Good Attention-Grabbers for

Autobiographical Narrative
Unlike a traditional autobiography, an autobiographical narrative is generally a more focused
retelling of a profound and life-changing event or series of related events the author experienced.
Because the focus is narrowed, the writer must immediately grab his reader’s attention and draw
him into the story. This means the opening lines and paragraph must include good attention-
grabbing techniques.

Introduce a Problem

To grab the reader’s attention, begin with a problem. All good stories include problems that must be
resolved or at least dealt with. By starting with the conflict, the reader is immediately engaged and
has a myriad of questions he wants the writer to answer. For example, “There I was all alone in the
middle of nowhere with no way home, no money in my pocket and no phone to call for help.” This
statement leaves the reader wondering where the narrator is, how he got there and where the story
is going.

Vary the Order of Events

Start the narrative somewhere other than the chronological beginning. An effective way to hook a
reader is to immediately involve him in the action of the story. This often requires beginning the
story in the middle or even at the end of the narrative. Readers like to be engaged and invested in
the story, so beginning at a point of action is an effective device. Writers can achieve this by literally
starting in a moment of action or through literary techniques such as flashback.

Describe Key Elements

Opening a narrative with description can also intrigue the reader. Describing an event, place, setting
or critical character grasps the reader’s attention and propels him forward through the narrative.
Engage each of the reader’s five senses -- taste, touch, smell, sight and hearing -- through the
description to give the illusion of being there. Use quotations or dialogue to bring the description to
life. Also use imagery, simile and metaphor to build connections between the reader and the
descriptions. For example, “Her vibrant red, curly hair was wound as tight as a drum, as if to reflect
her mood and scream, ‘Don’t you take one step closer!’ ”

Employ Rhetorical Devices

Rhetorical questions and devices can also be good attention-grabbing techniques. Readers enjoy
being surprised by interesting facts and statistics, especially if the new information relates to a topic
they are emotionally invested in. Quotes and questions can also be used effectively to begin a
narrative. These may be philosophical, practical or humorous in nature, depending on the tone and
mood of the story. Dramatic or ironic questions are also effective techniques for gaining the reader’s
interest. Rhetorical devices are especially helpful when writing for a mature and intellectual
audience.

https://education.seattlepi.com/literary-definition-narrative-techniques-5557.html
How to Start an Autobiography – 3 Great Examples
How to start an autobiography can be a tricky issue.

Do you begin with your birth? With a description of your parents, or maybe even your grandparents?

With the first notable thing you did? With the biggest crisis point in your life, and then go back to the
beginning?

While there is no single “best” way to start an autobiography, there are different approaches. The
key is to find the one that works best for your story.

How to start an autobiography: 3 examples

Here are excerpts showing four interesting ways that have been used to open an autobiography.
One author uses his birth name to foreshadow the life that lies ahead; one paints a simple sketch of
his parents; one talks about the beliefs that shaped him; and one reflects on the influence of chance.

Each opening is different, and each is just right for its subject. Perhaps one of these approaches will
be right for you! (I’ve linked the titles of each book below to Amazon so you can click on the “Look
Inside” button and read more.)

In the opening paragraph of Long Walk to Freedom: The Autobiography of Nelson Mandela, the
former President of South Africa hints at the tumultuous life he must face:

Apart from life, a strong constitution, and an abiding connection to the Thembu royal
house, the only thing my father bestowed upon me at birth was a name, Rolihlahla. In
Xhosa, Rolihlahla  literally means “pulling the branch of a tree,” but its colloquial
meaning more accurately would be “trouble maker.” I do not believe that names are
destiny or that my father somehow divined my future, but in later years, friends and
relatives would ascribe to my birth name the many storms I have both caused and
weathered.
In Take Me Home, singer-song writer John Denver uses only a few words to sketch a portrait of his
parents:

They met in Tulsa. Dad was a ploughboy from western Oklahoma; Mom was a
hometown girl. He was in the Army Air Corps, studying the mechanics of flight at the
Spartan School of Aeronautics, and she had been first-prize winner in a jitterbug
contest the year before. It was 1942: She was just turning eighteen, a high-school senior;
and he was twenty-one.
Former President Ronald Reagan opens An American Life by talking about the effects of chance:

If I’d gotten the job I wanted at Montgomery Ward, I suppose I never would have left
Illinois. I’ve often wondered at how lives are shaped by what seem like small and
inconsequential events, how an apparently random turn in the road can lead you a
long way from where you intended to go—and a long way from wherever you expected
to go. For me, the first of these turns occurred in the summer of 1932, in the abyss of
the Depression.
How to start an autobiography?

There is no single best way. The goal is to draw your readers in with your first sentence—to make
them want to read more by telling them something about you that makes you and your life story
irresistible.

If you can do that, you’ve figured out how to start an autobiography.

Before deciding how you’d like to open your autobiography, go back and review the purpose of the
autobiography and consider what it must contain.

Once you know where you’re headed, you’ll be able to zero in on the “right” opening more
effectively.
Great Opening Lines to Inspire the Start
of Your Story
By Mark Nichol

As Glinda the Good Witch says in The Wizard of Oz, “It’s always best to start at the beginning.”
That’s where editors and literary agents generally get going, so perhaps you should, too.
Here are some strategies, accompanied by exemplars from literature, for making the first
line of your novel or short story stand out so that the reader can’t help but go on to the
second and the third and so on to see what else you have to say:

1. Absurd
“‘Take my camel, dear,’ said my Aunt Dot, as she climbed down from this animal on her
return from High Mass.” — Rose Macaulay, The Towers of Trebizond
Are you in the mood for amusement? This opening line makes it clear that farce is in force.

2. Acerbic
“The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children’s
games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end, which is a nuisance for the
few people who grow up.” — G. K. Chesterton, The Napoleon of Notting Hill
Astute observations accompanied by a implied sigh of disgust are tricky to master, but
Chesterton, one of the most multifaceted men of letters, lights the way for you with this
sample of the form.

3. Bleak
“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” — William
Gibson, Neuromancer
Oh, by the way, just in case you missed the forecast? Don’t expect any fluffy bunnies or
fragrant blossoms or dulcet giggles to show up in this seminal cyberpunk story. A spot-on
metaphor expresses the story’s nihilism, letting you know what you’re in for and
lugubriously inviting you in.

4. Confiding
“There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.” — C. S.
Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
The author of the Chronicles of Narnia no sooner introduces by name a new character in
the latest installment than, in just five more words, he succeeds in telling you everything you
need to know about him. Well, got that out of the way.

5. Cynical
“Justice? — You get justice in the next world, in this world you have the law.” — William
Gaddis, A Frolic of His Own
Somebody got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning — and maybe the bed’s shoved
up against the wall, and that attitude is a permanent condition. The stage is set for an
unhappy beginning, middle, and ending.

6. Disorienting
“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.” — George
Orwell, 1984
Ho-hum — huh? Orwell’s opening line creates a slight but immediate discordance that sets
you up for an unsettling experience.

7. Enigmatic
“Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong
person.” — Anne Tyler, Back When We Were Grownups
It will not surprise you to learn that the protagonist sets about retracing her steps and
striving to correct the error, but after reading this subtle but striking first line, can you resist
finding out how she does it?

8. Epigrammatic
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” — L. P. Hartley, The Go-
Between
This offbeat observation from Hartley’s novel of painful reminiscence is a blindsidingly
original statement that one will feel compelled to read about just how the writer acquired
this wisdom.

9. Foreboding
“I have never begun a novel with more misgiving.” — W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor’s
Edge
The author is a bit intrusive here, true enough, but it is kind of him to let us know that we’re
in for a bit of unpleasantness. But if he can express such profound reluctance, it must be
quite a story.

10. Gritty
“There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that
come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump
and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel
the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands’ necks. Anything can happen. You
can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.” — Raymond Chandler, Red Wind
Chandler, the master of hard-bitten crime noir, makes it obvious that this story is not going
to end well. You can almost hear the smoky, whiskey-soured, world-weary narration in your
head. And this quote comes from one of Chandler’s half-forgotten short stories.

11. Inviting
“Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held
by anybody else, these pages must show.” — Charles Dickens, David Copperfield
Dickens extends his arm toward the passageway within, welcoming you to enter what
promises to be an entertaining story.

12. Picaresque
“In the last years of the Seventeenth Century there was to be found among the fops and
fools of the London coffee-houses one rangy, gangling flitch called Ebenezer Cooke, more
ambitious than talented, and yet more talented than prudent, who, like his friends-in-folly,
all of whom were supposed to be educating at Oxford or Cambridge, had found the sound
of Mother English more fun to game with than her sense to labor over, and so rather than
applying himself to the pains of scholarship, had learned the knack of versifying, and ground
out quires of couplets after the fashion of the day, afroth with Joves and Jupiters, aclang
with jarring rhymes, and string-taut with similes stretched to the snapping-point.” — John
Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor
Oh, but you know this novel is going to be juicy. This snide introduction to the main
character conveys a promise of a continuous feed of schadenfreude.

13. Pithy
“Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.” — Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were
Watching God
Every once in a while there comes an opening line that seems to have an entire story folded
up inside it. But it’s just the label on the envelope. And I challenge you to withstand the urge
to open it up and read the message.

14. Poetic
“We started dying before the snow, and like the snow, we continued to fall.” — Louise
Erdrich, Tracks
A somber, stately metaphor draws us in despite the pervasively gloomy imagery.

15. Prefatory
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age
of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of
Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”
— Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities
Many people associate Dickens with whimsy and eccentricity, but A Tale of Two Cities is a
stern study of the insanity of mob rule, and this floridly eloquent prologue sets the stage like
the presenter of a Shakespearean prologue: “Epic Ahead.”
16. Romantic
“He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.” — Raphael
Sabatini, Scaramouche
Romantic, that is, in the sense of lust for life, not love for another. This author of
swashbucklers like The Sea Hawk and Captain Blood (and, of course, Scaramouche) lets you
know right away that you are about to meet someone larger than life.
17. Sarcastic
“It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune,
must be in want of a wife.” — Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
Austen didn’t invent the word snark — but she certainly refined the application of the
quality. Notice, though, how subtle this line is. It’s a bon mot — understated, yet with teeth
behind that prim smile.
18. Sour
“If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you’ll probably want to know is where I was
born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all
before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don’t feel like going
into it, if you want to know the truth.” — J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye
Can you find it in your heart to forgive this young man his grievously bad attitude? More
likely, you’ll be impressed by — and want to immerse yourself in more of — his insolence.

19. Unexpected
“Every summer Lin Kong returned to Goose Village to divorce his wife, Shuyu.” — Ha
Jin, Waiting
This seemingly pedestrian introduction upends itself with an intriguing premise that raises a
question in the reader’s mind that must be answered.