musing as I go....

[lagilman]

Editing a short story this morning (wearing my freelancer hat), and I am reminded that there is a distinct difference between "not well-written" and "not how I would have written this story." The reader may have an opinion, the writer will certainly judge against their own inclinations, but the editor - even as a reader and a writer - must understand where you have no say on the story's choices, must think not subjectively about the work, but objectively.

It is not your work. You must accept the choices made by the author, even as you nudge them into ways to clarify or strengthen those choices.

This is an interesting balancing act, and one that creates an ongoing dialogue in my head between editor & writer, even as I'm working on the project....



[this is one of the things that makes editing - or deep beta-ing - so useful to the writer. When you can slip into an editorial mindset like that, it allows you to see your own weaknesses and work on them as well. And, likewise, when you see something positive, you can bring it into your own toolbox, suitably McGyvered for your own style and needs. Ideally, anyway. In theory. ;-)]

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/la_marquise_de_/]

I find myself doing this sometimes when I'm reading. There's a little piece of my brain that sits there, watching the other writer at work, saying 'Oh, look how they did that,' and 'I'd have phrased that XYZ' and, 'oh, clever.'

[firynze.livejournal.com]

...okay, can I send this to the two editors I recently had to part ways with? Because YE CATS AND GODS, I have more trouble with editors not thinking objectively about a work...

[lagilman]

it's a hard thing to do, I think. I'm still struggling with it myself - the step back and say "okay, no, not a choice I would make but they made it... now to make them THINK about why they made it, and get them to justify it in the text so it seems the only possible choice the story COULD make..."

The only dog an editor should have in the fight, to use a distasteful but effective metaphor, should be the author herself.

[firynze.livejournal.com]

It's definitely hard, and I catch myself trying to rewrite things sometimes, too, because it's not the way I would've executed it. I'm getting much, much better at simply leaving notes and comments along the lines of "Why did you choose to do it like X? Have you considered that Y might be stronger in terms of Z?" and letting the author deal with it...which seems a more productive approach than trying to rewrite them, for everyone involved.

Where I've started getting frustrated with the editors I work with is when they insist that there's only one possible way to write a certain story...

That's not editing. That's...well, that's critique, and unhelpful critique at best.

[joycemocha.livejournal.com]

One of the best things for my critique skills has been working as a middle school special education teacher. When you are working with a student in a remedial setting, often voice is the only good thing you have to work with. Which means you have to delicately tap dance around the writer's voice and focus upon the pieces that don't work. But you don't have the same sort of ownership tension that you encounter in working in a critique group.

Working with a sped kid and taking dictation, editing on the fly as they dictate, ends up being very useful training for editing adults. However, kids take critique better from a teacher than workshoppers do from a critiquing author. Seriously. Part of it is that they want to write it once, no edits, and it's not a life or death Career Future choice. I do try to preserve their thoughts and their voice, and keep it unique.

It made things easier for me when I finally did the critiquing author thing at Miscon this year. The habits I have developed as a remedial writing teacher made it easier to respect the author's choices while still pointing out the problems. Interesting. If you'd told me this eight years ago, when I was still going through sped teacher training, I wouldn't have believed it. But it's definitely the case.

Though remedial writing teaching in middle school is still easier.