This isn't a hostage situation. You don't have to choose whether to capitulate to our demands or try and negotiate the demands away. Here's what we're hoping to do instead.
“Brilliance, like electricity itself, happens between. It lights up only when people are connected, conductive, their valences surging unencumbered into each other’s hearts.”
How can your brilliance shine any brighter? Once again you are speaking about life and it just happens to apply to the goal of editing a piece of art.
This: "Editors don’t care whether you act on their specific suggestions for doing the trick; they just want you to do the trick."
I edit translations (line and copy editing) and I stress this in my introductory email to the translator (who for my purposes is the author), it's such a joy to see someone run with a suggestion and make a passage shine more than I ever could -- even if they've run in the opposite direction.
I tell them this:
I expect you will not agree with every suggestion – and you are free to reject my edits – but I hope you will see my interventions as signals that something might not be working as intended or could be clearer. Even if you think my suggestions are off-base, perhaps they will prompt you to consider whether a different kind of change might clarify the text or crystallize your intentions.
(On the other hand, it does feel good to get a "YES!" back once in a while.)
(Just subscribed and really enjoying your takes and truths.)
holy shit the end of this post!! as someone recently completely bewildered by how to handle editorial feedback from 12+ publishers, thank you - i think things are starting to gel
Thank you! This line - "we do not just want but HOPE that they come up with a better plan for filling that gap than we ever could" - reminds me of a writing group experience with a particularly confident peer. In looking back on the Hannah-isms I've taken out of my manuscript, I can see that she was often spot on with the gap/opportunity - I just tossed in a car instead of taking creative ownership.
“Brilliance, like electricity itself, happens between. It lights up only when people are connected, conductive, their valences surging unencumbered into each other’s hearts.”
How can your brilliance shine any brighter? Once again you are speaking about life and it just happens to apply to the goal of editing a piece of art.
ugh, this is really good.
This: "Editors don’t care whether you act on their specific suggestions for doing the trick; they just want you to do the trick."
I edit translations (line and copy editing) and I stress this in my introductory email to the translator (who for my purposes is the author), it's such a joy to see someone run with a suggestion and make a passage shine more than I ever could -- even if they've run in the opposite direction.
I tell them this:
I expect you will not agree with every suggestion – and you are free to reject my edits – but I hope you will see my interventions as signals that something might not be working as intended or could be clearer. Even if you think my suggestions are off-base, perhaps they will prompt you to consider whether a different kind of change might clarify the text or crystallize your intentions.
(On the other hand, it does feel good to get a "YES!" back once in a while.)
(Just subscribed and really enjoying your takes and truths.)
holy shit the end of this post!! as someone recently completely bewildered by how to handle editorial feedback from 12+ publishers, thank you - i think things are starting to gel
beautifully put! Thank you for articulating this work of collaboration on behalf of readers so well.
Thank you! This line - "we do not just want but HOPE that they come up with a better plan for filling that gap than we ever could" - reminds me of a writing group experience with a particularly confident peer. In looking back on the Hannah-isms I've taken out of my manuscript, I can see that she was often spot on with the gap/opportunity - I just tossed in a car instead of taking creative ownership.
“empathy for its target audience”
As we should be in real life, to be more concerned for others instead of gazing inward.