Paper 1 Question 2

     Richard Branson's letter was written to a stranger. His purpose of writing this letter was to express his advice on how to achieve absolute happiness by persuading the reader with convincing points made on how it has created happiness within himself. 

Like I mentioned, the text was written as a letter. With a letter, it has its destination name, along with ending it with who the writer consisted of. He started off his letter by saying ‘dear stranger’ as well as ending it off with ‘Happy Regards.’ This specific letter was written from a first person perspective. This helps the reader get a better understanding of the emotions that Richard Branson was expressing to try and persuade the reader to believe and connect with the thoughts and feelings he was trying to convey. 

As for the structure of this letter, he made it very open to anyone who needed to read it. This was shown when he addressed it to ‘stranger’ like I had mentioned previously. This makes the reader feel more comfortable and connected to him, due to it not being specific to one type of person. 

Richard Branson had written this with short paragraphs, intended to express his full thoughts. He was able to include different thoughts that helped impact the reader. This also included sentences that were run-on sentences. This made the reader be able to follow along with his thoughts, and let them flow simply without any type of confusion. 

Moving on to the language in the letter, Richard Branson had an inspiring tone that was used throughout his words. For example, he had used enchanting words such as ‘extraordinary,’ ‘grandiose aspirations,’ and ‘memorable.’ Having these types of words written throughout the letter, helps the reader connect more, which goes back to his whole purpose of trying to make an impact on people's lives, including persuading them with his personal advice. He also included words such as ‘try it’ which made the reader feel a more personal connection, and almost as if he was actually saying it as a friend. 

Repetition was also used a lot throughout his writing. This was shown when he had used words such as ‘be.’He emphasizes this word throughout the letter to be more forward and strong minded. Richard Branson even stated in his writing towards the end of this paper ‘just to be, rather than do.’ These words are powerful, because it is trying to accomplish winning the reader over into being happy. 

His writing was definitely informal because of the way it was written as if it was to someone who he knows. But it was addressed to a ‘stranger’ so that includes the audience to feel that it is directly to them. His wording that he used was also a key sign to not being a formal piece. An example is when he said ‘it’s OK to be stressed, scared, and sad..’ This sentence and many others were written almost similar to a conversation, not as a writing piece. He chose to write this way to make a deeper connection with the reader, so that they take his advice more seriously and consider what he has to say.

Involving his informal writing, it definitely connects with his emotive language that is being written throughout his paper.  

There was definitely pathos being used in this letter, Branson helped show this when he uses words such as ‘will,’ using powerful words like this, almost makes it an ultimatum, he included feelings that were as if you did not do them then you would not be happy like him. The audience finds him more personable, which includes vulnerability which makes him  sound more understandable and someone for the reader to have a connection with. Which this again, connects all back to his purpose for his writing.