This is one of my favourites when it comes to writing and editing. It is one of the areas that writers make the most mistakes.
I have posted on this subject before but it always crops up in books that I read. It drives me to distraction. There is really no reason for it to happen.
The latest is in Terry Pratchett’s “The Light Fantastic”. Page 139 in the Corgi paper back.
The character is Twoflower. ‘There was this. . . a clock that. . . and these people who. . . ’ said Twoflower. He shook his head. ‘Why does everything smell of horses?’
Now we fast forward to Page 228 where we find;
Which explains why, when the shop finally materialized in Ankh-Morpork, Rincwwind sat bolt upright and said ‘We’re here,’ Bethan went pale and Twoflower, who had no sense of smell, said, ‘Really? How can you tell?’
Now, how does this happen? Well, it’s all too easy. There we are writing away and we write something about a character and later on while the words are flowing and the keys are running hot under our fingers, we write this really great line.
As fate would have it, and we all know that fate is a real bitch, someone points out the discrepancy to the whole world to see. Character development is important. You have to get to know your characters.
Now another point of editing that has caught my eye is a matter of inconsistency in style. Style is different from country to country and indeed from publisher to publisher. As a writer you will need to know what the style is for the publisher you intend to regale with your writing.
Now, Corgi books is British. The style convention for British publishers is to use single quotation marks for speaking and double quotation marks for quotes. The interesting thing is that while Corgi follows this convention they have used the American spelling of “materialized” as opposed to the British “materialised”.
Well, that’s enough for this post. Now all I have to do is find a subject for the next one.
Editing, as I have said before, is something that all writers should do. Editing covers a wide range of problems writers often fail to catch in their own work.
The reason we fail to catch these problems is that when we read our own work, our brain is reading what we wrote in our minds and not what we actually typed.
The two areas of editing of most interest to writers are:
• Substantive or structural editing
• Copy editing
What makes these so special? Well, money really.
You see, when you have finished your manuscript it will need to be edited by someone. That someone is going to be paid and how well you have done your own editing will have a lot of bearing on how many hours that person spends on the job.
“But we’re writers, not editors.” Yes I hear you.
As a writer you are an editor, you edit as you write. This is what writing is. All you need is a better understanding of the editing requirements to write to your best ability.
But beware, it is all too easy to become trapped in the editing cycle to the point of a never ending edit where no writing gets done. You have to strike a balance.
Some writers edit as they go along, some write a whole book and then edit it, some edit as chapters are finished. What approach you take will depend on your temperament. But no matter how you do it you will need to understand what is required. You will already know some of this.
Structural editing as a writer means you need to be aware of the structure and sequence of your story. Maintaining clear and unambiguous language. Proper development of characters, plot and setting. Use language that is appropriate for the intended market. Avoid sexist and racist bias.
The writer as a copyeditor must watch out for grammar, punctuation and spelling as well as paragraphing. Then there are omissions, repetitions and inaccuracies to keep an eye on as well.
Can you even remember what the story was about? It really isn’t as bad as it sounds. As writers we do the editing, I mean, we look after the spelling and grammar in the background as it is, so adding these other bits of editing to our background editing should be no trouble at all.
Yes, I’m sorry. Sad and sorry. I wanted to write a great post on editing. But my mind is a total blank. Has been for a couple of days now. So today you are stuck with some drivel spawned from mental exhaustion and an empty head.
A few years ago I was in a class called “Short Story”. Yeah, go on, have a guess what it was about.
The teacher set us a task, to write a short story containing the words “I remember” at the beginning. I have never been very good at following instructions. Anyway this is the story I wrote;
In 1994 I had a heart attack. It was a strange affair. One moment I was fine and the next I was. . . well not fine.
No I didn’t clutch at my chest and fall to the ground. I did not turn green, or any other colour. But I knew.
At first I told myself the lies, but I knew what it was. Somewhere inside you just know. I ended up in the hospital, one of many that I saw the inside of over the next few months. From this first hospital I got to ride in an ambulance with the lights and siren going. Missed the whole show actually, due to being pumped full of morphine. This trip brought me to my second hospital.
Very nice people in hospitals. In the second one I met a young male nurse who spent a long time cleaning my navel while we discussed photography and old buildings. After a week they sent me home.
A month later I saw the inside of another hospital in the city where they took pictures of my heart. I suspect that photography is a past time much loved in hospitals. I would like to point out that an angiogram is much worse than open heart surgery and I only got to see one picture.
Three months later I was in yet another hospital. This time I was to be gently opened with a circular saw through the chest. The people in this hospital were very nice. The night before I was to meet the man with the saw a fellow came and said that he was there to give me a shave. It is hard to describe the joy of a body shave. I mean this left the belly button cleaner for dead in no time flat.
The next morning they wheeled me down to the theater for the big show. While I was being preped for surgery the fellow doing the work on me approached with a needle and said ‘This may sting a bit.’ It did.
The last thing I remember saying was; “If I wake up dead I’m going to be really pissed off.”
Okay, hardly great literature, I know. But that is not the point. The point is that I thought of this story when Lauren at www.travelnottour.com mentioned Synchronicity.
Synchronicity - noun: The relation that exists when things occur at the same time.
Have you spotted the point yet?
Okay, I’ll tell you. After writing our little stories, we had to read them out to the class.
I got as far as; “From this first hospital I got to ride in an ambulance with the lights and siren going.” when from the fire station across the road a fire engine took off with the siren going.
That is “Synchronicity”.
And the editing, well, if this was a murder story and I had left out the vital clue to solving the crime, such as there being a fire station next to the school, the story would be rejected.
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