The essay needs a central or controlling idea, called a thesis. Every paragraph must have something to do with that thesis. Below is an example of a paragraph. Can you find the controlling idea?
Charles Frazier, in his novel Cold Mountain, used a style found in the "mythological journey" to show that life is often unfair, but that it is up to us to still make life beautiful; beauty is in front of us, When his characters travel on journeys looking for meaning in a war-torn world, they find what is beautiful and discover that life is meant to celebrate beauty. Inman, a confederate soldier during the Civil War, deserts his comrades because he tired of the killing and starts on his journey of discovery. Ada, the woman with whom Inman longs to reunite and to whom he would like to marry, finds herself alone on a farm and must survive in a world that is as cruel to women as war is cruel to men. Although she must discover her independence, she also discovers the beauty that comes from self-discovery. Beauty is in front of us, Frazier would contend, and is visible if we only look in the right places, regardless of the wars going on around us. In fact, beauty can be found only in the right places.
As a writer, I had to create the connections between ideas. I used my connective words to show a specific relationship between ideas. I tried not to repeat myself while trying to take the reader along my idea. Sometimes we make the mistake of staying close to the controlling idea, but fail to take the reader anywhere. We end up just repeating the same statement, but in different words. Follow the map below to develop a new paragraph:
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