My essay is like, REALLY descriptive. It’s like a narrative almost. My friend that got into Yale told me that adcoms don’t want to sift through it, and to only add like 1-2 descriptions. I don’t think my “fluffy” language detracts from what I’m trying to say, but I really don’t know… How much is too much? I feel like my descriptions add character but I’ve never written a college essay and do not know what adcoms are looking for…
Granted, I could lose maybe half of the descriptions, but dropping to 1 or 2 makes my heart hurt.
If anyone can give me some general advice, or if any college kids or experienced individuals don’t mind reading my essay, I’d appreciate it!
If your writing style tends to be flowery, do not avoid changing that because someone else with a different writing style doesn’t appreciate it. Changing your writing style can take away from your personality, and college essays are your only chance to showcase who you really are to colleges. Schools like Yale have seen it all, and will not tell you that they prefer less narrative essays, so long as your essay can accurately portray who you are as an individual and CLEARLY send the message you are writing.
I think u mustn’t change ur writing style! Its as bad as changing ur essay. But i wud surely love to read it once; sometimes a change or two might really help.(helped me atleast)
PM me if its okay wid u…
But keep in mind: the point of the essay is to determine whether you would be a good fit. Every flowery, descriptive word you use up is one less you’ll have to make your case.
Keep that word limt in mind, and make sure that your descriptions COUNT.
Yep, flowery language can be good or bad depending on how you’re using it/how much you’re using it. If you want you could post a sentence or two excerpt from your essay to show us what you mean, and we could try to evaluate if it’s too much or not.
“I drooled over the idea of the New York Metro, its grasp latching on to tourists-musts like Rockefeller Center and then flowing into the Bronx, or the San Francisco trolleys, surging above hills and through twisting, narrow streets. I marveled at the places I could go.”
“they casted shadows that danced on the faces of my companions, inspiring nuances of sketches in my journal”
“I heard the sound of her bones aching - divulging she was a day or two past her good years. She wasn’t beautiful like she used to be, in the conventional sense, but her fine lines told a lifetime of stories, an anecdote with every scuff on her outer shell. I could tell adventure still pulsed through that old gal’s veins, like did mine, but I was no longer running from anything, I was running toward something.”
But here’s my issue: The samples you’ve provided use up a total of 141 words. You have, what, about 650 words maximum to use in your essay?
And nowhere in those 141 words do I see anything about you, other than the fact that you like descriptive words and that you appreciate the architecture of NYC. I get a great sense of your writing style, but not of who YOU are. Nothing of your hopes and aspirations and strengths and best qualities. Yet you’ve already use up 20% of the allotted words.
This essay isn’t about the best essay you can write. It’s your one opportunity to let the reader know who YOU are, to differentiate yourself from a few thousand other applicants with the exact same qualifications. At the end of the essay, you’ve GOT to leave the reader thinking “Now THIS is a kid I want to meet. We need this kid on our campus.”
Go back and reread the prompt. It should be about YOU.
I think you’re on the road to a great description of NYC. If I worked for the NY tourist board, I would absolutely want to see more. But if I were an adcom, deciding between you and another equally qualified applicant, I would be looking for reasons to choose you— are those reasons in the essay somewhere???
I agree with bjkmom. I think you are a talented writer, and I especially loved the third example. However, you’re not really telling us much about who you are. I don’t think your language is too flowery at all, but I don’t think it’s been used for the right purposes. I would use your solid writing skills to describe more about yourself, or about how those things that you’re writing about impacted you.
I will read it if you like. I’ve edited a number of them. One was so good, I was blown away, and said that she needed to teach others, not the other way around. Hers was on the descriptive side. So…it depends. Are you a good writer, whether sparing or prolific in your language? That is the question.