The topic sentence

One might justifiably object here to (a) the explicit mention of the text (this essay); (b) the hesitant use of hopefully; and (c) the reader's expectation that he is about to encounter little more than a summary of what he has already read. Such a sentence will almost certainly be improved by removing the entire sequence criticized here.

More effective by far are initial sentences that succeed in distilling an impression that you would wish your reader to derive from reading the body of your text. Thus, after a series of paragraphs on the joys and the tribulations of schoolteaching, a sentence like the following may well reflect the reader's feeling:

A teacher's job is indeed a responsible one.

This sentence clearly signals that the body is over and that concluding judgements may now be expected, but it succeeds in doing so implicitly; the use of the word indeed, suggesting agreement between writer and reader, indirectly wins over the reader's favour, with the implication that the writer understands the latter's reaction. And the very brevity of the sentence leads the reader to expect that its content is bout to be developed further.

It is vital that the conclusion should be conceived of as a conclusion to the entire preceding text. This is partly a matter of content, and partly a matter of linguistic form. Let us first consider content. In a text that presents, equally and fairly, two sides of an argument, both sides should be integrated into the conclusion, even if you go on later in the conclusion to express a preference for one of the two sides. Similarly, if you have presented in your body a number of arguments for a particular thesis, your conclusion should derive from the totality of the arguments. Particularly if you have constructed the body of the text in such a way that the final paragraph of that body contains the most important point you wish to make, there is a risk that the conclusion will be understood as a completion of the final body paragraph alone. It is vital that you make every effort to ensure that the reader will read the final section as a conclusion to the entire preceding text.

This brings us to matters of linguistic form. It is essential that any cohesion markers that you employ in the topic sentence of the concluding paragraph should be appropriate for the task at hand. Words such as so, however, thus and therefore are simply too light to carry the transition from the body to conclusion; their role should be confined to establishing cohesive links inside paragraphs, in the ways to be discussed in Chapter 9. other expressions, such as in conclusion, to conclude, by way of conclusion, to sum up do not have this disadvantage, but do have the drawback of being totally unsubtle. Our suggestion is to avoid explicit cohesion markers in the topic sentence of a concluding paragraph as much as possible; you may, however, find it worth while to employ words such as certainly, clearly, indeed, arguably, undoubtedly, which, as in the case of indeed discussed above, have the effect, if judiciously deployed, of intimating agreement between reader and writer. Some examples:

• After a for-and-against body:

It is clearly a matter of dispute whether poetry should serve a political purpose.

• After a body in which politeness has been compared, favourably, with rival virtues:

Politeness is arguably the most important lubricant of social relations.

• After a body exemplifying the benefits:

The Netherlands has undoubtedly benefited from membership of the European Union.

Alongside the function of signalling the completion of the body, the topic sentence of the conclusion serves a motivation function, to stimulate the reader to continue reading. In this respect, the sentence is no different from any other topic sentence, what should be apparent in the topic sentence of the concluding paragraph, however, is the progress that the reader has made as a result of reading the body paragraphs. It is therefore essential that it should not be a restatement of the topic sentence of the introduction. Rather, the topic sentence should ideally present the essence of the preceding argument and also, either explicitly or implicitly, suggest how the reasoning might be taken further. Topic sentences which merely summarize what has come before tend not to have the open-endedness that whets the reader's appetite. Thus sentences such as the following are inappropriate in this position:

*We have seen that the case for Republicanism in Australia is strong.

*As has been demonstrated in the preceding paragraphs, Schiphol is well-equipped to deal with the demands of the twenty-first century.

These sentences may well capture the gist of the body, but they do little to encourage the reader to expect that an interesting lesson will be drawn from the findings to which he has been exposed. One possible technique for rewriting such sentences involves presenting what they assert as presupposed. In this way, the reader is subtly associated with the writer's provisional conclusion, and can be led in the rest of the sentence to develop an interest in a follow-up:

If the case for Republicanism in Australia is indeed so strong, the question arises whether Prince Charles will ever rule over that distant land.

Well-equipped for the demands of the twenty-first century, Schiphol seems destined to become the hub of the Netherlands as an internationally oriented country.

Note how the sections in italics are presented in such a way that their validity if taken for granted rather than asserted; the communicative effect, if the preceding argument has been at all persuasive, will be to gain the reader's agreement with the view they present.