A biography paper is a type of assignment every college student should know how to perform. This text includes information about famous people who can be chosen by your teacher or by yourself. But the biography paper is not just a listing of the facts from the person’s life but a full study of his or her inner world. So how to write it to get a perfect academic essay and A+ from your teacher? Here is an ultimate guide provided by a biography writer from WriteMyPaperHub committed to provide college students with biography writing help of any complexity.
What is a Biography Paper?
There are two types of biography. If you write about yourself, it’s called an autobiography. If you’re writing about another person (whether a famous person or a friend), it’s an ordinary biography.
Biographies are also classified according to the length of the text. If it’s short, it’s usually more dry and concise and includes the basic facts. A long paper allows for more in-depth research and mentions small (but interesting!) facts.
What to Include Into This Type of Text
As mentioned above, a biographical essay is not just a listing of facts from date of birth to date of death. Thus, the main question students are trying to answer: “What information to include in this type of academic paper so that it was both complete and interesting?”
If you’re writing a brief biography, you only need the main points of reference. If, on the other hand, the teacher has assigned a long essay, it’s important not to go into boring and meaningless details. So, your job as a writer is to first and foremost study the entire life of the person you’re writing about, from beginning to end. It’s okay that some of the data you will read and know, your reader will never know. As an author, you must always know behind the scenes and leave hints about it.
After researching your character’s entire life, make a conclusion for yourself: from what point of view will you write about him? For example, you reveal Churchill’s life, but not as a statesman, but as an artist or journalist (yes, among his merits, there are some). Then you should emphasize the facts that show this path of his – where did he study, where did he exhibit, where can you see his work now? You should always understand why you write what you write. Otherwise, there is all to say a lot and nothing of substance.
How to Start a Biography Paper
A biographical paper, unlike a fiction biography or an article for a web resource, is still an academic text. And, like any other academic text, it has an established structure, which can be briefly described in three points:
- Introduction.
- The main part.
- Conclusion.
Oddly enough, the first part, the introduction, usually raises the most questions, not the main part. Why is this so?
The introduction is the first thing the reader sees, and therefore he or she decides whether or not to continue reading the text. So you can have the best introduction in the world, but your teacher may not even know it if you have a bad one.
So, this part should be quite interesting, engaging, have specific information and still not reveal the whole essence of the essay.
In the case of a biography, it is easier to compose an introduction than in any other paper because it is appropriate to “start from the beginning”: to say who you are writing about and why. In other words, mention the hero’s name, position or merits, what he is so remarkable for, and what part of his life you will reveal next.
Tips for Writing Perfect Biography Paper
The first tip has already been mentioned before, but it is worth explaining more here, but first, let’s repeat it again. So, the main rule.
When you write a biography, you must understand why you are writing it.
The answer “to get a good grade and finish studying the subject” does not fit. The answer “to tell about the person” is closer to the truth, but not specific enough. Get to the truth. Find the thing about your character that hooks you and the reader the most, even if it’s a well-known fact.
For example, everyone knows that Che Guevara is a famous revolutionary. But you can write about him purely as in Wikipedia, or you can trace his path, emphasizing those facts of his biography that emphasize his motives. When did the idea of freedom first take hold of him? What was the catalyst and what was the first step? Were there moments in his life when he plunged headlong into something else, or did he toil daily, nightly at his goal?
The second tip is to stick to the timeline. A biography is, after all, a biography; it has a specific beginning (birth) and a specific end (death). It’s bad form to keep jumping from past to future and vice versa-the reader gets confused.
It is also important that there be a clear correlation between the events. If your biography doesn’t have one direction and you write about everything, make subsections such as Family, Career, etc.
These simple tips will help you compose quality text. And to get the highest grade, be sure to check your academic paper for errors before giving it to your teacher.
