What is a Personal Narrative Essay - ScottJohnsonAuthor.com

Everyone has a story to tell. If you’ve ever learned, grown, developed or changed in any way shape or form, you could turn those lessons into a compelling tale for others. You should write it down! Or maybe type it instead, assuming you have a computer. That written story could be categorized as a personal narrative essay. I love personal narrative essays so much that I wrote a book of them: “Essays Out of Left Field“

A personal narrative essay is a form of creative nonfiction where the writer shares a personal experience, anecdote, or reflection. Basically, it’s storytelling. This type of writing allows the author to explore a particular event or moment from their own life in a compelling and introspective way.

Unlike traditional academic essays, personal narrative essays are less concerned with providing evidence or arguments and more focused on capturing the essence of a personal experience and its impact on the writer.

What are narrative essays used for?

Scholarship and Job Applications

If you’ve ever applied for a college scholarship, you were most likely asked to write a personal narrative. Applicants are more than a GPA or resume of accomplishments. A personal narrative essay allows scholarship committees to get to know the applicant deeper than a list of their activities and achievements. The writer can share how their unique experiences shaped who they are.

Certain jobs also want more than a resume to prove a candidate is a worthy selection. An essay could be an opportunity to connect an important event in your life to your qualifications for the role. Plus it’s a great way to let your future employer know you like to dress up in medieval attire and do plastic sword-fighting in the park on the weekends.

Advocacy

A powerful personal narrative essay can drive change. Perhaps you are writing to endorse a candidate? Maybe you need to convince a group to take action. Maybe you want to save a historic tree, or a family of owls, or convince your uber-conservative town to allow the teenagers to dance. A strong written personal essay can help bring awareness to issues that are important to them. The personal connection can help others relate, rather than demanding action.

Entertainment

My favorite. A personal narrative essay can and should be captivating. Its intent doesn’t need to address world hunger or climate change. It can simply be a funny story. Like so:

Rise of the Roombas

Inspiration

This feels self-explanatory. Use a narrative essay to inspire someone to be more awesome than they already are. Or simply to help them realize they are already awesome. Example:

Superheroes

Speeches

Writing out a narrative essay is a great way to design a speech. These are all the exact words you want to say. The final speech doesn’t have to be word-for-word the same as the original piece, but is a great source of building a compelling speech.

Public speakers may incorporate personal narrative elements into their speeches and presentations to engage their audience on a personal level.

Sharing personal stories can make complex or abstract concepts more relatable and memorable for listeners.

Artistic expression

Like poetry, song or dance. Simply telling a deep, personal story is a true form of artistic expression. Wear a beret for added impact.

Therapy

Think diary. It doesn’t have to be formal. Say what you want. The result is for your personal reflection.

Marketing and Sales

personal narratives help connect with customers. Think of the late, great Chris Farley in the movie “Tommy Boy”. He didn’t know how to sell, but he did know how to connect with people on a personal level.

Key features of a personal essay:

So how to you write one of these things? It’s a very flexible literary work. But in general, there are some best practices:

First-person perspective: Personal narrative essays are typically written from the first-person point of view, allowing the writer to directly share their personal thoughts and feelings with the reader.
Engaging storytelling: The essay should include vivid descriptions, sensory details, and dialogue to bring the experience to life and engage the reader’s imagination.
Reflection and insight: In addition to recounting the events of the experience, personal narrative essays often include reflections or insights that provide deeper meaning or significance to the story.
Emotional resonance: Personal narrative essays aim to evoke emotions and connect with readers on a personal level by sharing relatable experiences and universal truths.
Structure and coherence: While personal narrative essays may be more flexible in structure compared to other essay forms, they still follow a narrative arc with a clear beginning, middle, and end to ensure coherence and flow.

Do I need to follow a specific structure for a personal essay?

Well, you could. The official generic guidelines for essays are:

Introduction
Middle (3 paragraphs)
Conclusion

Wow, what thorough and complex guidance. Thanks.

The great thing about personal narrative essays is that they are (typically) creative non-fiction. The “creative” part suggests you are the creator, therefore can use your creative judgment. Like abstract art, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Do you absolutely need a specific number of paragraphs? No. Can you throw in casual dialog? Sure. Can you ask the reader several rhetorical questions to help convey the main point? Of course.

Overall, a personal narrative essay offers writers a platform to share their unique experiences, perspectives, and reflections with readers in a compelling and authentic manner.

Other ways to describe a personal narrative essay

One of my main frustrations about this type of literary tool is that I don’t really know what to call it. I enjoy writing and reading these these personal stories. But they are not always described or identified in the same way. So it makes it difficult to find useful information (like this blog post!) and author’s work itself. You may find personal narrative essays described in the various ways below.

Autobiographical essay
Autobiographical narrative
Autobiographical nonfiction
Creative nonfiction
Fact-based storytelling
Faction (a blend of fact and fiction)
Immersive storytelling
Introspective essay
Life experience narrative
Life memoir
Life narrative
Life reflection essay
Literary journalism
Literary memoir
Literary nonfiction
Memoir
Narrative journalism
Narrative nonfiction
Nonfiction storytelling
Personal anecdote
Personal chronicle
Personal essay
Personal narrative
Personal reflection
Personal storytelling
Personal testimony
Real-life storytelling
Reflective memoir
Reflective narrative
Self-exploration narrative
Self-narrative
Self-reflection essay
True storytelling

Whatever you call it, the personal narrative essay is a powerful, flexible tool that can inspire, motivate, educate or entertain. Some may even use these personal anecdotes to launch their career as an author. (Hi, that’s me.)

How long should a personal essay be?

Sorry to say, it should be as long as the assignment requires! Your “assignment” might be a high school paper, a college entrance exam, or a column for a magazine. Typically, each will have a guide for word count.

What if the assignment calls for a 400 word essay. Maybe 1000 word essay. Need some inspiration?