back into the working schedule...

[lagilman]

Awake at 6am. Caffeinated and at my desk by 7am. Spent an hour correcting the copy-editor who thought that all dialog should be in textbook-perfect English grammatical structure, without regard for regional variations or personal speech patterns. *facepalm* I will cheerfully take correction, Universe knows. But please to be keeping your grubby hands off my character dialog, kthnxbai. Sent changes back to editor in time to feel Virtuous and still have entire day to do other needful stuff, yay.

Also, off comments in a locked post elsewhere about the 'joy' of Book Release Day, I present you with my procrastination of the morning:


To brace or not to brace; that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The inevitability of that Klausner review,
Or to take refuge against a poor store display,
And by ignoring deny them? To work: to weep;
No more; and by weeping to say we endure
The heart-ache and the thousand returned books
An author is prone to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd. To work, to weep;
To weep: perchance to go out of stock: aye, there's the rub;
For in that work of bookstores what fears may come
When we have shuffled off this contractual coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect
That makes calamity of too little backlist;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of Locus,
The reviewers's wrong, the disappointed reader's spite,
The pangs of despised love, the payment's delay,
The insolence of wannabes and the spurns
That patient merit of the unpublished takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a delete button? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of there being nothing after,
The remainder'd country from whose bourn
No author returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus publishing does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And manuscripts of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the pacing of action. - Soft you now!
The fair New York Times list! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember'd.

(and yeah, I couldn't get the scansion to work on the fly. Bite me)

Right. Back on the pony, Gilman.

Comments

[wookiemonster.livejournal.com]

...Wow... I never thought Shakespeare could be so...personally relevant...

[booraven22.livejournal.com]

Oh that's BRILL, hon!

[lagilman]

well, brilliantly cracked, anyway.

(I keep having the urge to go back and refine it, and have to remind myself that sometimes the rough draft really is as good [or at least, as amusing] as something's gonna get...)

[booraven22.livejournal.com]

Well, for a rough draft, it made me smile.
And I'm diving back in the Retrievers-Verse, just so's ya know.
Hope to be caught up by end of July. Reading time has been at a premium lately. ::facepalm::

[lagilman]

Sometimes you just have to take a deep breath, send up a prayer, and reach for that STET stamp....

[fakefrenchie.livejournal.com]

STET?

[lagilman]

don't quote me on this without checking another source, but I think it's from Latin "stet frocesms" -- let it stand. Basically "put it back the way it was, please, you over-eager twit."

[booraven22.livejournal.com]

I like your definition better. ;) Of course my version adds a few words that are not genteel for mixed company.

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith.livejournal.com]

When I write something in dialect, or need to use exotic words, or anything else that may seem like a mistake but isn't -- I often include a note in the cover letter to that effect, so the editor(s) will know it's deliberate. That helps.

Re: Thoughts

[lagilman]

except that this wasn't in dialect, or using any exotic words. It was just a character who had a non-Government Issue manner of speaking. A good copy-editor should be able to tell the difference (especially when it was just that one character with that speech pattern).

If a copy-editor isn't sure if something was intentional, the proper response is to query, not to "fix" it so that the character now sounds like he swallowed a Strunk's. I thought so when I was an editor/writer, I especially think so now as a writer/editor.

Re: Thoughts

[fakefrenchie.livejournal.com]

This is why I don't edit fiction. I tend to want everything to read like non-fiction prose. And it's deadly on dialogue. Aren't you glad I know my limits? ;-)

[klingonguy.livejournal.com]

kthnxbai????

[lagilman]

sound it out, doc, sound it out...

(hint: it's LOL-ese)

[clowe.livejournal.com]

Funniest thing I've read all week!

[esc-key.livejournal.com]

FYI. Someone's contracts are fully executed and should get paid soonish. :D

[burger-eater.livejournal.com]

I like this more the second time.

Of course, I'm supposed to be typing creatively right now, but I can't help smiling at that. Thanks.