James Norton

The following material is an unpublished essay about my philosophy of editing.

For 13 of the last 15 years, I’ve had the title “editor” connected to my name in one capacity or another. I’ve worked for The Christian Science Monitor (editing Middle East news) and for The Al Franken Show (writing and editing scripts and original research), but much of my work has been for Flak Magazine, a project that reached 10 years of continuous publication before wrapping up. I’ve edited hundreds of writers, and been edited by dozens of editors.

Much of editing is an art, not a craft. You’re juggling the loyalties of three sometimes competing entities: the reader, the writer and the publication. You’re also building and sustaining a personal connection that is often (if not generally) maintained via email, an ambiguous, faceless medium perfectly suited to passive aggression.

Still, there are guideposts that every editor should know. Many of these may seem obvious in print. Indeed, they represent nothing more than common sense and a modicum of experience in the field. That said, I have worked with editors at national organizations who have disregarded some or — in one particularly spectacular case — all of the following rules.

Ten Rules

1. Check all proper names and anything resembling a fact

Google and Wikipedia are fine places to start when you’re doing something like confirming the spelling of a proper name or simple fact (the year a treaty was signed, the title of an artist’s third album, a quote on the public record), but, naturally, are best cross-confirmed with mentions in other (presumably also fact-checked) publications of substance.

Check everything that can possibly be checked. A writer may write with confidence about a sequence of events on the public record, but he or she may be mis-remembering or confused. You’re their safety net.

2. When checking for flow, read the story aloud

This sounds ridiculous, and is difficult to adopt as regular practice. The dividends are worth the effort. The eyes will often scan briskly across dense copy that is clearly impossible to understand when read aloud.

3. Whenever possible, let the writer do the work

Rather than re-writing a flawed lede, stop for a second. What, precisely is flawed about it? To what extent are you citing objective problems (inaccuracy, redundancy, awkward writing) as opposed to a style of writing which is not, in fact, your own personal style of writing?

Once you’ve boiled your problems with a piece of writing down to some hard concerns, let the writer wrestle with the re-write. Two advantages to this: one, you preserve voice. Two, the writer learns something. Even if all they’re learning are your preferences and prejudices, it develops your working relationship.

You will be tempted to skip this step because of “time concerns.” Rarely, if ever, is there not enough time to type something into an email, place a phone call, and get the re-written copy.

4. Run the changes past the writer

This step is most assuredly a pain, but it keeps the whole process healthy. The writer can pick up on inaccuracies you may have introduced, or problems created by perfectly well-intentioned cuts. Moreover, he or she will learn about the publication’s values and your style of editing.

5. While editing, note things that work particularly well

Even experienced professional writers like to hear that a particular turn of phrase or reported fact kicked ass. The editing process is one of your key opportunities to provide feedback, and if some of that feedback is positive, it sweetens the whole process for everyone involved.

6. Call a problem “a problem”

Sugarcoating criticism is not helpful. The practice forces your writer do the work of translating your left-handed compliments and gussied-up griping before they discover what you’re actually trying to say. Come out and write what you mean without padding it. Be direct without being a jerk, however; it takes very little sarcasm or bile (or perceived sarcasm or bile) to sour a relationship.

7. Offer soft as well as hard feedback

When you can, provide some big-picture feedback on top of line edits and suggested re-writes. Note, for example:

“This whole piece hung together very well, but I think it’s actually oversourced; if we pull out two or three of the more redundant voices in this piece and expand your lede (which frames the story) the whole thing will read more clearly.”

This puts all of your minor changes and tweaks into a greater context. This is also a good place to cite recurring problems with a writer’s approach, or to praise ongoing improvement.

8. Apply the right amount of pressure

Think about the application of editing pressure as a continuum. Don’t apply so much that your crush the life out of a story, but don’t apply so little that garbage and errors slip through the net.

If you’re rewriting almost everything and attempting to convert a story into precisely the piece you would have written, you run a number of risks. You crush the writer’s voice. You risk inserting the kind of minor (and sometimes major) errors that often accompany rewrites. And you risk putting your own spin on the story, which can vary radically from the reported facts.

Know when to back off. Sometimes a story will come in that’s essentially perfect. Your basic urge may be to find something to “fix” so you can “do your job.” In this case, your job is actually to get out of the way of a beautiful story.

By contrast, if you don’t apply enough pressure to an imperfect story — if you give a piece a cursory read for flow and then kick it to the copydesk — you run a whole new gamut of risks. You may let writers hang themselves on their own quirks. You may let factual errors slip into the publication, and you can leave stories riddled with unreadable copy.

9. Keep the writer in the loop

Stories get cut down in size, spiked, reassigned and rescheduled all the time. Let your writer know as soon as you do. It’s an easy thing to overlook, but writers appreciate knowing what’s going on with their stories.

10. Respond promptly

Make time during the day to shoot brief, helpful emails back to writers who are pitching stories, inquiring about the status of their work, chasing down payment, etc. It’s a key part of your job, and a critical way to keep writers happy. This doesn’t mean that you have to encourage every unsolicited pitch that crosses your desk, but you owe your published writers prompt communication on a regular basis. Don’t let a query sit in your inbox for days.

Postscript

There are plenty of world-caliber editors who scream at their writers, rewrite without running the changes past anyone and basically ignore a large percentage of what I’ve written above. Good for them. The rules above reflect the following philosophy: if you establish and maintain a civil, cordial, well-ordered relationship with your writers, and they will repay you with good stories, good pitches and goodwill.