02.26.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 2:39 pm by Administrator
Editing is not always about spelling and punctuation. Sometimes an editor has to get inside a writer’s mind, wade into a sentence or paragraph whose true meaning is cleverly hidden within phrases and structures that make absolutely no sense. The editor enters the murky world of creative spelling, misplaced modifiers, horrifying accidents of punctuation. Trust me, it’s not a pretty place.
How should one approach such a daunting task? First, let the self slip into the background. Your ego has no business entering someone else’s writing. Gently feel the writer (minds out of the gutter, please) through his or her words. Allow the true meaning to reveal itself. When the meaning becomes clear, cup it gently within your hands and bring it to the surface for the rest of the world to see.
That’s one method. Then there’s the method most of us actually use, which goes something like this:
Leaning forward, rest elbow on desk and place forehead in palm of hand. Read nonsensical sentence again. And again, only backwards this time. Sigh loudly. Proclaim, “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Leave office to get a fourth cup of coffee. For especially confusing sentences, have a jelly donut too.
Okay, despite their essential yumminess, jelly donuts are not actual editorial tools. (Please note that coffee is an actual editorial tool, at least in my office.) Being able to temporarily slip out of yourself and “become the writer” is an essential editorial skill, though. Good editors will understand what a writer means even when that writer’s words say something completely different. Then the good editor will rephrase the words to say exactly what the writer meant to say in exactly the way the writer would have said it if the writer had not been so befuddled by his/her initial thought. Some writers will be amazed by this editorial skill. Others will take it for granted. A small minority will be offended that the arrogant, dimwitted editor has made their writing make sense. The nerve!
One thing is clear to me: Egos have no place in editing. It can be tempting to rearrange or change a writer’s words just because you think you could have written that story or paper or poem so much better than the writer did. But I think the editor’s job is to help the writer say exactly what the writer meant to say in exactly the way the writer meant to say it. Sometimes this is a tough job that involves a certain amount of sighing and swearing. Often, though, it’s what you refrain from, what you leave behind when you sit down to work, that’s most important. No imposition of self. No editorial ego. That’s Zen and the art of editing.
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02.24.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 4:03 pm by Administrator
I love commas. They’re such tiny things, but their power is immense. Okay, “immense” is probably an overstatement. Let’s start by agreeing that commas are important and move on from there.
My love of the humble comma extends to the serial (or series, or Oxford) comma. For those of you so-called “normal” people who don’t spend hours out of every day thinking about commas, the serial comma is the comma that comes before the conjunction in a series of three or more items (as in “puppies, kittens, and salamanders”). Some people consider this comma “optional” or “extra” (they would prefer “puppies, kittens and salamanders”), and many writers and editors treat serial commas like so much disgusting punctuation litter, the kind of trash one must handle only while wearing rubber gloves and a respirator. Certain word nerds enjoy arguing over whether the serial comma is necessary or appropriate. I prefer not to argue about it; I just go ahead and use that little comma unless there’s a good reason not to.
Certainly there are times when a serial comma would get in the way or cause confusion for the reader. In such cases, leave it out. However, I edit lots of documents written by people who either don’t like serial commas or think the use of the serial comma is absolutely forbidden somewhere in the Ten Commandments. I call these unfortunate folks commaphobes. Somewhere there must be a support group for commaphobic people—at least I hope there is. But getting back to my point, I think the serial comma clarifies more often than it obscures. I don’t enjoy obscure writing, so I’m all for anything that will improve clarity. I guess this makes me a commaphile.
By the way, please feel free to disagree with my thoughts on the serial comma. I won’t even argue with you. Hey, you’re entitled to be commaphobic, misguided, and wrong.
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02.22.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 7:32 pm by Administrator
Nobody’s perfect. Editors generally like things to be perfect, and some of us experience a certain queasy feeling when we realize an error (even a tiny one) has slipped by, but at some point we all have to admit that we make mistakes. Humility is a beautiful thing. So, in the spirit of humility, today I will share a couple of my recent mistakes.
Several weeks ago, I finally decided I should actually read the little disclaimer I place at the top of “Madame Zwelch’s Weekly Forecast” on my Bog blog each Monday. (For those of you who are either just learning about me or haven’t been paying attention, Madame Zwelch is a somewhat grumpy mud turtle who has “the sight.” She offers confident but questionable advice, which you should follow only at your own risk.) I immediately realized I had misspelled the word “guarantee.” Because I’d been doing the ol’ copy-and-paste instead of rewriting the statement each week, “guarantee” had been misspelled consistently for perhaps about two months. I sincerely hope that my site had been visited only by exceptionally poore spelers during those two months.
Then, just this morning, I randomly decided to check over the profile information in one of my online business accounts. I realized I had entered my Web address incorrectly. (Presumably, this would explain the lack of hits.) Oh, the idiocy! I am still blushing over this one. Seriously, would you hire an editor who can’t spell her own address? Of course not. You would think, “Boy, what an idiot,” and move on.
Take a lesson here. Read over your stuff. Yes, even the small stuff. Yes, even your name, your address—every single little thing. Especially if you’re an editor. And when that queasy feeling comes because you realize you’ve embarrassed yourself in print or online, try drinking some warm ginger tea; it has a remarkably calming effect on upset editorial stomachs.
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02.18.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 12:38 pm by Administrator
“Kids today can’t spell and don’t know how to write a simple sentence. It’s because of all that texting they’re doing—all those newfangled abbreviations, no punctuation. They’ll all end up with rotten brains and broken thumbs, and the language catastrophe will culminate in 2012, when (according to the Mayan calendar) the world will end because no one can remember how to spell ‘you.’”
Many old fogies (and even quite a few of us slightly younger fogies) have made pronouncements of doom just like this. Heck, I opened up the newspaper this morning, went straight to the comics, and found that today’s Speed Bump deals with this very topic. “The end is near!” the language prophet says. Nobody pays attention; they’re all too busy texting, probably sending messages like “u c ths crzy gy” to the BFF standing right next to them.
But is this the end?
According to some recent studies, no. In fact, the rules of chatspeak are more complex than most of us realize, and kids who are proficient in chatspeak are just as proficient in fogeyspeak (that would be ordinary written English). A study published last year in the British Journal of Developmental Psychology found that texting might actually make young people more literate. Similarly, a University of Alberta study found that kids who can spell things like “OMG” and “LOL” can also spell things like “chilblain” and “exponentially.” Granted, “chilblain” and “exponentially” were probably not on the kids’ spelling tests, but a good speller is a good speller.
So maybe we should all relax. Young people’s brains are not rotting at an ever-increasing rate because of chatspeak. Those young people are actually being very clever in their use of language to communicate vital 411 such as “Does he like like me, or does he like like me?” I would have written that question in chatspeak, but I don’t know how. I suppose that makes me a chat-illiterate fogey, which brings up my next point: Young people are communicating via coded messages that people over thirty can’t possibly understand, and they’re developing super-fast, super-strong thumbs. Those of us with weak, fumbling thumbs don’t stand a chance in the chativerse.
Hmm … maybe we shouldn’t relax too much.
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02.03.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 9:46 pm by Administrator
It’s been a sad week for me. It’s also been a little less busy than usual, and it’s all because I lost my favorite freelance job late last week. For a little over a year, I’d been writing a comedy blog based on a fictional dog character for a nonprofit dog-rescue group. The work was steady and fun, the pay was good, but money’s tight and the group can’t afford me anymore. So now I don’t have to wake up three mornings every week and try to think of something funny to write (not an easy thing to do week after week). That’s the silver lining, I guess. I have time to pursue other opportunities (more silver lining). But now I have to pursue other opportunities—less-fun opportunities—or my bank account will start looking a little anemic within a month or two.
What to do? Well, I’ve been able to put some more effort into my Boghaunter site, for one thing. No one pays me to do that (minor complication), but it’s still a good use of a few hours out of every week. That’s what I tell myself. I think it might even be true. And I’ve got other irons in the fire, other paying gigs. Still, there’s this worried voice in the back of my head that keeps telling me maybe this will be the month the bad economy catches up with me. Maybe this will be the month it all starts to slide downhill. I am confident that I have the resources to get through, but still.…
I have sign above my desk. “Don’t Panic!” it says. Good advice, for freelancers and hitchhikers of all sorts. So I’m not panicking. But I am a little sad.
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02.01.10
Posted in Editorial Musings at 10:01 pm by Administrator
Sometimes editors (and others) can be unimaginative, boring old coots. I was reminded of this uncomfortable fact just moments ago as I was leafing through Miss Thistlebottom’s Hobgoblins (by Theodore M. Bernstein). My little eye fell upon the entry for “land on water,” an innocent and useful phrase that has apparently induced apoplectic fits in some people.
Now, we all know what “land on water” means, don’t we? We don’t have to get all bent out of shape and argue that one can only “land” on land, do we? Perhaps, Bernstein says, we could use “alight on water,” but (as Bernstein also says) that sounds prissy. You certainly wouldn’t say that the crippled Airbus A320 piloted by Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger alighted on the Hudson. A big ol’ Airbus doesn’t alight anywhere. It lands, even on water.
Surely you’ve encountered at least one annoyingly literal-minded person in your life. This would be the guy who laughs when you talk about climbing down a ladder. “Climb” means you’re going up, not down, this person explains. It’s nearly impossible to have normal conversations with such people. Perhaps it’s best to just punch them in the face and be done with it, but I haven’t tried that approach and can’t recommend it. (If you happen to be one of these literal-minded people, please note that the preceding sentence was a joke, not an actual suggestion or threat. Don’t take it literally. And don’t you dare say anything stupid like “Of course I literally have a mind.”)
Bernstein ends the entry like this: “To insist on confining words to their original meanings regardless of the need to accommodate new situations is to handcuff the language.”
Handcuffs are for criminals. Let’s leave them off our living, growing language.
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