You think you write bad essays? Think again.

[Ruan Chun Xian]

You know, if this is real and students actually wrote essays like this, I would be very very very worried for the fate of humanity.

~*~

The greatest writer of the Renaissance was William Shakespear. Shakespear never made much money and is famous only because of his plays. He lived in Winsor with his merry wives, writing tragedies, comedies and errors. In one of Shakespear's famous plays, Hamlet rations out his situation by relieving himself in a long soliloquy. In another, Lady McBeth tries to convince McBeth to kill the King by attacking his manhood. Romeo and Juliet are an example of a heroic couplet. Writing at the same time as Shakespear was Miquel Cervantes. He wrote Donkey Hote. The next great author was John Milton. Milton wrote Paradise Lost. Then his wife died and he wrote Paradise Regained.

During the Renaissance America began. Christopher Columbus was a great navigator who discovered America while cursing about the Atlantic. His ships were called the Nina, the Pinta, and the Santa Fe. Later the Pilgrims crossed the Ocean, and that was called the Pilgrim's Progress. When they landed at Plymouth Rock, they were greeted by Indians, who came down the hill rolling their war hoops before them. The winter of 1620 was a hard one for the settlers. Many people died and many babies were born. Captain John Smith was responsible for all this.

Delegates from the original thirteen states formed the Contented Congress. Thomas Jefferson, a Virgin, and Benjamin Franklin were two singers of the Declaration of Independence. Franklin had gone to Boston carrying all his clothes in his pocket and a loaf of bread under each arm. He invented electricity by rubbing cats backwards and declared "a horse divided against itself cannnot stand." Franklin died in 1970 and is still dead.

Bach was the most famous composer in the world, and so was Handel. Handel was half German, half Italian, and half English. He was very large. Bach died from 1750 to the present. Beethoven wrote music even though he was deaf. He was so deaf he wrote loud music. He took long walks in the forest even though everyone was calling for him. Beethoven expired in 1827 and later died from this.

The sun never set on the British Empire because the British Empire is in the East and the sun sets in the West. Queen Victoria was the longest queen. She sat on a thorn for 63 years. Her reclining years and finally the end of her life were exemplatory of a great personality. Her death was the final event which ended her reign.

~*~

Statements students have actually made on AP essays

Madame Bovary's suicide caused her own death.

Because this writer is so grammatical and excellent with language, this passage is really difficult for me to understand. (Someone should try and write this in an unseen )

Incase the checker is interested, I did read the book to the end; I just did not want to reveal the ending to the reader of my essay.

Tom had no more conflicts with his mistress after she died.

Brutus' suicide was particularly affecting as he did it himself.

In many books, a violent scene occurs. Good-bye. [A complete essay.]

Emma married the doctor for money, position, a fine house, and the grand balls she thought he would provide.

I have fallen asleep and am now pressed for time. There are only five minutes remaining. Thus, I don't have enough time to write an essay. However, I can write an outline to let you know I could write a good essay if I had time.

~*~

Ok, so there was zack from TSR who spent half of his AP English exam drawing treasure maps and writing in Hebrew but that's at least because he didn't care about AP and had his IB anyway. But this...

[Enter Sandman]

In many books, a violent scene occurs. Good-bye.

Because this writer is so grammatical and excellent with language, this passage is really difficult for me to understand.

I have fallen asleep and am now pressed for time. There are only five minutes remaining. Thus, I don't have enough time to write an essay. However, I can write an outline to let you know I could write a good essay if I had time.

Hahahaha that's some genius work right there...how I would love to write any of the above lines in my examination essays - if only my future weren't dependent on the upcoming exams *sigh*

[Graeme]

The best one is:

Emma married the doctor for money, position, a fine house, and the grand balls she thought he would provide.

Absolutely brilliant.

[Enter Sandman]

Haha I can't believe I missed that, nice one man.

[Afterglow]

Silly people. I like those statements especially. Made me laugh out loud. It reminds me of these things that I have seen before;

Oh and I forgot to mention - some of these might be offending. At least for me :/

Click 1

click 2

Click 3

oh and this one makes me laugh out loud but I wonder if it is even real...

LINK

[Ruan Chun Xian]

What I find disturbing is that the teacher (?) actually annotated the one about Jimmy McPearson like it was being marked seriously.

"Please a little less drama"???

The last one certainly gives me a whole different perspective on Oedipus. Did you notice on the 3rd page of the Oedipus one, whoever annotated it put "This page is to big" which is, in fact, grammatically incorrect? Haha. 61%....well, at least you've got to give him credit for retelling the gist of the story right.

The best one is:

Emma married the doctor for money, position, a fine house, and the grand balls she thought he would provide.

Absolutely brilliant.

LOL. I think the key words here were "she thought". Ahhh poor Emma.

[Enter Sandman]

She wouldn't have been disappointed if she had come to me

[winter]

"Peter, please see me."

My friend wrote "And they all lived happily ever after. Amen." as her final line. She got the mark for structure!

[Ruan Chun Xian]

My friend wrote "And they all lived happily ever after. Amen." as her final line. She got the mark for structure!

Please tell me this is creative writing class or something...

[winter]

Please tell me this is creative writing class or something...

A History essay (exam), actually.

There's that 'structure' criterion... and she needed a conclusion!

[Afterglow]

I just remembered this one. It's actually hilarious and good for a laugh.

Physics Lab Report

Makes you wish you could be honest when a lab doesn't go as expected

[Ruan Chun Xian]

Conclusion

Going into physics was the biggest mistake of my life. I should've declared CS. I still wouldn't have any women, but at least I'd be rolling in cash.

Best conclusion EVER!!! Haha, this is hilarious.

[spaceisland]

Hahaha.

A friend of mine ran out of time in an unseen, wrote about a page, and then added in the last five minutes: [insert brilliant sounding paragraph here]...[insert smooth transition to an even better paragraph here]...[insert witty and ironic conclusion supporting my thesis here]...

[Afterglow]

Hahaha.

A friend of mine ran out of time in an unseen, wrote about a page, and then added in the last five minutes: [insert brilliant sounding paragraph here]...[insert smooth transition to an even better paragraph here]...[insert witty and ironic conclusion supporting my thesis here]...

omg Did she/he hand it in as well? Haha I wonder what the reaction must have been then.

[spaceisland]

She most certainly did, haha. Sadly, she actually did better than a couple of students who handed in complete essays... I suppose that says something about that English class...

[Ruan Chun Xian]

She most certainly did, haha. Sadly, she actually did better than a couple of students who handed in complete essays... I suppose that says something about that English class...

God...you're kidding right?

Well I suppose it would depend on what she wrote in that other 1 page.

Though if it were my English teacher he'd probably fail that essay regardless of what is in the other 1 page.

[Guest House]

Every year, English teachers from across the U.S. can submit their collections of actual analogies and metaphors found in high school essays. These excerpts are published each year. Here are last year's winners.....

1. Her face was a perfect oval, like a circle that had its two sides gently compressed by a Thigh Master.

2. His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free.

3. He spoke with the wisdom that can only come from experience, like a guy who went blind because he looked at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it and now goes around the country speaking at high schools about the dangers of looking at a solar eclipse without one of those boxes with a pinhole in it.

4. She grew on him like she was a colony of E. Coli, and he was room-temperature Canadian beef.

5. She had a deep, throaty, genuine laugh, like that sound a dog makes just before it throws up.

6. Her vocabulary was as bad as, like, whatever.

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

8. The revelation that his marriage of 30 years had disintegrated because of his wife's infidelity came as a rude shock, like a surcharge at a formerly surcharge-free ATM machine.

9. The little boat gently drifted across the pond exactly the way a bowling ball wouldn't.

10. McBride fell 12 stories, hitting the pavement like a Hefty bag filled with vegetable soup.

11. From the attic came an unearthly howl. The whole scene had an eerie, surreal quality, like when you're on vacation in another city and Jeopardy comes on at 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:30.

12. Her hair glistened in the rain like a nose hair after a sneeze.

13. The hailstones leaped from the pavement, just like maggots when you fry them in hot grease.

14. Long separated by cruel fate, the star-crossed lovers raced across the grassy field toward each other like two freight trains, one having left Cleveland at 6:36 p.m. traveling at 55 mph, the other from Topeka at 4:19 p.m. at a speed of 35 mph.

15. They lived in a typical suburban neighborhood with picket fences that resembled Nancy Kerrigan's teeth.

16. John and Mary had never met. They were like two hummingbirds who had also never met.

17. He fell for her like his heart was a mob informant, and she was the East River.

18. Even in his last years, Granddad had a mind like a steel trap, only one that had been left out so long, it had rusted shut.

19. Shots rang out, as shots are wont to do.

20. The plan was simple, like my brother-in-law Phil. But unlike Phil, this plan just might work.

21. The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

22. He was as lame as a duck. Not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real duck that was actually lame, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

23. The ballerina rose gracefully en pointe and extended one slender leg behind her, like a dog at a fire hydrant.

[Lil]

". His thoughts tumbled in his head, making and breaking alliances like underpants in a dryer without Cling Free."

and

"In many books, a violent scene occurs. Good-bye."

hahahaha this is cool

[deissi]

hahaha some of these metaphors cracked me up SOOO bad

7. He was as tall as a six-foot, three-inch tree.

I'll use this the next time someone asks me how tall I am "about as tall as a 175cm tree"

[icecoldstar]

let me make one up on the spot

The syntax of the essay conveys a sense of depression while the tone describes something different. As a result, I turn to the diction for the final judge.

nah... this is kinda not that funny, but you guys know what i mean right?