Instruction
The essay is one of the most time-consuming journalistic materials. In the center of the portrait - personality, character. Starting to write a work, designate for yourself two vectors, two objects of the upcoming biography. The first is the social relationship of your character with his environment, the second is his inner life.
Writing an essay is preceded by collecting materials about your hero. Conversations with him and those who know him well are the main sources of information. The main thing is what you will write about, feel it, find out about what he is, what he is proud of in this life and what he regrets most of all. Select key points.
A reference to the main milestones of the biography in the essay is indispensable, but the main thing here is not to replace interesting story presentation of personal information. The reader is interested in human nature in action. You should tell about the positive character traits of your hero (honesty, hard work, perseverance, and others) not with a simple enumeration, but with facts. Show how he behaved in extraordinary situations, in dramatic moments of his life.
Describing this or that act of the hero of your essay, show his motivation. At the same time, it is important to figuratively comment on individual and typical character traits, psychological characteristics of a person. Both you and the reader should be interested in the original thoughts of the person you have chosen.
Each person is inevitably connected with the socio-political, economic, and socio-moral processes taking place in society (how non-academic it sounds). It is important to be able to show a connection with these processes, an attitude towards them in this or that event of an individual life. Try to relate your character's social experience to that of his generation. Perhaps you will be able to make some kind of reconstruction of a historical event through a fact, a vivid detail of his biography.
If your choice is a person with great social merit, emphasize with examples the significance of all achievements. The journalistic component in such an essay will be significant, and the theme of spiritual quest, creativity - one of the main ones. A good essay has one remarkable quality. It gives the reader not only knowledge of someone else's life, other life experience, mistakes and dreams, but also pushes them to comprehend their own.
note
Novice essayists are often concerned about the question: is the author's fiction acceptable in an essay? A fantasy that has nothing to do with real events in a person's life is unacceptable. But conjecture as an artistic technique is appropriate if there is no distortion of the fact itself. A classic example is the description of a person's mood in a given situation. Only the person himself can know for sure. But it is possible to assume and figuratively describe the emotions of the hero in specific circumstances.
Be attentive to details and any uniqueness in the life of the hero of your essay. Try to discover special character traits in the selected individual, a “zest” in a profession or hobby, originality in relationships with family and friends. Try to describe his unusual view of familiar things. Any “talking” touch can make the image lively and attractive.
Sources:
- portrait sketch example
The term "portrait", originally meaning "description of a person's appearance", over time was transformed into a more voluminous concept. In journalistic work, he began to designate not only the external, but also the internal features of a person, everything that is connected with. spiritual life of the individual. Therefore, the objects of display in a portrait sketch can be both the social relations of a person with his immediate environment (the sociological aspect), and the internal psychological processes occurring in the life of an individual. A sociological analysis of personality, supplemented by a psychological one, certainly expanded the possibilities of a portrait sketch in terms of a holistic image of a person.
A portrait essay is a compressed story about someone's life. It is not easy to write it, and it is also not easy to understand another person in a few hours of communication. Well-known journalist Yuri Rost said about this: “I try to feel my interlocutor. I ask him what he regrets most in life, what he is proud of. My interest is sincere, and it helps me to create, first inside myself, and then on paper, the image of my hero.
There is a question: is it possible to write an essay about every person?
The portrait sketch develops a certain aspect of the concept of a person, reveals the inner world of the hero, the socio-psychological motivation of his actions, individual and typical in character. Essayist looking in real life such a person who would embody the main typical features of his social environment and at the same time be distinguished by the originality of character traits, originality of thought (as D.V. Tumanov believes). And only then he creates not a photographic image, but an artistic and journalistic display of an individual image.
This is not a simple biographical note. A person's life cannot be revealed in its moral beauty, in the richness of its creative manifestation, replacing the story about it with a presentation of personal data or a description of the hero's labor technology.
In a successful portrait sketch, the character of the hero is given, as a rule, in a non-trivial situation. Therefore, it is very important for the author to discover such a “section” on the life path of the hero, which contains some extraordinary difficulties, has a dramatic character. It is here that one can find concrete manifestations of the character of the hero, his talent, perseverance, diligence and other significant qualities in terms of achieving the goal. In the event that such a “site” cannot be found, it is more difficult for the author to count on creating interesting material. So the researcher A.A. Tertychny. The writer and journalist Konstantin Paustovsky has a different opinion about whether it is possible to write a portrait essay about every person, - To write a good essay, you must have the ability to open in the human heart what can be long forgotten, drowned in the hustle and bustle of daily worries. A good essay makes readers remember who they are at their core, what they want, what they dream about.
The question is natural: is it possible to write an essay about every person? Yes. The main thing is to be able to find some “zest” in your interlocutor, to emphasize the peculiarity of his profession or hobby, to talk about his unusual views. In a word, to create a lively image that will not leave the reader indifferent. Remember that a portrait essay should not look like a short biography. This essay arises as a result of an artistic analysis of the personality of the hero and is similar to a short story or short story.
The main purpose of the essay is to introduce readers to the person. Before you start writing an essay, you should have a conversation with this person, talk with people who are familiar with him. A portrait essay is a story about a person (or a group of people), it should not be limited only to listing facts from his (their) life, interests and successes, or only an interview with him (them).
In order for a portrait essay to take up a whole newspaper page, a person who would be very significant is needed. After all, a journalist outlines a portrait of his hero only in details, with strokes. However, even in less than 300-400 lines, the essay is unlikely to fit: the relative laconism of the genre is combined here with a journalistic development of an actual problem, an analysis of the psychology of the hero.
We figured out how to write a portrait essay, now we will consider the types of a portrait essay and more detailed characteristics on this occasion.
Journalists pay attention to the most important milestones in the fate of the hero (meaning biographical information), to his spiritual quest, life experience, and finally, to the features of his professional activity. Specific human life is a multi-level education, so the author faces the most important task of showing the hero not just as a bearer of certain social roles or functions, but in close relationship with socio-political, economic and socio-psychological processes in society. Such concepts as the environment and circumstances, upbringing, character, etc., are taken into account, the influence of which on a person's life is of exceptional importance. But, you must admit that it is impossible to show all the "multi-story" nature of human nature in an essay due to its small volume. The versatility in the depiction of a person determined the species diversity of the portrait sketch. Among them are: biographical portrait sketch, portrait-problem, psychological and political portrait. Each type of portrait essay has specific tasks, its own forms of journalistic biography, specific opportunities in showing the hero of the work, methods of psychological and social characterization, typification of human natures, and finally, methods of compositional construction of the work. Let us consider what lies at the basis of one or another type of portrait essay.
Biographical sketch. Here the leading place is occupied by the biography. Turning to it, a journalist can get heterogeneous information about the most significant stages of life for a person, about his life experience, about changing social statuses, about life priorities and goals, etc. Through this subjective material, the life story of one person is ultimately recreated. So that it does not resemble a detailed biographical note, journalists try to select the most typical and characteristic facts for the hero of the work, revealing the internal dynamics of a person’s spiritual growth, his moral quest, social orientations and relationships with the outside world. In addition, the essay shows the relationship between the individual history of a person’s life and the history of society, correlates the social experience of an individual with the experience of his generation, and identifies specific features of the hero’s individual life.
Using biographical information, the essayist can describe the complex processes of socialization of a person in a changing world, explain the nature of a person’s psychological and social behavior, talk about the hero’s genealogy, reconstruct certain historical events through the life of one person, etc. Here, as we see, the connection between biography as a subjective construction and biography as social reality. When a biographical portrait essay is created in this relationship, it tends to generate the most interest, prompting readers to reflect.
Anniversary portrait sketch. The reason for writing such a work is the celebration of the anniversary of a famous figure in culture, art, literature, science, etc. In this case, it is important to show the positive contribution that a person has made to society. In order for the essay not to turn out to be “ceremonial”, special skill is required from the publicist. The anniversary date should be only an occasion to reflect on the fate of a person. The main thing that a publicist should concentrate on is the spiritual quest of the individual.
As practice shows, essays about writers, cultural figures, art and science are especially popular with readers. And this is understandable. It is always interesting to read about people of creative professions, because their life is a constant creative search. But in this case, it is not the analysis of artistic, art history or scientific works that is of interest to readers, but the personality of the creator, his individual portrait. The range of the hero's description can be the widest, ranging from the characteristics of his artistic or scientific activities to information about creative ideas and biography facts. In the anniversary portrait sketch, we can talk about the already established worldview of the hero, as well as about his new creative aspirations and plans. Essayists in such works, as a rule, focus on various aspects of a person’s creative activity, identify the most significant moments of the spiritual development of a person, evaluate his creative path, and finally, consider a person’s work in the context of the spiritual life of society.
The aesthetic tasks of an essay, even an anniversary one, do not include an ordinary retelling of the fate of a person. The bar is much higher here. To tell people something new about a well-known person, you need to familiarize yourself with archival materials, correspondence, testimonies of contemporaries, etc. All this will allow the essayist to comprehend the fate of a person, his deeds, deeds and accomplishments in a new and non-standard way, and most importantly, to identify various manifestations of the human soul.
Now let's look at the artistic elements of the portrait sketch, which help to most fully create the image of the hero.
Scenery. The presence of extended landscape sketches in portrait essays is the exception rather than the rule. After all, the attention of the essayist is more focused on the biographical aspects of a person's life, on revealing his character, on showing his mental characteristics, etc. Therefore, landscape components, if they are present in the work, usually act as a background that characterizes the scene. The introduction of landscape elements into a portrait sketch is necessary only in those cases when without these expressive means it is impossible to convey the atmosphere of what is happening, to penetrate into the essence of human perception of the world, to clarify a person's attitude to the world around, etc. In this case, the landscape becomes a semantic element.
In portrait sketches, the landscape is used:
- as a contrasting comparison between the internal state of the hero and the surrounding nature;
- as a means of revealing human character;
- as a background for the hero's portrait;
- as a technique in revealing the worldview positions of the hero, etc.
Detail. The item also serves effective tool typification of essay images. In order for a detail to take its rightful place in a work, to become a “key one”, to contribute to the creation of an artistic image, characterization of heroes and artistic and aesthetic understanding of reality, a journalist must master various methods of playing with a detail.
Techniques for playing with details in an essay can be very diverse. In some cases, the details are used for the figurative interpretation of certain events, in others - to create a symbolic image, in the third - for associative links, in the fourth - to convey the features of external and internal human manifestations.
portrait features. A portrait in journalism often acts as a kind of analogue of the hero's character. It makes it possible to visually, visibly see the hero, and in this regard, it stimulates the reader's imagination. Its other function is to help, through highlighting some external details, to look into the world of a person’s soul, into the world of his emotions and feelings. The portrait characteristic is directly related to psychological characteristics personality. Indeed, the appearance of a person, his manner of dressing, habitual postures, gestures, facial expressions, etc. They can tell a lot about a person when looked at closely. The main requirement for any portrait characteristic is the documentary accuracy of the display. In this case, the essayist does not have the right to invent something in the depiction of a person's appearance, but one should not refuse to show a typical one either. It is the combination of strict documentalism and artistic generalization that gives rise to a full-fledged essay image.
In portrait characteristics, journalists actively use the achievements of modern psychology. For example, having found out which psychological type this or that person belongs to: sanguine, phlegmatic, choleric or melancholic, they can determine how certain qualities are manifested in the appearance and behavior of the individual. This is how, based on certain psychological characteristics, a portrait of a person is recreated. In the description of the appearance, various portrait strokes are also used. They are necessary when a journalist needs to emphasize some psychological state the hero, his habitual gestures and mimic reactions, and finally, the way he dresses and behaves with people.
Artistic means of representation are necessary not only for depicting the external environment, but also for the internal state of a person. In modern journalism, psychological principles are intensified in showing the spiritual world of the individual.
Essay is a genre that most clearly demonstrates publicism in media texts. Here there is the education of morality, culture, not dry facts. In addition, the essay, in addition to its permanent informational function (which we will not talk about for now), had an additional social function - reward. The publication of an essay about a person was tantamount to placing his portrait on the board of honor, it was an award of glory. And readers are accustomed to the fact that the essay gives an example to follow.
Resources of artistic journalism: a) the image as an emotionally enlightened thought actively influences the audience, prompting it to active cooperation; b) the image as a generalized picture of reality significantly expands the possibilities of semantic comprehension of reality; c) the image as a system of signs, as a kind of code, creating a certain model of the surrounding world, intellectually enriches the audience with ideas about the aesthetic possibilities of reproducing reality. The artistry of journalism is embodied both in a holistic image of a person and in an image-thesis (image-concept), and in "talking" details - subject description nature, replicas of characters, details of reproducible situations.
The fantasy element in the essay (and in the feuilleton) does not contradict the working feature of a journalistic text - its focus on a certain result, calculated impact on the audience.
The last point raises questions - where are the limits of what is permitted, can fantasy be combined with reliability, objectivity, or is it better not to take risks? We will try to consider this using the example of the Biography magazine.
Portrait essay "Best Friend". It's been three years since I've known this man. Of all the people close to me, he is the most dear to me. At first glance, this is a typical student who does not stand out from the crowd.
Short stature, pleasant features, blonde hair wheaten and golden blue blue eyes. And yet he is special to me. This is my best friend Andryushka.
An inextinguishable light shines in his eyes - this is his desire, the desire for something new, the thirst for life. He never misses the opportunity to listen to interesting seminars and learn a new craft. This unstoppable desire helped him in his 20s to achieve a lot in life, in his studies, where he became the "Student of the Year 2000".
But those around him are drawn to him not at all because he is quite famous in his environment and enjoys great authority, but because he has a lot of positive energy that he shares with people. By nature, this is a strong, strong-willed, very optimistic and cheerful person who knows how to set goals and achieve them. But at the same time, he is a little childishly naive and emotional. The combination of these qualities helps him to better understand and understand people. You can trust him in any situation, knowing that he will always listen, give advice or just say good word. He easily finds common people completely unfamiliar to him.
And people, in turn, are attracted by his liveliness and originality. Of course, he's not always like that.
After all, sometimes you just want to relax and watch life from the side. It is at this moment that he goes to the theater.
There, as if not in the auditorium, but on the stage, he gets used to the role of heroes, lives the moments of their lives, and then returning home, he likes to talk about today's production. And most importantly, the pleasant thing is that this serious young man appreciates and respects ordinary human friendship, where, despite the difference in age, he still remains the younger brother - Andryushka. Feature 1) B fiction one of the varieties of the story, which is more descriptive, affects mainly social problems. 2) A journalistic, including a documentary, essay sets out and analyzes real facts and phenomena of public life, usually accompanied by a direct interpretation by their author. The plot essays include portrait and problematic.
The portrait tells about some interesting person: a scientist, athlete, musician, artist, village worker, etc. In general, the author is faced with the task of drawing the living features of the hero with all available speech means, to report about the unusual way in which this person differs or differed from others. In problematic essays, instead of individual facts or events, portraits of people drawn in a specific setting, generalized images of heroes are given. In such essays, the reader's attention is focused on solving topical problems, and for this, the journalist needs to give such an artistic and journalistic analysis of reality, in which the phenomena of life, the facts themselves are selected and presented in the light of public problems. Descriptive ones include event and travel essays.
Eventful - most often dedicated to some important event in the life of a fairly large group of people, for example, folk holiday, the launch of a spacecraft, a military parade, etc. In travel essays, the author talks about facts, events, people whom he happened to observe during his trip. A travel essay is always a story from the place of events, even if the author has been in these places for a long time.
What it is?
Such a concept as a portrait essay is a special kind of journalistic genre, a feature of which is a description of the person’s personality, external features, outlook on life, type of activity, character traits. In addition, an outside opinion is expressed. In a portrait essay (examples are essays that are written at school), one can see a similarity with a description of a person's biographical activity. But there is distinctive features. When describing biographies, they mainly relate to the topic of a person’s activities and occupations, but, for example, a lively, detailed description of the appearance or character traits and attitudes of other people towards him is omitted. An essay is similar to a story. An essay on the theme of a portrait essay is able to reveal the inner world to the reader, to convey the general mood of the story. So, in a short and concise form, an explanation and description of such a concept as a portrait essay was provided. The next moment of the story will be a kind of story, how to write a portrait essay. So let's continue.
Portrait sketch of a friend
In this section, we will give an example of a portrait sketch, we will break it into parts. As an example, we present to your attention a sample of writing a portrait essay. Here it should be noted that the narrative also has similarities with the story: “Her name was Lena, but she liked us to call her Alena. By the will of circumstances, now we live in different cities, to say more - in different countries, but this fact does not prevent me from remembering her with tenderness and gratitude, because best time A person's life, such as childhood, largely depends on his friends. I was lucky to have such a friend. So her name was Alena. She introduced us elder sister. Once, when I was at home, the front door bell rang, Irina stood on the threshold, holding her hand younger sister. “Meet girls, I hope you make friends,” she said. And we became friends. Alena was a tall, strong and fearless girl, she was especially distinguished by the expression of her green eyes. Such bold and big eyes gave her nature. Her movements were impetuous, with difficulty she restrained herself, as if an inexhaustible flow of energy filled her all. The bangs constantly interfered with her, and one could see how she often stabbed her invisible, but she did it hastily, which is why she often looked ridiculous, which, however, did not bother her at all. In this part of the proposed example, pay attention to the details of the description of the girl's appearance, to the transfer of character traits, as a result of which a "live" image is obtained.
As can be seen from the above example of a portrait essay, the description of amusing incidents also reflects the essence and character of the selected character. All these moments have a place to be given in the essay.
Comes from childhood
Influence of friendship
Each of us needs friends, each person appreciates friendship and friendly relations. This is help, support, devotion and interest in each other, spending time together. You can ask a friend for help in difficult times. I would like to wish you, reader, to look around in your life and try to write your own portrait essay, an example of which is presented in this material.
Conclusion
In conclusion, summing up what has been said, I would like to once again note the peculiarity of writing a portrait essay. This is the inner world of man. Also, in a portrait essay, you need to show your attitude to the character you describe. It can be not only a portrait sketch of a friend, but also a father, mother, teacher, sister.
I did not think long about whom I should write about in this essay. Paying attention to the words interesting person”, I immediately realized that I would write about my teacher, Sergei Petrovich, who taught at an art school.
He was a stately man of about forty-five, with thick, short-cropped hair, a cheerful face, and strong arms and large palms. When he smiled, his eyes became kind and even began to shine. He smiled, and everything around him became joyful and pleasant. But sometimes Sergei Petrovich came gloomy and immersed in his problems, closed himself in the utility room, did not go out and did not answer questions. Even the weather these days frowned and adjusted to his stern image.
Sergei Petrovich did not impose drawing techniques on us, but paid great attention to how to draw correctly in tone. To the words: "Teach me to draw a face (or something else)", he briefly answered: "Draw as you can." Perhaps that is why our group had great success in competitions than others. He taught to create, not to imitate.
Sometimes Sergei Petrovich liked to joke with us. It happened that one of the students forgot a pencil, clip, black marker and so on at home. They turned to the teacher, who, it seems, never ran out of “stocks” of erasers and paints. But do not think that Sergei Nikolaevich gave it away just like that. "Forgetful" had to either sing a song for the entire art school, or recite a poem, or dance a dance. And all this had to be done diligently, like a real artist.
He liked to joke, but we did not remain in debt. Once they wrote him a letter, that is, Mishka wrote it (he had the most adult handwriting of the entire group), supposedly from a secret admirer. They put the letter under the door crack along with the treat. That day Sergei Petrovich was especially kind to us and even extended the break. We thought that he believed in our fiction, and laughed at them for a long time. But then, out of breath, Katya showed us her find, found on the table in the study room. With unbearable curiosity and unrestrained giggling, we began to open the reply letter.
Here it was written carefully and carefully. In a letter, Sergei Petrovich said that he was pleased to hear tender words and care for him, thanked for the treat, and also mentioned us, what obedient and talented children we are. Since there were eight more candies attached to the letter, and there were just eight of us in the group at that time, everything became extremely clear.
After that, we could not look into his eyes for a long time (it was a shame), but it was during this time that Sergei Petrovich became almost like a father to us.
Unfortunately, he did not stay long in the position of our beloved "second father". He was invited to work in another city, but I still remember this talented person and those happy times with special tenderness.
Perevedentseva Victoria,
8th grade student.