Exposition Exposition is writing that explains. Most of t

Exposition
   Exposition is writing that explains. In general, it answers the questions how and why. If we go into any university library, most of the books we find on the shelves are examples of exposition. Philosophies, histories, theories of economics, studies of government and law, the investigations of science -all these have for their purpose to explain.
   Although expositions, often, is formal and academic, it appears also in magzines and newspapers, in any place where people look for explanations. It is the most common kind of writing, the sort we conduct our workday affairs -the business letter, the doctor’s case study, the lawyer’s brief, the engineer’ s report - and the writing with which we attempt to control our world, whether our means of doing so is a complicated system of philosophy or a cook book or a medical instruction.
   Exposition, then, is a wide net. What, we may ask, is not exposition? If the guiding purpose of the writer is to tell a story, to tell merely what happened, then we say the writing is narrative rather than exposition. If the writer intends to tell us how something looks, to recreate the thing in words, we may call it description. A narrative arranges its material in time; description most often organizes in space; exposition organizes its subject by logic. The subject of the expository writer may be people, things, ideas or a combination of these, but always he is a man thinking, interpreting, informing and persuading. Although he may appeal to our emotions, he is more likely to appeal to our reason by using evidence and logic. Exposition is like a lecture, discussion or debate.
   Yet seldom is a piece of writing pure exposition. Just as the lecturer tells a story or uses maps, charts, or slides to at tract his audience and clinch his point, so the expository writer may turn to narration or description. Often these kinds of writing become so fused as to be practically recognizable: the description of the structure of an atom is as much an explanation as it is a picture. The historical narrative is as much. concerned with the why and how as with what happened. Even so the traditional classification; Fication of prose into description, narration, and exposition is useful so long as we are aware of its limitations. The expository writer will do well to remember that his primary purpose - the purpose that guides and shapes his total organization - is to explain by logic and to show relationships.
   The writing of exposition begins, therefore, in an under standing of the broad purpose to be achieved. It begins, like all composition, in the writer’ s head. Even before he sharpens his pencil, the expository writer must ask himself four questions: What specific purpose do I intend to make? Is it worth making? For whom am I making? And how can I best convey my point to my readers? Unless the writer has care fully answered each of these questions, no amount of good grammar and correct spelling will save him, and his composition is already worthless even before he begins to scrible. Deciding upon reader and purpose is easily half the task of writing. Once the writer is determined what point he intends to make, his composition is already half organized, if not completely planned. With his reader in mind he has already solved many of his problems of diction and tone as well, and however awkwardly he has expressed himself when he has done, he will know that he has fulfilled the first requirement of all writing--a definite point for definite readers.