Paragraph and Topic Sentence
5/3/99 Version
Excerpts from, Strunk and White, The Elements of Style follow.
[This item was retrieved from the World Wide Web, via a site that
contains pointers to many other authors' works
Bartleby.]
1. Make the paragraph the unit of composition: one paragraph to each
topic.
If the subject on which you are writing is of slight extent, or if you
intend to treat it very briefly, there may be no need of subdividing it
into topics. Thus a brief description, a brief summary of a literary
work, a brief account of a single incident, a narrative merely outlining
an action, the setting forth of a single idea, any one of these is best
written in a single paragraph. After the paragraph has been written, it
should be examined to see whether subdivision will not improve it.
Ordinarily, however, a subject requires subdivision into topics, each of
which should be made the subject of a paragraph. The object of treating
each topic in a paragraph by itself is, of course, to aid the reader.
The beginning of each paragraph is a signal to him that a new step in
the development of the subject has been reached.
...
2. As a rule, begin each paragraph with a topic sentence; end it in
conformity with the beginning.
Again, the object is to aid the reader. The practice here recommended
enables him to discover the purpose of each paragraph as he begins to
read it, and to retain the purpose in mind as he ends it. For this
reason, the most generally useful kind of paragraph, particularly in
exposition and argument, is that in which
1. the topic sentence comes at or near the beginning;
2. the succeeding sentences explain or establish or develop the
statement made in the topic sentence; and
3. the final sentence either emphasizes the thought of the topic
sentence or states some important consequence.
Ending with a digression, or with an unimportant detail, is particularly
to be avoided.