In Journalism, there’s this thing they teach us called the inverted pyramid. A writer must start with the most broad, important details because it’s almost guaranteed everyone will read the first sentence. However, the details that are more specific must come later because only those who are really interested in the story will continue to read, hence the inverted pyramid writing technique.

This technique stresses the introductory lines, and Ozick does the same. However, she very clearly points out that the essay is not like the article in the sense that the essay does not expire and does not exist in a certain time frame. The introductory paragraph still matters though because like an article, it sets the tone for the rest of the piece.

One of my favorite openings from the essay anthology we read is the one from Barry Lopex’s “The Raven.” It reads:

“I am going to have to start at the other end by telling you this: there are no crows in the desert. What appear to be crows are ravens. You must examine the crow, however, before you can understand the raven. To forget the crow completely, as some have tried to do, would be like trying to understand the one who stayed without talking to the one who left. It is important to make note of who has left the desert.”

The essay opens with a note of mysticism. Ozick talks about the power each essay has, and the power in this introduction lies in this peculiar tone of someone instructing the reader to compare two very similar yet different things that the reader probably never thinks about. There is an ominous note, and before I finished the essay I had a feeling the author was going to venerate the raven and I was right to an extent. The essay acts almost like a morality essay through the tales of the crows and ravens.

The second essay I looked at was one that we had read in class previously, which is Annie Dillard’s “Total Eclipse.” The introduction reads as follows:

“It had been like dying, that sliding down the mountain pass. It had been the death of someone, irrational,that sliding down the mountain pass and into the region of dread. It was like slipping into a fever, or falling down that hole in sleep from which you wake yourself whimpering. We had crossed the mountains that day, and now we were in a strange place – a hotel in central Washington, in a town near Yakima. The eclipse we had traveled here to see would occur early the next morning.”

There is so much foreshadowing in this introduction, which is mainly why I wanted to focus on the piece. Immediately Dillard sets up this tone of dread, which is a major theme she explores later on when she sees the total eclipse. The style also very closely reflects the style of what to come. In that introduction alone, Dillard uses three metaphors which is something she continues to use throughout the piece to describe the phenomenon and how it makes her feel.

Moreover, she also sets up this sense of anticipation for what to come by not immediately naming the event she and her husband drove all the way to see. Annie Dillard’s power lies in her words and her control over them, which is something she sets up immediately in the introduction paragraph.