Hello and welcome to my first editing post. In these quick journal entries, I'm going to be talking about my journey to becoming a copyeditor. Here's what I've been up to lately.
Studies
I picked up a copy of The Copyeditor's Handbook by Amy Einsohn and Marilyn Schwartz in August so I can start to fill in the gaps in my knowledge. I'm taking my time reading it and doing the exercises. Right now I'm on chapter 2, which covers the basic procedures of copyediting. Last week I practiced hand-marking a hard copy exercise provided by the companion workbook, and I'm pleased to say that I caught and correctly corrected most of the errors in the copy. Sometime this weekend I plan to practice the on-screen editing exercise, something I'm more accustomed to.
Though I definitely prefer making changes on-screen, where it's easier to correct any mistakes I might make and doesn't require memorizing a bunch of random-looking squiggles, it was fun to work by hand. There's something concrete about pen and paper that makes everything feel a little more real. In fact, I prefer writing by hand, and usually go that route at least for my first drafts. Will I end up doing most of my editing by hand? Probably not. The convenience of on-screen editing ultimately outweighs the benefits of hand-marking, in my opinion, though I can see using hand-marking for short pieces.
Additional Reading
Right now I'm reading through Self-Editing for Fiction Writers by Renni Browne & David King. So far it's mostly covered topics I'm familiar with, like show vs tell, but the chapter on Proportion stood out to me as it's not a topic I've seen mentioned in many of the other books on writing or editing that I've read before.
The idea behind proportion is to carefully consider the events, characters, and descriptions in your story to make sure that the time spent on them is proportionate to their importance to the story. For instance, if your character goes to the grocery store, is there a good reason, such as plot or character development, to describe every step of their shopping trip, or would it be better to say, "On her way home from work, Mary stopped at the store for groceries."?
It's important to consider proportion because when you place emphasis on something by describing it in great detail, you're telling your readers that that thing is important. If it's not, they might get bored or feel misled.
Proportion concerns definitely fall more in the realm of developmental editing, I think, than copyediting, but could wander into the territory of line editing. Whether or not it's useful to me as an editor, it's good stuff for me to consider in my own writing.
That's all for now. Until next time!
Amaris Farr
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