Essay Formats

The format of the standard essay is explained to be:

Qi means the beginning of an essay, in which there is a topic partly related to the theme. The role of cheng is to follow the beginning paragraph and amplify it. In the third part, zhuan, the whole essay turns in another direction. That is, the topic introduced in the beginning and following paragraphs will be addressed from a different perspective, which aims at surprising the reader. The whole essay also reaches a climax at this point. The last paragraph, he, is to conclude the previous paragraph with a particular point which refers to the theme of the essay. A good ending paragraph is powerful and speedy, providing the reader with a great insight and also some space to ponder the theme. This basic structure has been used in Chinese poetry and prose for centuries. (2-3)

— Chen

Another commonly used structure is the “eight legged essay”, an essay that has been used for many centuries as an imperial examination format. It is not officially used anymore, but people like Kaplan  have suggested that it has permeated into modern Chinese writing.

Some oriental writing, on the other hand, is marked by what may be called an approach by indiscretion. In this kind of writing, the development of the paragraph may be said to be “turning and turning in a widening gyre”. The circles or gyres turn around the subject and show it from a series of tangential views, but the subject is never looked at directly. Things are developed in terms of what they are not…

— Kaplan; page 17 — read more at : http://ksuweb.kennesaw.edu/~djohnson/6750/kaplan.pdf.

The eight legged essay: “ba gu wen”: This essay format is marked by its heavy parallelism and redundancy, which similarly serves to allow the reader to draw conclusions. It is a very rigid format, with eight clearly defined sections, sentence amounts, and word counts. Similar to the standard essay format as mentioned above, this essay format also puts a high emphasis on indirectness, with the idea that the essay is there to explain the points and the reader is there to draw the conclusions.

 

The eight-legged essay was formulated around a rigid, artificial structure. It tested, among other things, the examinees’ knowledge of the Four Books and Five Classics and ability to insert classical allusions and idioms at the places deemed appropriate. The structure of much of the essay included heavy parallelism and redundancy, rhetorical features that survive in modern Chinese expository writing.

The eight “legs” or sections were as follows:

English	Hanzi	Definition
Opening	破題 pòtí “break topic”	Two sentences of prose whose function is to broach the topic.
Amplification	承題chéngtí “carry topic”	Five sentences of prose, elaborating upon and clarifying the theme.
Preliminary exposition	起講 qǐjiǎng “begin speak”	Prose text
Initial argument	起股 qǐgǔ “begin section”	A specified number (4, 5, 8 or 9) of sentence pairs written in parallel, developing the initial argument. The parallel sentences address the topic and convey similar meanings, with similar structure but different words.
Central argument	中股zhōnggǔ “middle portion”	Sentences written in parallel, with no limit as to their number, in which the central points of the essay are expounded freely.
Latter argument	後股 hòugǔ “after portion”	Sentences written in parallel, with no limit as to their number. Here, points not addressed in the previous section are discussed; otherwise, the writer may continue padding the ideas in the central argument. It is to be written in a serious tone rooted in realism.
Final argument	束股 shùgǔ “tying-up section”	Parallel sentence groups, each one consisting of either two to three, or else four to five, lines. Here, the main theme is revisited and loose ends are tied up.
Conclusion	大結 dàjié’ “big knot”	Prose text where free expression and creativity are allowed. The concluding remarks are made here.

In addition to the rules governing the number of sentences for a particular section, there were also strict limits on the total number of words in the essay. (source — wikipedia).

Read more about the Eight legged essay format here: https://www.princeton.edu/~elman/documents/Eight-Legged%20Essay.pdf.

This focus on indirectness is in direct contrast with the direct nature of English essays.

The english essay format. Note the direct nature — the topic sentence is explicitly said, the support is supplied immediately afterwards. This is very different from the Chinese essay forms.

This difference in essay formats commonly causes problems for Chinese ESL students when they submit papers.