SecondPen.ai

Templates · Writing & publishing

Essay (Paul Graham) template

For an idea you want to work out in public. Origin: Paul Graham's essays and his notes on writing them ("The Age of the Essay", "Write Simply", "How to Write Usefully"): one question, followed wherever it leads, in plain words.

Start from this templateFree, no account needed. The blank is written with guidance in each section, ready to fill in.

Structure

  1. A question or a surprising claim
  2. Short paragraphs that each move the argument one step
  3. Concrete examples, ideally from the writer's own experience
  4. Objections taken seriously
  5. An ending that says something the beginning could not

How a tough reader scores it

When you score a draft against this format, the Critic evaluates this essay. The weights add up to 100; the fixes for the weakest criteria arrive as cards in the editor.

CriterionWeight
Says something true that most readers had not already thought25
The argument moves: each section adds a step, none restates20
Examples are concrete and specific, ideally first-hand15
The strongest objection is stated fairly and answered15
Language is plain: simple words, short sentences, no hedging15
The ending is sharper than the opening10

How it works in SecondPen.ai

Open the template and the editor writes the blank once, with a line of guidance under each heading that you delete as you fill it in. Write your abstract and the editor names the format it reads like. Ask for a document with a slash command and it offers to start from the matching format. When the draft is ready, the Critic scores it against the criteria above, the way this format's toughest reader would, and the three highest-leverage fixes become Editor cards.

More in Writing & publishing