Rhetorical Strategies: How They Enhance the Essay Today, rhetorical strategies are ubiquitous. They can be discovered in the latest top box office cinematic movie, the beloved binge-watched television show on Netflix, the aggravating commercials we are forced to sit through, the latest best-selling book, etc. Applying rhetorical strategies helps the writer communicate with ease and fluidity. Rhetoric additionally helps the reader or viewer gain interest while making it pleasurable. All in all, rhetorical strategies are simply ways of effectively and adequately presenting material. In the essays of discussion the effectiveness of how imagery, emotional appeal and tone build the writers credibility and enhance the essay will be discovered. For example, Virginia Woolf uses rhetorical strategies in “The Death of The Moth”. Woolf begins by using imagery effectively throughout her essay by strategically incorporating descriptive details. Woolf encountered this moth in the day time, so she begins her essay by stating, “moths that fly by day are not properly to be called moths . . .” (para. 1). This statement spikes wonder; what does that mean? She explains that moths in the day “ . . . do not excite that pleasant sense of dark autumn nights and ivy-blossom which the commonest yellow-underwing asleep in the shadow of the curtain never fails to rouse in us” (Woolf para. 1). Her sense of imagery is full of color and expression which helps her credibility in her writing. It truly makes you visualize that “dark autumn night” and “ivy-blossom” as if you experienced it yourself. Woolf continues her essay by using more imagery to describe the day of her encounter. As she was sitting by her window on a mid-September morning, she noticed the moth “ . . . fluttering from side to side of his square of the window-pane” (para. 2). Woolf stated “One could not help watching him” (para. 2). Intrigued by the moth, she is still watching him intently. After seeing him repetitively fluttering back and forth, a sense of pity overcomes her. Woolf shared her thoughts: He flew vigorously to one corner of his compartment, and, after waiting there a second, flew across to the other. What remained for him but to fly to a third corner and then to a fourth? That was all he could do, in spite of the size of the downs, the width of the sky, the far-off smoke of houses, and the romantic voice, now and then, of a steamer out at sea. What he could do he did. (Woolf para. 2).
This use of descriptive language to describe what she saw makes the reader feel that same pity she felt for the moth. How she describes and organizes her wording enhances the overall essays fluidity and use of imagery. After expressing her anecdote by using imagery effectively, she continues her essay. Now with a different tune, she begins to realize that this moth is actually full of life. Even though Woolf thought the moth was pathetic and was limited greatly, what she saw was a moth full of energy and life. She stated “it was as if someone had taken a tiny bead of pure life and decking it as lightly as possible with down and feathers, had set it dancing and zig-zagging to show us the true nature of life” (Woolf para. 3). After a while he settled on the window ledge and Woolf forgot about the moth. Her expression of the moth’s liveliness helps the reader capture how much her view of the him has changed. The reader can easily understand and picture this by her flawless use of imagery. A few moments after, Woolf expressed what she now saw. “I looked up, my eye was caught by him. He was trying to resume his dancing, but seemed either so stiff or so awkward that he could only flutter to the bottom of the window-pane; and when he tried to fly across it he failed” (para. 4). Her pity for the moth now grows stronger as she realizes she was wrong. The moth was still just as pathetic as before. She now realizes again that he really just is a moth with no purpose. As she sees a change in the moth, Woolf introduces another rhetorical strategy to the reader; theme. She introduces the theme of life and death when she describes the dying moth’s struggles: After perhaps a seventh attempt he slipped from the wooden ledge and fell, fluttering his wings, on to his back on the window sill. The helplessness of his attitude roused me. It flashed upon me that he was in difficulties; he could no longer raise himself; his legs struggled vainly. But, as I stretched out a pencil, meaning to help him to right himself, it came over me that the failure and awkwardness were the approach of death. (Woolf para. 4).
Woolf has a unique way of introducing the theme of life and death. Her essay has been a rollercoaster of emotion with twists and turns of a lively moth to a dying one. Woolf’s use of this theme accurately and wonderfully portrays this concept while helping the reader fully grasp it. Moving forward, she expresses to the reader her connection with the dying moth. She watched and even tried to help the insect: I lifted the pencil again, useless though I knew it to be. But even as I did so, the unmistakable tokens of death showed themselves. The body relaxed, and instantly grew stiff. The struggle was over. The insignificant little creature now knew death”, but there was nothing she could do. (Woolf para. 5).
She ends the essay with a powerful statement, “O yes, he seemed to say, death is stronger than I am.” (Woolf para. 5). That statement certainly makes you question the theme of life and death and how the use of theme contributes to the effectiveness of the essay. Throughout “The Death of a Moth”, Woolf accurately and productively portrays both rhetorical strategies, imagery and theme. Next, in the essay “Thinking Like A Mountain”, by Aldo Leopold, his use of tone is apparent. While reading, you get a good feel for his attitude by his style of writing. Leopold has an irritated and angry tone in this essay. His argument is against hunters because he believes they are clueless as to the valuable assets they take away from the mountains when they hunt. Leopold states “only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of a wolf” (Leopold para. 1) Thus, you can sense his tone and how he believes no one truly understands the important roles that take place in the mountains besides for the mountains themselves. You can see and feel his frustration here when he says: Those unable to decipher the hidden meaning know nevertheless that it is there, for it is felt in all wolf country, and distinguishes that country from all other land. It tingles in the spine of all who hear wolves by night, or who scan their tracks by day. Even without sight or sound of wolf, it is implicit in a hundred small events: the midnight whinny of a  pack horse, the rattle of rolling rocks, the bound of a fleeing deer, the way shadows lie under the spruces. (Leopold para. 2).
The importance of wolves is so prominent to him, and he is angered that hunters cannot see it. He says “only the ineducable tyro can fail to sense the presence or absence of wolves, or the fact that mountains have a secret opinion about them” (Leopold para. 2), which shows that hunters truly don't understand the wolves importance to the mountains and what lacks when they are killed. By Leopold using tone in this way, it helps his credibility as a writer. His tone makes the reader want to believe him because of how passionate and strong he feels about this topic. All of this frustration and anger that you can feel in Leopold’s tone is shown again as we discover emotional appeal in his essay. You can see here his reaction to when he killed a wolf when he was young: We reached the old wolf in time to watch a fierce green fire dying in her eyes. I realized then, and have known ever since, that there was something new to me in those eyes - something known only to her and to the mountain. I was young then, and full of trigger- itch; I thought that because fewer wolves meant more deer, that no wolves would mean hunters' paradise. But after seeing the green fire die, I sensed that neither the wolf nor the mountain agreed with such a view. (Leopold para. 5).
He became so emotionally connected to the wolf after he stared into her eyes as her “green fire” slowly died. Ever since that incident, he understood the wolf is more than just good game, it plays a critical role to that environment. When he describes what becomes of the mountain when the hunters don’t stop killing the wolves, his expression of emotion compels you to feel the same. Leopold states “such a mountain looks as if someone had given God a new pruning shears, and forbidden Him all other exercise. In the end the starved bones of the hoped-for deer herd, dead of its own too-much, bleach with the bones of the dead sage, or molder under the high-lined junipers.” Leopold was strategic in the way he incorporates God into his feelings because it can trigger emotion to readers of this essay. His use of emotional appeal shows his credibility in that he knows and saw first-hand what happened, and you can tell how truly upset and frustrated he is about this topic. Leopold ends “Thinking Like A Mountain”, off with a powerful and emotional statement when he says: I now suspect that just as a deer herd lives in mortal fear of its wolves, so does a mountain live in mortal fear of its deer. And perhaps with better cause, for while a buck pulled down by wolves can be replaced in two or three years, a range pulled down by too many deer may fail of replacement in as many decades. So also with cows. The cowman who cleans his range of wolves does not realize that he is taking over the wolf's job of trimming the herd to fit the range. He has not learned to think like a mountain. (para. 7).
The strategy involved while implementing emotional appeal is critical in order to have the reader affected by it. This rhetorical strategy enhances and completes this essay by making the story believable and understandable. Overall, his use of tone and emotional appeal in this essay succeeds in that it makes the reader think deeper than the surface and clearly understand his argument. The last essay to discuss is “A Piece of Chalk”, by G.K. Chesterton. His artistic strategy is obvious when reading the essay. He wrote this essay very precisely to convey a much larger and powerful message. Chesterton, along with Woolf, uses an abundant amount of imagery in his writing. He starts his essay off by describing the day, “I remember one splendid morning, all blue and silver, in the summer holidays when I reluctantly tore myself away from the task of doing nothing in particular, and put on a hat of some sort and picked up a walking-stick, and put six very bright-colored chalks in my pocket” (Chesterton para. 1) Starting off an essay with imagery helps the reader envision themselves in that exact moment. Imagery is a great rhetorical strategy when trying to get the reader to feel as if they are there too. He continues his essay by explaining how he asks an old woman for some brown paper to draw on. Chesterton does not just grab the brown paper and simply draw, in “A Piece of Chalk”, he describes the color brown so uniquely when he says: I then tried to explain the rather delicate logical shade, that I not only liked brown paper, but liked the quality of brownness in paper, just as I like the quality of brownness in October woods, or in beer. Brown paper represents the primal twilight of the first toil of creation, and with a bright-colored chalk or two you can pick out points of fire in it, sparks of gold, and blood-red, and sea-green, like the first fierce stars that sprang out of divine darkness. (para. 2). He thinks so deeply about the colors and describes them so descriptively by using imagery to where we can picture it perfectly. The way he uses descriptive language to describe the “sparks of gold” and “blood-red” colors creates the images of those colors in the readers mind. As a writer, it is crucial to implement imagery so the reader can fully understand exactly what the writer is trying to convey. As you can see in all of these essays, there is one common occurrence. Excellent portrayal of rhetorical strategies are shown in all of the essays discussed. Imagery, emotional appeal and tone are three great rhetorical strategies which have been proven effective by Woolf, Leopold and Chesterton. The use of rhetorical strategies are all unique in each story but all have the same basic rules. Each strategy has their own personal role in the essay, and must deliver it precisely and accurately. In “The Death of The Moth”, “Thinking Like A Mountain”, and “A Piece of Chalk”, we fully discovered the effectiveness of how imagery, emotional appeal and tone all help build the writers credibility and transform the essay from “good” to “amazing”.

Works Cited

Chesterton, G.K. "A Piece of Chalk." N.p.: Daily News, 1905. N. pag. Print.

Leopold, Aldo. "Thinking Like A Mountain." N.p.: n.p., n.d. N. pag. Print.

Woolf, Virginia. “The Death of A Moth.” N.p.: n.p., n.d. N. pag. Print.