"The Art of Hooking a Reader" | Arvon Masterclass

Hello.

Thanks for coming to the Masterclass.1

Here’s The Handout

The first pages in the handout show opening sentences that could be better. These are for you to improve.

Later pages in the handout show opening sentences that I admire, for you to emulate.

Download the handout here:

The Art of Hooking a Reader Arvon Masterclass Handout John-Paul Flintoff.pdf (2.2 MB)

The First Pages

These contain lines taken at random from a recent copy of the daily newspaper.

I’m not trying to be clever at the expense of journalists who are under great pressure to produce stories fast.

But I wanted to point out that several of those first paragraphs (in the first six pages of the handout) don’t sound good if you read them aloud.

That’s the simplest possible test for a first paragraph. I strongly recommend that you test your own opening lines – and everything else! – by reading aloud.

Your first assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to rewrite some of those opening paragraphs from the newspaper. Keep what’s most important, leave the rest.

For example, the longish sentence about Prince Charles on p2 of the handout might be changed to read thus:

“The Duke of Edinburgh’s coffin will be borne on a Land Rover, at his own request.”

Everything else can be fitted into a new sentence or later paragraphs.

For extra points, I challenge you to go out and buy a newspaper and look for first paragraphs that you might amend.


Later Pages

These examples of more polished first sentences were taken not-quite randomly from books.

Many are from a collection of journalism published in the New Yorker by the novelist Julian Barnes.

Julian Barnes Letters from London.png

Your second assignment is to take the general shape of those opening lines (pages 7 to 14) and re-write them so that they reflect on your own interests and situation.

Keep as closely as possible to the shape of Barnes’s sentences.

For example, on p10 of the handout Barnes writes:

“A few years ago, an elderly friend of mine was being examined in a British hospital for possible brain damage.”

If I were to re-write that sentence to reflect my own interest and situation right now, it might go thus:

“Last night, someone I knew at university was handed a plate of what looked like noodles.”

That kind of thing – I’m sure yours will be better.


What This Will Do For You

First, it builds a habit of writing elegant sentences. Second, the exercise will help you (anybody!) to understand better what it is that a sentence is doing, and how.

The one I picked out above, by Barnes, opens up some kind of mystery that the reader is likely to want to resolve. It’s a mini-cliffhanger.

My own version aims to do something similarly teasing, but I’ve deliberately chosen something less sensational than brain damage. I refer to something very ordinary – noodles – but hint that they may in fact be something else.

So it’s less of a cliff-hanger, but it does create mystery.

My other changes are straight swaps:

1. a few years ago = “last night”
2. an elderly friend = “someone I knew at university”
3. was being examined = “was handed” (both passive verbs)

I notice now that I haven’t actually indicated a location, to parallel the British hospital. Ideally, I’d change that, but I like to show you that I did it spontaneously and imperfectly.


Leave A Comment

Or just share an example of one (or more!) of your sentences.

Thank you.


John-Paul


1 Masterclass. This page was originally created for participants in a live session hosted online by the Arvon Foundation, in May 2021.