"Peons of Praise"--The Author Said That

msolga wrote:

Roberta wrote:
You noticed that? Thought it was just me.

The proofread really being an edit, you mean, Roberta?

So this means you'd be doing pretty much the same work as you would have done (as a editor) but paid less because it's less "important" work?

This proofread is in a class by itself for a variety of reasons.

For the most part, proofreading requires different skills that are less demanding than editing skills. However, IMO, proofreading is not less important than editing. Just different. It's especially important when editing is done on the computer, as much of it is these days. You see things on paper that are less evident on the screen. You also find mechanical mistakes that never occur when an edit is done on hard copy. For example, the editor put the cursor in the wrong spot. The editor didn't add or delete a space.

Some places now edit and proofread on the computer. I think this is a gigantic mistake. You don't don't see things the same way on the computer. I think that someone should be looking at a piece of paper--what the reader will be looking at. But I'm from the old school.

I could go on. But I'm gonna shut up now.

BTW, yes, you get paid more for editing than proofreading. And you get paid more for one kind of editing than another.

Now I'm really gonna shut up.

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Roberta wrote:

I think that someone should be looking at a piece of paper--what the reader will be looking at. But I'm from the old school.

I could go on. But I'm gonna shut up now.

BTW, yes, you get paid more for editing than proofreading. And you get paid more for one kind of editing than another.

Now I'm really gonna shut up.

I know what you mean about how text can look quite different on paper, Roberta, having edited/proofread many an (amateur) publication! You think you've nabbed the lot, but some eensy teensy errors sneak through anyway! Bloody maddening - drives me nuts! (once, under extreme pressure, I was proofreading line after line of text in my dreams! Awful!) Worst is when the boo boos find their way into the published material! Embarrassed

Agghhh! Imagine doing this for a living!!! Shocked

But you shouldn't shut up unless that's what you really want, Roberta! I love reading your posts!

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Want a clue as to why I know in my gut that this project was typeset someplace where people aren't native English-speakers?

prohot

Can you guess what that word is supposed to be?

Hint: I found it again later as poto.

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Roberta wrote:

Want a clue as to why I know in my gut that this project was typeset someplace where people aren't native English-speakers?

prohot

Can you guess what that word is supposed to be?

Hint: I found it again later as poto.

Sounds like an Olga typo! Embarrassed

But you are probably right.

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photo?

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Give Eva a kewpie doll. You got it.

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Of course! What else could it be?! Laughing

(I get a lot of practice. Not only am I editing middle school and highschool articles, but Hubby is a terrible speller. SonofEva isn't any better. On the bright side, I feel very competent in my own home.)

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Books written in English are being outsourced to India for editing.

Of course.

Why should this or anything else surprise me?

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Roberta, thanks for the link to this thread! Now I know how you've earned your wrinkles. Does your paycheck include damages for pain and suffering? It should!

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Not many years back, I proofread a novelette. I went over it countless times, and kept finding more errors. I finally called in help, yet still found half a dozen after the other got done. I salute the ones that can make a living doing that.

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I was reading a published and highly acclaimed adolescent novel. It's not knew, probably has been reprinted. I found several typos. It was annoying.

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Are Americans reading a lot of foreign literature in translation? In Germany, I'd say about a third of published fiction -- the supposedly sophisticated fiction! -- consists of translated English texts. With the exception of three notable publishing houses, you can tell that the translators were paid by the word, and that the editor hadn't bothered to look at the translator's output.

I could, to stay with the title of this thread, sing a whole Jeremiad of lamentation about this whole subject.

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Dammit, Roberta! Thanks to this thread, and your descriptions at dinner yesterday, I now feel extra guilty about my own editorial glitches. My latest atrocity that slipped through "we used to got ..." Embarrassed

Needless to say, I discovered it just after someone else posted. Grrrrr!

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Okay, lil k, did you do that just to keep Roberta focused? Laughing

I don't pay attention to details here if I get the general idea of what is being communicated. In real life it drives me crazy, though. I can't imagine relying on editing to put food on my table.

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Thomas wrote:

Are Americans reading a lot of foreign literature in translation? In Germany, I'd say about a third of published fiction -- the supposedly sophisticated fiction! -- consists of translated English texts. With the exception of three notable publishing houses, you can tell that the translators were paid by the word, and that the editor hadn't bothered to look at the translator's output.

I could, to stay with the title of this thread, sing a whole Jeremiad of lamentation about this whole subject.

Ooooh! He said "Jeremiad"!

I love people who say Jeremiad.

If he says Philippic, I'm done.

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In a Consumer Medicine Information I was checking recently, which had already been read and checked by several people (few of whom have English as a first language), immediately prior to loading it to their website, when I came across this one:

Watch for....sings of anaemia

I sent it back with a note saying that I had heard of singing of consumption as in La Boheme, but never singing of anaemia.

The next point referred to signs of gastrointestinal problems.

The person who sent it asked me to change it to signs...but I don't think she saw the joke. At least it gave me a good laugh.

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First I would like to say that I don't pay much attention to mistakes I'm not paid to catch. Certainly not in a place such as this, where English is casual and conversational and generally rushed.

I was recently hired to edit a book that had been published in India in English. It's one thing to say purr say when you mean per se. It's another to write whole paragraphs that are incomprehensible. Still another to publish these paragraphs without hiring a native English speaker to take a gander.

And so it goes.

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Roberta wrote:

First I would like to say that I don't pay much attention to mistakes I'm not paid to catch. Certainly not in a place such as this, where English is casual and conversational and generally rushed.

I was recently hired to edit a book that had been published in India in English. It's one thing to say purr say when you mean per se. It's another to write whole paragraphs that are incomprehensible. Still another to publish these paragraphs without hiring a native English speaker to take a gander.

And so it goes.

Or goose, in you case.

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Reviving this thread for the latest.

I'm proofreading. This means that an editor went through and fixed stuff--grammar, punctuation, wording.

I've been specifically asked not to edit when I'm proofreading. Just fix the outright mistakes and leave the rest. Okey dokey.

But I drew the line last night.

I drew the line at a "responsive response." Had to fix that. Didn't I?

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@Roberta,

I think so, of course. Probably damn hard to stop with that, but since they said not to...

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"Peons of Praise"--The Author Said That

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