: But you cannot compare their skins! An avocados skin is as warty as a toads. An avocado looks like a
vegetable with leprosy. The pear is characterized by a thin roughness, delicate and interesting to the touch. If you
could magnify it a hundred times, do
you know what it would sound like, the sound of your fingertips running
over the skin of a dry pear?
BEATRICE: What?
VIRGIL: It would sound like a diamond on a record player entering a groove. The same dancing crackle, like the
burning of the driest, lightest kindling.
BEATRICE: A pear is surely the finest fruit in the world!
VIRGIL: It is! Thats the skin of a pear for you.
BEATRICE: Can one eat it?

VIRGIL: Of course! Were not talking here of the waxy, thuggish skin of an orange. The skin of a pear is soft and
yielding when ripe.
BEATRICE: And what does a pear taste like?
VIRGIL: Wait. You must smell it first. A ripe pear breathes a fragrance that is watery and subtle, its power lying in
the lightest of its impression upon the olfactory sense. Can you imagine the smell of nutmeg or cinnamon?
BEATRICE: I can.
VIRGIL: The smell of a ripe pear has the same effect on the mind as these aromatic spices. The mind is arrested,
spellbound, and a thousand and one memories and associations are thrown up as the mind burrows deep to
understand the allure of this beguiling smell
Which it never comes to understand by the way.
BEATRICE: But how does it taste? I cant wait any longer.
VIRGIL: A ripe pear overflows with sweet juiciness.
BEATRICE: Oh that sounds good.
VIRGIL: Slice a pear and you will find that its flesh is incandescent white. It glows with inner light. Those who carry
a knife and a pear
are never afraid of the dark.
BEATRICE: I must have one.
VIRGIL: The texture of a pear, its consistency is yet another difficult matter to put into words. Some pears are a
little crunchy.
BEATRICE: Like an apple?
VIRGIL: No. Not at all like an apple! An apple resists being eaten. An apple is not eaten, it is conquered. The
crunchiness of a pear is far more appealing. It is giving and fragile. To eat a pear is akin to kissing.

BEATRICE: Oh my. It sounds so good.

VIRGIL: The flesh of a pear can be slightly gritty. And yet it melts in the mouth.
BEATRICE: Is such a think possible?
VIRGIL: With every pear. And that is only the look, the feel, the smell, the texture. I have not even told you about
the taste.
BEATRICE: My God!
VIRGIL: The taste of a good pear is such that when you eat one, when your teeth sink into the bliss of one, it
becomes a wholly engrossing activity. You want to do nothing else but eat a pear. You would rather sit than stand.
You would rather have silence than music. All your senses but taste fall inactive. You see nothing, you hear nothing,
you feel nothingor only as it helps you to appreciate the divine taste of your pear.
BEATRICE: But what does it actually taste like?
VIRGIL: A pear tastes like, it tastes like(He struggles. He gives up with a shrug.) I dont know. I cant put it into
words. A pear tastes like itself.
BEATRICE: (sadly) I wish you had a pear.
VIRGIL: And if I had one, I would give it to you.
(Silence.)ACTIVITY:

To Describe is to paint a picture to your audience with words. (1) You will receive a picture. Choose
relevant details and precise language, brainstorm and write those details down. Make sure you describe to your

audience the item in your picture. They must guess what the item is in accordance to your description. You cannot
tell them what the item is nor show them the picture. They MUST GUESS IT using only your details. Be ready to
present in the front of the room.