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Copy editors: act as the readers' advocate
By January 29, 2004 08:16 PM
The following is an excerpt from a recent API Online Copy Editing seminar. I read a lot of newspapers in connection with my work for API. While I find a lot of good and sometimes great journalism, I also find examples of work that it, to put it charitably, is in need of some help. Here, briefly, are the four problems I find most often: 1. Lack of focus. By far the biggest weakness of most less-than-successful stories. Maybe the reporter didn't quite decide what the story was about before writing it, and as a result produces a wandering piece. Or maybe the writer failed to recognize the news. One example: A while back I read a pretty routine story about unsolved homicides in a southern county. The lede was about a family still mourning the loss of a son, and the story went on to talk about other victims and about progress in a few of the cases. It wasn't until the jump, deep in the story, that readers learned that the sheriff couldn't even find a lot of the murder-case files, and that evidence was missing, too. It could have been a great story if the reporter had stopped and asked: What exactly is this about? That's a question more copy editors also need to ask. 2. Terrible leads. Wordy, dull, sometimes unconnected to the story. Consider a story I read last year about one state's school violence problems. The piece spent four grafs talking about violent incidents in local schools, then hit readers with a nut graf that said those schools were far better than others in the state and in fact were quite safe. The lede, in other words, illustrated the opposite of the story's main thrust. This is far more common than you might think. Excessively long ledes are a problem, too ? one that's guaranteed to cost readers. Here's a tip: Try to keep ledes to 16 words. That's about as much as a time-pressed reader can quickly scan. And limit them to two pieces of punctuation; that keeps them from being peppered with clauses and complex constructions. 3. Sloppiness and wordiness. Reporters too often use eight words when four would do and seem hell-bent on passive constructions ? variations on "to be," such as is, was and will be, all of which lack power. In writing as in life, it's good to be active. Another big issue: the indiscriminate use of adverbs, which many writers use in a futile attempt to pump up the energy of the story. Do a spell check on every story you edit and search for words that end in -ly. You'll usually find an adverb, which lend sponginess to writing. Forget them and use stronger verbs instead. Examples: "She knocked lightly" becomes "She tapped," and "He ate heavily" becomes "He gorged." 4. Forgetting to tell a story. Even a city council meeting can be a pretty good yarn if the reporter pays enough attention to what's going on. Such meetings have drama, conflict, pathos -- everything you learned in English lit. Yet too many stories simply recite facts. Reporters need to be encouraged to treat every story as a potential narrative by looking for the human tension in each situation. They need to go beyond saying that an event took place and tell readers what really transpired. Think that's not a problem? Look at your own coverage of a routine event ? a meeting or a festival, for instance ? and ask if there wasn't a better story than the one you told readers. I could go on, but I won't. My point is that copy editors these days have a bigger role than ever in making stories better. The best way to do that is to sharpen your skills, read everything closely, and really act as the readers' advocate on every story you edit. Easier said than done, I know, but it's a worthwhile calling. My last point: Sometimes even great newspapers publish stories that need help. Consider the following that appeared last year in one of the nation's best. At 103 words, the following lede is so long and convoluted that you couldn't blame readers for failing to get all the way through it. See what you think: Though social anthropologists have failed to take note of the phenomenon, the weeks leading up to the end of the year provide men with a nearly unmatched occasion to understand the opposite sex. In late November and December, many women submit themselves to the Darwinian consumer experience known as the sample sale. It is here that a woman outwardly reticent and contained might reveal herself to be as pitbullish as a Marge Schott, the former owner of the Cincinnati Reds, when in close proximity to a pair of tweed culottes at 96 percent off and three dozen other women determined to own them. As a copy editor, you have the privilege of making such writing better. Step up to the plate! Email this article
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Comments
Yes, lack of focus is a major weakness in news media stories. Writers can deal with that weakness by properly planning stories — from idea to revision. My advice is make an outline. Many writers believe an outline is something for elementary grammar students, not for professionals. Jon Franklin has a simple outline that he explains in "Writing for Story." It's basic and easy, and it helps focus on the story's major segments. I also deal with lack of organization in my book "The Concise Guide to Copy Editing." An outline using short active voice headlines for the focus and major developments forces writers to think before writing, makes transition easy, and most of all, helps the reader.
And on the subject of active voice, Curt Hazlett's fear of passive voice seems misplaced. It seems he would do away with all forms of the verb "to be." I deal with that fear in my book. Here's a quote from the book's segment on passive voice:
"Fear of passive voice is so srong in some wriers that they sometimes see it where it isn't. Passive sentences always contain an auxiliary verb and a past participle. But not all sentences with auxiliary verbs are passive. The passive voice can't be identified solely by whether the sentence employs a form of the verb to be as an auxiliary.
Obviously, all sentences with forms of to be — is, are, was, were, be, been being, or am — are not passive.
Here's an easy way to identify passive sentences: the receiver of the action is in the subject position, the verb consists of a form of the verb to be, or sometimes get, followed by a past partciple. The following sentences are not passive:
The boys were angry. (Were links boys, the subject, with angry, the predicate adjective.)
The girls were walking along the highway. (In this sentence, were is an auxiliary verb with the present participle walking.)
The following sentence is passive:
The scheme was discoveered by
Posted by: Paul R. LaRocque | January 30, 2004 11:50 AM
Regarding the necessity of prosecuting stories, here's part of something that I posted in one of the on-line seminars that I do for API:
... At too many papers, copy editors are discouraged from challenging copy. I can't tell you how many times I've heard statements such as these from copy editors:
"We're told to concentrate on correcting spelling, writing headlines and putting in codes for typesetting. We're supposed to let assigning editors handle content. "
"We're never allowed to change a lead. "
"Our editor says that we have enough to do without worrying about what reporters might have missed. They're expected to know their subjects. "
"We're not supposed to change words in stories because that might be considered altering a reporter's style. "
It's statements such as those that give our area of the newsroom the down-at-the-heels feeling it often suffers from.
Posted by: Kenn Finkel | January 30, 2004 01:22 PM
Active voice usually is better because sentences (or headlines) in which the subject is doing something carry more action and are thus more readable than those in which something is being done to the subject.
But often a passive voice headline is better because it gets important information at the beginning.
Example:
Baltimore grand jury indicts Quackenbush
That's active voice, but are readers served best with that? No. It belabors the obvious and doesn't contain much information. In the United States, who else but a grand jury would return an indictment?
This headline:
Quackenbush indicted on 23 fraud counts
uses passive voice, but it's better than the first one because it sells the story. It has valuable information, 23 fraud counts. And it leaves out something that doesn't help much, Baltimore. Assuming that you know who Quackenbush is, location is superfluous. (And, if you don't know who Quackenbush is, then putting Baltimore in the headline doesn't help.)
Posted by: Kenn Finkel | January 30, 2004 01:38 PM
Curt's is all excellent advice, but as Kenn notes, there still is a gulf in many newsrooms between what should be and what is. As I talk to copy editors in seminars and the like, too many also tell me they are primarily copy processors, not editors, and certainly not advocates for the reader. Line editors cannot be such advocates; they have too much invested in the story and the reporter. I fear the copy editor's row will be even harder to hoe as multimadia puts a premium on speed. It does not have to hurt clarity and accuracy, but from what I've been able to judge so far in newsroom conversations, too often it is seen that way.
Posted by: Doug Fisher | January 30, 2004 06:10 PM
Along the lines of what Doug and I have been talking about, her's another excerpt from something I posted in one of my API on-line classes:
The treatment of copy editors (as well as the respect they get among their peers and managers) goes in cycles. In the 1930s, 40s and 50s, the copy editors were absolutely the best journalists in the newsroom.
Their word was law. Management rewarded them. Assigning editors deferred to them. Reporters sought their help. In fact, at most papers, you couldn't even be considered for a copy desk position unless you had four or five years' experience as a reporter. Copy editors clearly had the respect of all, partly because they had done so many things — and usually had done them well.
But respect carries obligations. You had to be good at your job. If you were going to prosecute stories, cut stories, rewrite paragraphs, demand that reporters account for their work, then you had to know what you were doing. The absolute worst error that could be in a story was one introduced by an editor, and everyone knew that and respected copy editors for their knowledge and their diligence.
Posted by: Kenn Finkel | January 31, 2004 06:01 PM
Four most common mistakes that copy editors must correct stories for: "Fear of passive voice is so srong in some wriers that they sometimes see it where it isn't. Passive sentences always contain an auxiliary verb and a past participle. But not all sentences with auxiliary verbs are passive. The passive voice can't be identified solely by whether the sentence employs a form of the verb to be as an auxiliary.
Obviously, all sentences with forms of to be — is, are, was, were, be, been being, or am — are not passive.
Here's an easy way to identify passive sentences: the receiver of the action is in the subject position, the verb consists of a form of the verb to be, or sometimes get, followed by a past partciple. The following sentences are not passive:
The boys were angry. (Were links boys, the subject, with angry, the predicate adjective.)
The girls were walking along the highway. (In this sentence, were is an auxiliary verb with the present participle walking.)
The following sentence is passive:
The scheme was discoveered by
Posted by: viv | February 14, 2004 07:40 AM