The language and style: Improving yours

Be solid on the fundamentals: Spelling, grammar, punctuation … and style.

Nature or nurture? (Are copy editors born or made?)

• Born - A good copy editor is passionate about:

  Spelling and usage … such as:

• Affect vs. effect
  
• Its vs. it's
  
• Lank vs. lanky
  
• Wax eloquent(ly?)
  
• Cutting off the nose despite the face
  

Language - its construction as well as its meaning

• Trapped in a joyless marriage and empty bourgeois lifestyle, Carol's nose starts to bleed one day while getting a perm.
  
• A woman who answered the phone at Miss Woods' listed number in Alliance, Ohio, said she was not there and did not know where she was.
  
• Dick Rinewalt, an associate professor of computer science, said many viruses are written for different reasons.
  
  
• Fairness and accuracy
  
  
• Style
  
  
• It helps to have:
• A very bad sense of humor
  
• An eye for the trivial
  
• A dirty mind
  
  
• Made - Self-restraint

How to improve your language and style

• Above all: Read, read, read. Your newspaper, other newspapers, magazines, novels, nonfiction - poetry, if at all possible. All kinds of magazines: People, Newsweek, The New Yorker, Car and Driver.
  
• Keep your ears open (figuratively and literally - and by the way, know the difference between figuratively and literally). Listen for what's good, and keep your ears open for what's bad. (Seeking reporter to leverage experience to enhance coverage - an editor who posts a job opening like this needs an editor himself.)
  
• Read the AP Stylebook - yes, the whole thing. If you have a local stylebook, read it, too.
  

Text

Developing a personal style as a copy editor: DON'T!

• Don't overedit. You don't need to fix what's not broken.
  
• Be anonymous. Editing shouldn't call attention to itself.
  
• The best-edited story is the one the writer doesn't know has been improved.
  

Know your stuff

• AP stylebook
  
• Local stylebook (if any)
  
• Be skeptical of "facts." (Half the world's population has never made a phone call: True or false?)
  
• Listen to that "still, small voice" that tells you something's not quite right. (Is it Columbo or Colombo?)
  
• Insist on clarity, logic, organization.
  
• Know what words mean (With his pallid skin, lanky hair and crisp black suit, Mr. Glover suggests a well-dressed zombie.)
  
• Recognize and avoid cliches - but know the rare occasions you can use them for effect.
  

Headlines

• This is an area where you can show some flair. (It's OK to push the envelope in terms of style - if you don't, the paper is in danger of falling into a boring pattern. ALWAYS push the envelope in terms of quality.) But …
  
• Don't get fancy until you have the basics down: Start with factual, readable headlines.
  

Here's where self-restraint comes in:

• Don't be seduced by the allure of a pun. ("On track": enough already)
  
• What you think is clever, readers have probably seen before.
  
• Is it really clever, or is it juvenile? (Kurds get their way)
  
• Go for words that are telling, evocative, rich in meaning (but be careful you're not editorializing)
  
  • Yes: Rangers gingerly hit road; U.S. Jews take Torah to Auschwitz
    
  • No: Simpson claims he's innocent
    
• Listen to the music of the language (Sosa belts 2, but Cubs fall)
  

Behavior

• If you have the time and means to do it, show your editing.
  
• Be collaborative (if your desk's culture allows it)
  
• Don't know it? Look it up.
  
• Do no harm (e.g., beluga caviar is NOT from whales).
  
• Reporters are people, too.