Copyediting: Response to Instructions

D—: I should have this wrapped up in the next day or so. The writing is pretty clean, so thanks for that. I'll use Track Changes and also provide a clean copy if you and the editor would rather work from that as opposed to vetting each of the changes. If not, I'll skip that step.

I'd like to use Word's Comments feature for queries, as opposed to in-line queries [QY: like this], as they're simpler and have less chance of messing up the text.

Regarding the notes, I'll use the basic available information in a style that's pretty close to Chicago that I've established with a few of my nonprofits that traffic heavily in these types of medical/social science citations. The notes provide the usual information, with a standardized form or forms for the URLs/DOIs. It's a simple approach and gives the readers everything they need to find the citations online -- or not, if they'd rather not. Something for everyone, and not too complicated. My main question for you, though, is do you want the notes numbered consecutively through the book? Since there are relatively few of them for a book of this length, that may not be a bad approach, and it also saves the book from having a bunch of notes numbered 1 or 2, which sometimes seems a little goofy to me. Your call. It's easy to do either way, mostly a function of setting up page breaks with section breaks rather than page breaks.

And I'll assume, unless you tell me otherwise, that you want page breaks before each new chapter. Even without coding added at this stage, I think it would be easier for your designers.

So many people are working on weekends these days, even the salaried folks, so if I hear from you today, that's great. If Monday, that's fine, too. But I'll probably be able to start keying today.

Thanks.

Bob

I'll Say It Again: Bill Gates, Stay offa My Lawn!

If Word flags a correctly typed word as misspelled, typically when you unmisspell it the first time, Word leaves you alone.

I'm working on a manuscript that includes the abbreviation (or acronym or initialism; I don't keep them straight) IHS. I've got to fool this damn software into thinking I'm typing something else, because it keeps reverting back to HIS. Maybe this has to do with ignoring all caps in spell checks, although I can't recall how I'm clicked there.

Of course, I could leave HIS all caps and simply replace it later. I might do that.

But did you know that Word's dictionary -- at least none I've come across -- has "lynching" in it? And that Word's contextual spell-checker always flags "centuries" as possibly wrong? Do you know why? Hmm? Well, do ya?

The simple answer is that they should stick to ones and zeroes and stay offa my lawn.

Not Helping Matters

Bill Gates: Stay offa my lawn!

Microsoft introduces enhanced research and editing features for Word.

This move will not make for better research or better manuscripts. It will, however, lead to increased plagiarism and more embedded links in Word documents that make my life hell.

Going Which Hunting

Moi lamented to me recently about a book she was reading off the clock that was chock-full of "which"s that should have been "that"s. I am at the end of a 500-something-page copyediting job that was much the same. Probably 300 of them in there, and only a handful needed the comma before "which" instead.

(Entry title courtesy of Fowler, Modern English Usage, a required text for us in senior year of high school. I think we used the 1897 edition; four pages devoted to "which" and "that.")

Fowler (not an endorsement of the seller)

Interesting project, though, from two perspectives, neither of which deal with the quality of the text, unfortunately:

1. This is the first of 18 volumes by this author, translated and reprinted from one of those romance languages, that the publisher will be doing over the next decade or so. It's a name that you'd know if you followed twentieth-century theology, I think. I'd call that an annuity. I'm presuming I'll be copyediting all of them.

2. Given that this volume -- actually a reprint of three books in one volume -- has been published numerous times before, in different languages . . . and probably in English before, but this is based on a translation . . . I'm copyediting with a rather light touch. The last situation I would want to create is, "Such-and-so maintained this bit of jargon until the 2014 XZX Books version, in which he wrote. . . ." I mean, how do I know? They sent along the original-language edition, but that's not going to help much.

* * *

A website developer told me that Google eventually moves you out of its rotation if the posting becomes infrequent. Sure enough, this blog is no longer getting hits when people search "editing" or "proofreading" or "indexing." So I might begin to post more . . . and actually back to on-topic stuff. I've probably said that before, too.

Tales of Brave Ulysses and Matters Mystic

The title of the post is for the Paisan, but the post is all about me. I mean, this is a work blog, right? My work blog?

And the point of the blog was originally to serve as a site to hawk my wares. Evidence over time shows that the approach has worked. I’m presently editing a nifty and utterly fascinating book on the history of hypertext. The author came referred to me from an Australian professor who found the blog and me and whose book I worked on a few years back. Now he’s spreading the love around the world to his peers. That’s the way it’s supposed to work.

Occasionally my readers might not be authors but managing editors who have sent work my way. It’s all good.

Those of you keeping score may remember that I’ve been proofreading since 1974. First for my high school newspaper (perpetual gold-medal winner at the Columbia Scholastic Press Association), and then beginning in 1981 with a now-lengthy series of paying gigs (in addition to and wrapped around editing, etc.). It’s probably not an exaggeration to say that I’ve forgotten more companies that I’ve proofread for than I remember.

The only time in the last 38 years that I’ve not been involved in some way with printing or publishing was during my three-plus years as an English major in college -- time during which I avoided publishing . . . and the classics. Don’t ask why. I can’t say I always make the best or most appropriate decisions.

During those college years, I met a friend with whom I’ve recently reconnected over the last few years. He’s always had one foot firmly planted in matters mystic. In a recent email from him, he warned, “Be careful about what you invite into your life.” I think the point was that if you want a door to open, you’d better be ready to handle whatever’s behind that door. It might be way more than you bargained for.

And a few posts back, I pondered . . . How would I handle it if Gertrude Stein’s The Making of Americans were to come in over the transom these days? And what if it required a read against the manuscript, which is rarely done anymore? Nine hundred pages of one of the English language’s most unreadable novels . . . that I would have to read under deadline pressure . . . and where mistakes carry consequences.

I thought the 900-page family history that came into my life which I edited, and which I may soon be indexing, was the universe’s little giggle on my behalf.

Be careful what you invite into your life.

Even unknowingly.

I give you a moment from last week’s Land on Demand inbox:

* *

Dear Bob:

[OUR] press is publishing an e-book edition of Ulysses based on [OUR] World Classics print edition. We are going to create this e-book edition by optical character recognition (OCR) scanning of the print book. We need to get it proofread because this kind of technology is, of course, imperfect and we want to avoid the introduction of the kinds of errors one often sees in quickly made e-books.

I am sure I don’t need to tell you that this particular book is going to be a challenge to proofread. Joyce was not a conventional speller or punctuator. There are existing typos and other errors in the book that have to be retained for historical reasons, so this will be a careful check against the original. What you would read are Word files containing the output of the OCR process. Only errors introduced during OCR will be fixed.

Anyway, I thought of you immediately. We should have the files around the 23rd of March and were hoping to have them back a month later. I don’t know exactly how many pages it will be in Word terms, but the print edition is 980 typeset pages.

* *

As an English major, a lifetime proofreader, and one whose business relies on the graces of scholarly presses, I can think of no greater capstone than to be “thought of immediately” when [OUR] Press wants to republish its definitive version of Ulysses in an in-demand format for a new millennium.


Here's lookin' at you, kid.

 

Too Much to Do

Christmas Eve day, and miles to go.

New Dorp Lane, Staten Island, NY;
except for the cars, 
the view hasn't changed in at least 50 years.

Shopping is basically done, although I have to brave the grocery store sometime this morning for tomorrow's feast. Per popular acclamation at chez czar, we're giving the czarina the day off from heavy cooking and doing a far simpler low country boil just for the family. It's the kind of thing we typically only make when there's twenty or so people around, so I'm going to halve the recipe. We'll throw some newspapers on the table and make believe it's summertime. And no dishes to wash.

***

Many interesting projects lately, and I wish I was wrapping up one of them this morning instead of what I'm working on: an index that seems not to want to go away. I've started placing the PDF and the Word doc side by side on the screen rather than looking at paper. Every second counts. Maybe I'll become the Frederick Taylor of the editorial world. Now if I could just keep my fingers out of my mouth while editing or proofreading and keep that red pen close to the paper.

***

When our younger son came home from college last week, I asked him if he'd signed up for any shifts at a local drive-thru he'd been working at for some years. He said no, but I knew that he needed some holiday funds (and I had become used to the intern labor), so I asked him if he wanted to do some word processing for me. I had about nine hundred pages of manuscripts that needed editorial changes keyed in. He did an OK job, but his reactions to the work were interesting. On job one, he pondered, "There wouldn't be so much to do if authors just followed the right style to begin with." On job two, he asked, "How hard is it for them to get the reference style right?" Out of the mouths of nineteen-year-old babes . . .

***

When Colleen (former intern) returns for winter/spring semester, I'll be talking to her about paid work for keying in changes. In the right circumstances, it saves me enough time and is worth the money to have someone input corrections to a Word document. We were speaking about this as a family last week, and we chuckled that, unfortunately, the czarina is not the person to help me in this area -- for a number of reasons. As I put it quite simply to the czarina's laughter, "You won't do what I want you to do when I want you to do it." Working for me is probably only slightly worse than being married to me.

***

The two books that my younger son slaved through were both rather interesting. One was a first-person account of a South Vietnamese army/government official's experiences from the mid-1940s until his escape in the early 1980s after imprisonment by the new regime, although the author began in the Viet Minh. The author knew John Paul Vann and Daniel Ellsberg and people like that from the mid-1950s on. Having come to consciousness during the height of the Vietnam War, I found the information on French and US involvement in SE Asia, and especially the internal Vietnamese happenings, fascinating.

[Great note on this book. As the coauthor, who is my primary contact, told me, "The [Vietnamese] author is 88 and not in great health. We're hoping he holds on until the book is published." So sweet. The book has been in various stages of writing for 24 years. The coauthor, who is concerned about his colleague's age and health, is 85.]

The second book was about the Fed's operations during the credit crisis of 2008. The editor was almost apologetic when sending the book out. "It's about economics, and many copyeditors don't like books with a lot of numbers." After explaining that I used to be the lead editor at the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, he was relieved and I suspect a little surprised. I suspect, also, that I'll now have an inside track on copyediting any books dealing with banking or economics coming from this press. Fine by me. They pay fast.

What I didn't mention was that I'd probably still be at that job if my boss wasn't one of the most despicable human beings I've ever met in my life. Her name was . . . oh, it's Christmas. Never mind.

***

I've had a few other things going on, it seems, but I have to finish this index NOW. Then to the store(s), then wrapping presents, then back to work on an intense little proofing job that must go out on Monday. At least it's not indexing.

***

The photo above comes from my hometown. Staten Island is part of New York City yet a world of its own. When the czarina was first there in 1985 and we went down New Dorp Lane, she said, "This reminds me of small towns in the South," the point being, "I had no idea that the evil urban Northeast full of you Yankees and Jews was actually like the rest of the world." Staten Island, when it's not acting more like Alabama, can be a very nice place.

***

Happy holidays, folks. Glad you're out there.

Surprised? Insulted?

Just received an email from a client that decided to go with a different type of page numbering system. Instead of numbering each book sequentially from 1 to the end, the publisher has decided to number within each chapter. Thus, 1.1-end, 2.1-end. Kind of a tail-wagging-the-dog issue here, but the publisher has a reason for doing so.

Email reads:

Hi Bob,

I know we ran the idea of changing the page numbering system by you, and we wanted to let you know we have decided to use the approach described in the e-mail below. A week or so ago Jane asked me to ask you if your indexing/copyediting software could handle this type of numbering system, but we put contacting you about this on hold until the final decision was made to change the page numbering system. Now that the decision has been made, can your indexing/copyediting software handle this?

Let us know.

Thanks!

Longtime readers know where this one is going. Cue the snarky email response in 3, 2, 1:

Not sure what you mean by "software."

If you ever run into an indexer who touts his or her software, I'd run in the other direction.

And I guess I use the same copyediting software that your authors use writing software. Your authors let all the software do the mental work of writing and researching and editing and keeping review panels happy, right?

:-)

bl 

scanning

My memory being what it is, I'm not sure if I'm exactly right about this, but I don't think I initially had a computer for writing or editing at my first writing/editing job. I know we each had computers for internal office email (this was 1984), but it seems like it was a big deal when one of the writers on staff actually got his own computer for composing textbooks.

One of the first pieces I was asked to edit was a student guide for a life insurance law textbook (and you think the stuff I read now is tedious). The person who had the technology was the department secretary/AA. You'd give her the manuscript (handwritten?) and she would key it in using an OCR (optical character recognition) ball on an IBM Selectric. OCR = the kinds of numbers you see at the bottoms of checks. That output would get scanned by a data processing (later information services) department, and thus would the file be saved.

And OCR wasn't too bad back then. If there were errors going in, there would be errors coming out. Often not too many errors resulting from the scanning itself.

I've received recently a little (66-page) book from one of my publishers, thinking it was going to be an easy job.

Wrong.

The job appears to have been scanned in from what is probably an existing out-of-print book. The easiest ways to tell are missing punctuation, certain letter pairs always being wrong; probably the most common is seeing modem for modern. You can see how a scanner would get that wrong.

But from a proofreader's perspective, so much can go bad with scanned-in copy. While it seems like an easy way to produce a book (I really don't know how fast page proofs scan), to me the task is fraught with peril. Do publishers increase the size of the originals so that the scanner has better input with which to work? I don't know whether they do or not. Is my job as a proofreader to catch mistakes? Of course, but . . .

. . . but what I end up with, especially with documentation (footnotes and bibliography), is ultimately a copyediting task, because the print was usually so small on the pages to begin with. And as I've mentioned before, being paid for proofreading but essentially delivering copyediting gets my goat.

city books; Word style sheets

The indexes are done, finally. It's at least four days 'til I have to write the next one. I will enjoy the break.

I spent today reading a Chamber of Commerce book on Fayetteville, NC, the text for which I'd already copyedited. Most of the time when I read one of these books, I want to move to that city. Done right, everywhere seems like paradise. Two exceptions: Springfield, MO, which came across as the US capital of the Aryan Nation, and Fayetteville, NC, which is probably a great place if you want to listen to even more of a daily drumbeat of how, properly used, the US military can save the world, and is actually doing so as we speak. Oh, please.

Tomorrow I begin copyediting The Deed and the Doer in the Bible: David Daube's Gifford Lectures, Volume 1. Naturally, I have no idea who David Daube is, nor what the Gifford lectures are. This publisher usually gets stuff to me in great shape, though. Bad news/good news on this project: They want the copyeditor to prepare the m/s for the typesetter in a big way, which is to say, applying Word's style sheets to the entire document -- and it's about a 400-page manuscript. Also, hundreds of auto-footnotes need to be converted to hard characters -- both in the manuscript and in the notes section. The good news is that this is one of those times I am glad to be paid by the hour.

On Word's style sheets: In the hands of a good copyeditor and a typesetter who knows what s/he is doing, these style sheets can make typesetting a breeze -- saving hours and days on the task. This publisher refers to the style sheets as XML style sheets. I mentioned that one time to a typesetter who said their nomenclature was wrong: that XML style sheets are another thing entirely, which made for about 15 minutes of very confusing conversation. Because of my work with this publisher, though, I've tried to get some other typesetters on board with the Word style sheets, but there's some trick to getting them to import properly into Quark, blah, blah. So not everyone can do it or is willing to take the time to learn. But what do I know?

After getting some other work done, I might actually be facing a night when I can sleep for 6 or 7 consecutive hours. Not that my body will allow this, of course, but it's nice to imagine that it might happen someday.

Excelsior.

Book Design: Leave It to the Pros

Writers, take note. Treat your word processors like a typewriter with memory. Don't design your manuscripts -- that is, no boxes, no tables, not a bunch of different fonts and colors, not different font sizes, and so on. Not only will all that formatting be for naught when your precious prose gets dumped into some page design program, but, nothing personal, hopefully your strength is in writing and authoring. Just because you have page design tools at your fingertips doesn't make you a book designer, any more than having a piano in your house makes you Mozart.

Here's a comment I received today from a book designer I've worked with. She's speaking here mostly of cover designs, but many of the same feelings apply to a book's insides as well:

I love it when I have a client who says "Wow, this is great!" I seem to go in spurts, I will get huge amounts of positive feedback for a period, and then I'll have several clients who aren't satisfied with my brilliance (IMHO) and insist on tweaking incessantly or seeing more choices. I designed some covers a few months back for a client that I thought were fresh, original, and compelling. Nope, didn't fly. Then, after much struggling with getting something that made everyone happy (author, marketing dept., publisher, distributor, etc) I gave them a cover that was attractive, but to me looked like 100 others already out there. That's the one they chose. The lesson to me was that I can't give my clients design sensibility, I have to design for the design sense they have. Ugh.

I worked years ago for perhaps the most ill-qualified individual in my working career. She'd hired me to edit a scholarly economics journal. A friend of my wife's was a great illustrator, and I convinced my boss to feature his work for two articles per issue: one on the cover, and one that would appear only on the inside. The boss's idea was that the illustrations needed to replicate reality . . . that if we were showing a ship that was to represent imports and exports, then the cargo on the ship had to be shown in direct relation to the actual percentages of US imports and exports. So, if 50 percent of the imports were automobiles and 25 percent were electronics, then the car had to be twice the size of the container clearly marked electronics. This kind of thinking drives creative people crazy . . . well, it drives just about anyone crazy.

Lesson: leave the design stuff to the people who know what they are doing. If you want a book to fulfill your vision for it 100 percent, self-publish it and maintain complete control over the product. If you want to hire pros, give them the latitude they need to do their jobs. That's not to say you shouldn't have input, but realize where your own strengths are and stick with them.