READERS of The Cavalier Daily might pay attention to by-lines, or they might simply read the story. But those that look at the author's names could have favorites. Maybe Laura Hoffman, Sarah Myers, Prashanth Parameswaran, Maria Tchijov, Megan McDonald or Barney Breen-Portnoy, all of whom wrote stories or columns in Monday's newspaper.
But can anyone name a famous Cavalier Daily copy editor? While copy editors are not famous, they are famous for preventing embarrassment.
Copy editing isn't glamorous. But copy editors are real journalistic heroes, because of some of the most basic reasons -- they eliminate excess words, keeping sentences short so that readers can grasp one idea at a time; they catch typos, errors, misspellings, inaccuracies, unnecessary qualifiers, redundancies and inappropriate innuendo; and they add movement to the story, substituting active verbs in place of passive ones, and replace generalities with specifics.
Unfortunately, all mistakes are not always corrected before publication. James J. Kilpatrick, one of America's greatest writers, said: "To read almost any American daily today is to conclude that copy editors have vanished . . . Once there was a white-haired geezer in an eye-shade to intercept a reporter's copy, and to explain gently but firmly to the author that phase and faze are different words, and that affect and effect ought not to be confused. The old geezer has gone, and literacy with him."
Copy editors -- or students editing research papers for any discipline -- need a strategy or a process to eliminate mistakes. There are many that work, but what doesn't work well is a once-through read on deadline.
One process that works well has multiple steps. First, read the story without changing anything, for understanding and context. On the second read, change the obvious typos and grammatical mistakes. Next, make a list of the facts that need to be checked, check them and fix them. Make one more read noting anything that needs to be re-written, or substantially changed. And finally, make a final read with the author to make changes as appropriate.
That five-step process might not always be realistic, especially with breaking news, but it should be a goal. Take for instance the "Rushing around Grounds" story in Monday's newspaper. Unfortunately, it read like it was given a rush-around job of copy editing.
The story is interesting, topical and timely. But the tone, style and consistency were cursed, partly because it was compiled by four different staff writers. To begin with, it is too long -- 1,536 words. The story also has some easy fixes; here are just a few samplings:
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