The Day Clark Cable Kicked Me

One of my part-time copy editing jobs is at an operation that works as follows.

A freelance writer turns in an article to an editor. Then the editor edits it. Then I edit it (copy edit it, really, but it’s not that different from what the first editor did). Then it may or may not get sent back to the writer for some revisions or with requests for more information. Then the article gets laid out on a page and printed. The editor proofreads the printout, then I proofread the printout, then a third editor proofreads it.

Sounds like a good way to catch all the typos right? Read on.

Sometimes, after all these steps are completed, the advertising sales department will have some last-minute change. Perhaps another advertiser bought space on the page, or maybe an advertiser decided on a bigger ad.

So the editor has to pare down the story to make it fit in less space.

At that point, she or he will print out the page yet again, proofread the chopped-down story again and, once again, I proofread it.

And that’s exactly the point at which, in a recent article, I noticed the name “Clark Cable.”

I’d like to say it’s fascinating how the eye, when expecting to see “Gable,” will skip right over a misplaced C. But really, I find it terrifying. I’m the only copy editor. The other editors who read the page have a broader range of responsibilities. I’m the dedicated typo finder -- Lady Quality Control. And I darn near blew it.

The point is: When you have to make sure the page numbers match the table of contents, make sure the logo at the top is correct, look out for ambiguous wording, seek out and correct missing or misused commas, make sure no periods at the end of sentences got chopped off, make sure every quotation has a clear beginning and end and speaker, make sure that every John Doe in the article has included an age, city of residence and/or company affiliation, and credentials, make sure that the phone numbers are in the proper format and the URLs are all italicized, when you have to look for passives and read for overall logic and make sure all the photos contain what the captions say they contain, when you have to watch like a hawk for about a dozen other things too boring to include in this list -- well, that's when Clark Cable can be one sneaky dude.

Tags: COPY EDITING, SPELLING, TYPOS

This entry was posted on Monday, March 21st, 2011 at 6:02 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.