The Conclusion That Argues With Itself
A student's free-response essay on a prose passage has a strong thesis: the narrator's apparent sympathy for a character is undercut by the narrator's own self-interest. The two body paragraphs are solid. The conclusion, however, reads: "In conclusion, the author uses many literary devices to show that sympathy is complicated. This is still relevant today because people often struggle with empathy. The author's use of symbolism and irony makes the passage effective." The student has 10 minutes left and asks whether to expand the conclusion to fill the page.
1. Diagnose the conclusion and advise on the 10 minutes.
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The conclusion commits three errors: it announces itself ('In conclusion'), it retreats to a platitude ('sympathy is complicated'), and it introduces devices (symbolism) never analyzed in the body - which reads as padding and can signal to a grader that the essay is thin. The 'still relevant today' move is generic and adds nothing about this passage.
Expanding it to fill the page would deepen the problem: more sentences in the same register produce more vagueness, not more credit. The 10 minutes is better spent replacing the conclusion with 3–4 sentences that extend the thesis: e.g., name what the narrator's self-interest costs the character, and what the passage implies about the limits of narrated sympathy. A short, sharp conclusion that advances the argument outranks a long one that restates it. Do not introduce any device not already analyzed.
2. What is the difference between 'extending' and 'restating' a thesis, with a concrete example from this essay?
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Restating repeats the thesis in different words ('the narrator's sympathy is complicated by self-interest'). Extending draws out a consequence the body paragraphs implied but did not state - it answers 'so what?'
Concrete extension: the body shows the narrator's sympathy is undercut by self-interest. An extending conclusion might observe that the passage therefore makes the reader complicit - we are positioned to see the character's need and the narrator's evasion at once, so our sympathy is also compromised. That is a new claim, generated by the analysis, not a summary of it. It also stays anchored to the passage rather than drifting to 'people today.' The test: could a reader disagree with the conclusion? If yes, it extends; if it merely agrees with the thesis, it restates.