Mark Thornton
The comments here sum up the rubicon that we are about to cross: are written standards of language important enough to defend and where do we draw the line? Some people think you are just being pedantic about the ‘lain/laid’ thing, some see barbarians at the gate. It’s a lot more subtle than that though. If we are moving to a digital/crowdsourcing world, where stuff can be rushed through, and then corrected based on feedback after the event, we then have to rely on enough of the crowd to be educated enough to make those judgement calls.
I'm seeing the same trend in the current state of console video games. The hardware has advanced to the point where a buggy game can be released and then a patch (or often multiple patches) is downloaded later to fix whatever may be wrong.... For many developers who hold themselves to high standards regardless, this can be a good thing, but on the flip side it can just lead other developers to be lazy and put out an inferior product thinking they can just 'fix' whatever is wrong later. The same could be said about digital books, etc. Similar to Mark's conclusion, we have to hope the consumer is educated enough to vote with their wallets.
Here's a good point:
Cheryl Pickett
A note about editing costing a lot has been noted at least a couple of times so far and I think that’s where the issue starts at least in part. If a publisher doesn’t value the extra editing it often takes to make a book shine, why on earth would the average writer make the effort?
I’ve recently read a comment on another blog which pointed out that if you cannot afford proper editing for example, then you probably aren’t really ready to self-publish or you need to rethink your business model. Would a bakery say well we can’t afford sugar or eggs, but hey, we’ll make do with what we have and expect to not only stay in business but to be viewed as putting out high quality product? Can a writer write half a song and expect it to be played, purchased and recommended? The same goes for artists, clothing designers, carpenters or anyone else. Performing your job, working at your craft half way is generally not a formula for success. Why should publishing be viewed any differently?
Yes, mistakes are going to slip through and less and less people will notice. I understand and can deal with that. What is tougher to accept is that a top notch effort was not put forth in the first place. If someone is fine with “good enough or average” then expect reaction and results to most likely be about the same.
And this one probably sums up my thoughts the best:
Marco
This article makes me sad. Not because there was an error in a published book, but because of the tone and the insistence that grammar trumps all else. That, to me, is a poor editorial viewpoint. I’ve been a copyeditor, a proofreader, and a senior editor for a combined 21 years, and the attitude of this article’s author is one I often see in unseasoned new editors. They don’t have the experience to understand when rules should be bent and broken, and when not. They latch on to rules because then they can’t be wrong. But while a text that is free of any grammatical issues is certainly clean, that doesn’t make it good. A good editor understands that each book is its own thing, its own world. Some authorial voices are more prim and proper than other. Not all follow the rules of grammar.
That doesn’t mean it’s okay to input the flat-out wrong word (“they” for “there” or some such), but it does mean that voice (of authors, characters, and readership) must be considered.
Now, let me be clear. I’m not arguing that there’s no mistake in the book mentioned. I’m arguing that it may have been a conscious choice. Perhaps there was an editorial decision made that it scanned better as is; we’ve seen in the comments that some people think so. That’s a choice the author and publisher have the right to make. You are free to go ballistic about it being improper if you like, but that does not mean it was a mistake.
Of course, it might have been. None of us know for certain.
My point is that your article doesn’t go far enough. Yes, editorial professionals must absolutely know the fu**ing rules. That way, if they need to fix something they can do it properly.
Maybe we don’t know enough about the writer of this article, but I too am appalled that she would stop reading a manuscript because of a grammatical error on the first page. That’s symptomatic of an editor who is looking for reasons to reject, rather than looking for reasons to accept. Grammatical errors can be fixed; poor story control, pacing, characterization, and writing style are much more difficult to fix. If a single error like that pushes you away from a story, then you’re looking at grammar, not language. Not story. And that is a rather sad thing.
Grammar and punctuation are not the “highest standards” to which the printed word should be bound. They are important, certainly, but the real value of literature is in its impact on readers and society. When people remember the books that affected them, they don’t remember the sentence structure of the verb tense. They remember the emotion and the meaning.
And I am a proponent of correcting all errors except for those changes that might adversely affect the emotion and the meaning and the characterization, etc.
Much food for thought there, definitely.
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