Why editing really matters
Business comms expert Seán Galvin pens an ode to the lost art of editing, and stakes his claim for why autocorrect is the work of the Devil.
The big man was reaching inside his jacket as soon as I entered the room. I froze, waiting for his next move. “Not so fast,” I thought. I said, “I’d put that down if I were you, sir. At least hear me out first.”
A faint smile played across his lips but his eyes were cold and hard. “OK. Have it your way,” he said. “But this better be good. Give me what you’ve got.”
He laid the loaded Parker 51 carefully on his desk but kept its barrel pointed at me. In the wrong hands, a pen like that could do terrible damage.
I swallowed hard and handed him the news release. “Read it first,” I said. “That’s all I ask.”
I’ve never heard of this website/publication, but I have to say, this article was one of the best I have ever read.
Good story. As someone writes for a living I don’t have an editor and miss the process which 9 times out of 10 improves the content.
Not sure young kids thinking they’re Ernest Hemingway is a bad thing. Not only was he famous for parred-back prose devoid of flowery adjectives, he also came from a newspaper background.
If more kids sought to write like him we would need less subbies. But maybe that’s the hidden message of this article.