{"id":1010,"date":"2025-05-31T18:32:57","date_gmt":"2025-06-01T00:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/janajm.com?p=1010"},"modified":"2025-07-10T18:41:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-11T00:41:07","slug":"endings-essay-writing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/janajm.com\/endings-essay-writing\/","title":{"rendered":"Endings."},"content":{"rendered":"
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\u201cLandscape with a large building\u201d (c. 1818\u201383<\/a>), by Franz von Hauslab the Younger<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We recently had the pleasure of interviewing Elisa Gabbert<\/a> for Women of Letters<\/em>, and in preparation for that publication (as I do with all of our publications) I spent some time immersing myself in her recent work.<\/p>\n

I was reminded, in the process, of her 2024 interview with the LARB<\/em><\/a>, in which she discussed how she writes the endings for her essays:<\/p>\n

\u201cIn terms of the endings\u2014it\u2019s funny, I actually started using this trick in college, maybe even in high school. When I was writing a \u2018paper,\u2019 I never wanted the last paragraph to feel like a summary, so I\u2019d always save one good point to make there. Now, I do a lot of the thinking and connection-making in the notes process before I even start writing the essay. Then, when I sit down to write, I\u2019m trying to have at least 20 to 30 percent new thoughts, so it doesn\u2019t feel too predetermined. Ideally, some of those new ideas are happening toward the end\u2014it\u2019s like we got there together!\u201d <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It\u2019s an idea that\u2019s stuck with me, and one that I\u2019ve incorporated into my own work ever since. (In writing the chapters that comprise my doctoral dissertation, for example, I specifically set aside some of the insights that would traditionally have been placed in the \u2018results\u2019 or \u2018discussion\u2019 sections of each chapter for their conclusions.) As both a writer and a reader, I\u2019m finding that I like the way this approach opens up those texts \u2014 makes them feel more expansive, somehow \u2014 as though there were even more excellent ideas that could have been added to each one had it not eventually had to end at some point.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014<\/p>\n

Recommended reading<\/h2>\n