一个好的描述性段落就像一扇通向另一个世界的窗户。通过使用仔细的例子或细节，作者可以想象出一个生动地描述一个人、一个地方或一件事的场景。最好的描写性写作能同时运用嗅觉、视觉、味觉、触觉和听觉等多种感官，在小说和非小说中都能找到。

以下每一位作家（其中三位是学生，两位是专业作家）都以自己的方式选择了一个对他们有特殊意义的归属地或地方。在一个清晰的主题句中确定了这个主题之后，他们开始详细描述它，同时解释它的个人意义。

“友好的小丑”

"On one corner of my dresser sits a smiling toy clown on a tiny unicycle―a gift I received last Christmas from a close friend. The clown's short yellow hair, made of yarn, covers its ears but is parted above the eyes. The blue eyes are outlined in black with thin, dark lashes flowing from the brows. It has cherry-red cheeks, nose, and lips, and its broad grin disappears into the wide, white ruffle around its neck. The clown wears a fluffy, two-tone nylon costume. The left side of the outfit is light blue, and the right side is red. The two colors merge in a dark line that runs down the center of the small outfit. Surrounding its ankles and disguising its long black shoes are big pink bows. The white spokes on the wheels of the unicycle gather in the center and expand to the black tire so that the wheel somewhat resembles the inner half of a grapefruit. The clown and unicycle together stand about a foot high. As a cherished gift from my good friend Tran, this colorful figure greets me with a smile every time I enter my room."

观察作者如何清晰地描述小丑的头部、身体以及下面的独轮车。除了眼睛的感官细节，她还提供了触感，描述头发是由纱线和尼龙制成的。某些颜色是特定的，如樱桃红的脸颊和浅蓝色，描述有助于读者形象化对象：分开的头发、西装上的颜色线和葡萄柚类比。整体尺寸有助于向读者提供物品的比例，鞋上褶边和蝴蝶结的尺寸描述与附近的尺寸相比提供了生动的细节。最后一句强调了这份礼物的个人价值，有助于把这一段联系在一起。

“金色吉他”

杰里米·波登

"My most valuable possession is an old, slightly warped blond guitar―the first instrument I taught myself how to play. It's nothing fancy, just a Madeira folk guitar, all scuffed and scratched and fingerprinted. At the top is a bramble of copper-wound strings, each one hooked through the eye of a silver tuning key. The strings are stretched down a long, slim neck, its frets tarnished, the wood worn by years of fingers pressing chords and picking notes. The body of the Madeira is shaped like an enormous yellow pear, one that was slightly damaged in shipping. The blond wood has been chipped and gouged to gray, particularly where the pick guard fell off years ago. No, it's not a beautiful instrument, but it still lets me make music, and for that I will always treasure it."

在这里，作者用一个主题句来打开他的段落，然后用下面的句子来添加具体的细节。作者通过以逻辑的方式描述吉他的各个部分，从头部的弦到身体上磨损的木头，为心灵的眼睛创造了一个可以穿越的图像。

他通过对吉他磨损的不同描述来强调它的状态，例如注意到它的轻微弯曲；区分擦伤和划痕；描述手指对乐器的影响，包括磨损琴颈、使琴纹失去光泽以及在身体上留下指纹；列出它的碎片和凿痕，甚至注意它们对乐器颜色的影响。作者甚至描述了丢失的残片。在这一切之后，他清楚地表达了他对它的喜爱。

“格雷戈里”

芭芭拉·卡特

"Gregory is my beautiful gray Persian cat. He walks with pride and grace, performing a dance of disdain as he slowly lifts and lowers each paw with the delicacy of a ballet dancer. His pride, however, does not extend to his appearance, for he spends most of his time indoors watching television and growing fat. He enjoys TV commercials, especially those for Meow Mix and 9 Lives. His familiarity with cat food commercials has led him to reject generic brands of cat food in favor of only the most expensive brands. Gregory is as finicky about visitors as he is about what he eats, befriending some and repelling others. He may snuggle up against your ankle, begging to be petted, or he may imitate a skunk and stain your favorite trousers. Gregory does not do this to establish his territory, as many cat experts think, but to humiliate me because he is jealous of my friends. After my guests have fled, I look at the old fleabag snoozing and smiling to himself in front of the television set, and I have to forgive him for his obnoxious, but endearing, habits."

本文作者关注的不是她的宠物的外表，而是猫的习惯和行为。注意，在这句关于猫如何行走的句子中有许多不同的描述词：骄傲和轻蔑的情绪以及舞蹈演员的延伸隐喻，包括“轻蔑之舞”、“优雅”和“芭蕾舞演员”。当你想通过隐喻来描绘某样东西时，请确保你是一致的，所有的形容词都有意义。不要用两个不同的比喻来描述同一件事，因为这会使你试图描绘的形象尴尬而复杂。一致性增加了描述的重点和深度。

拟人化是一种有效的文学手段，可以给无生命的物体或动物提供栩栩如生的细节，卡特使用它产生了巨大的效果。看看她花了多少时间讨论猫为什么感到骄傲（或不为什么感到骄傲），以及猫的态度如何，挑剔和嫉妒，用喷雾来羞辱，以及整体行为令人讨厌。尽管如此，她还是表达了她对这只猫的深情，这是许多读者都能理解的。

“神奇的金属管”

汤亭亭

"Once in a long while, four times so far for me, my mother brings out the metal tube that holds her medical diploma. On the tube are gold circles crossed with seven red lines each―"joy" ideographs in abstract. There are also little flowers that look like gears for a gold machine. According to the scraps of labels with Chinese and American addresses, stamps, and postmarks, the family airmailed the can from Hong Kong in 1950. It got crushed in the middle, and whoever tried to peel the labels off stopped because the red and gold paint came off too, leaving silver scratches that rust. Somebody tried to pry the end off before discovering that the tube falls apart. When I open it, the smell of China flies out, a thousand-year-old bat flying heavy-headed out of the Chinese caverns where bats are as white as dust, a smell that comes from long ago, far back in the brain."

这一段开启了Maxine Hong Kingston的《女勇士：鬼魂中的少女回忆录》的第三章，这是一个在加利福尼亚长大的华裔美国女孩的抒情故事。请注意，金斯顿是如何在这篇关于“金属管”的文章中整合了信息性和描述性的细节的，这篇文章持有她母亲的医学院文凭。她使用颜色、形状、纹理（锈迹、缺漆、撬痕和划痕）和气味，在这些方面她有一个特别强烈的隐喻，以其独特性让读者感到惊讶。这一段的最后一句话（这里没有转载）更多的是关于气味的；用这一方面来结束这一段会增加重点。描述的顺序也是合乎逻辑的，因为关闭对象的第一个响应是它的外观，而不是打开时的气味。

“纽约尼亚加拉县7号区内学校”

乔伊斯·卡罗尔·奥茨

"Inside, the school smelled smartly of varnish and wood smoke from the potbellied stove. On gloomy days, not unknown in upstate New York in this region south of Lake Ontario and east of Lake Erie, the windows emitted a vague, gauzy light, not much reinforced by ceiling lights. We squinted at the blackboard, that seemed far away since it was on a small platform, where Mrs. Dietz's desk was also positioned, at the front, left of the room. We sat in rows of seats, smallest at the front, largest at the rear, attached at their bases by metal runners, like a toboggan; the wood of these desks seemed beautiful to me, smooth and of the red-burnished hue of horse chestnuts. The floor was bare wooden planks. An American flag hung limply at the far left of the blackboard and above the blackboard, running across the front of the room, designed to draw our eyes to it avidly, worshipfully, were paper squares showing that beautifully shaped script known as Parker Penmanship."

本段（原载于《华盛顿邮报世界丛书》并于​乔伊斯·卡罗尔·奥茨（Joyce Carol Oates）在《作家的信仰：生活、手艺、艺术》（Faith of a Writer:Life，Craft，Art）中深情地描述了她从一年级到五年级就读的一间教室的校舍。在继续描述房间的布局和内容之前，请注意她是如何吸引我们的嗅觉的。当你走进一个地方，它的整体气味会立即袭来，如果它是刺鼻的，甚至在你用眼睛进入整个区域之前。因此，这一描述性段落的编年史选择也是一种合乎逻辑的叙述顺序，尽管它不同于《香港金斯敦》段落。它让读者想象房间就像他走进房间一样。

本段充分展示了项目相对于其他项目的定位，以使人们清楚地了解整个场所的布局。对于里面的物品，她使用了很多描述它们是由什么材料制成的。注意短语“薄纱灯”、“雪橇”和“马蹄”所描绘的图像。你可以想象，通过对数量的描述、纸方格的故意位置以及该位置给学生带来的预期效果来强调书法研究。

来源

• 汤亭亭。《女勇士：幽灵中的少女时代回忆录》。年份，1989年。
• 奥茨，乔伊斯·卡罗尔。作家的信仰：生活、技艺、艺术。哈珀柯林斯电子书，2009年。