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I woke up this morning thinking about why we write. All of us, not just “authors”. The answer, of course is that we have something to say. It might be how it feels to be transgendered, or about seeing the humor in a difficult situation. It might be “I hurt”, and here’s why. It might be as simple as “I’m too tired to write an episode tonight.”.
It’s all about communicating something about our selves. As such, this communication deserves the dignity of having it’s message stated clearly, and without confusion.
The time of the reader is as important as that of the author. He or she deserves a message free from unintended ambiguity. If your goal in writing is not to communicate clearly, then why are you bothering? Counting on an electronic spell checker to do your editing and proofreading for you defeats your very purpose, in trying to communicate.
I proofread everything that I write, even grocery lists. That way, I, or my wife come home from the store with what was intended.
In a recent blog, Tels wrote:
“IF you are heart set on picking apart every single mistake you see in a story from any author of any type... well you will probably always have high blood pressure.
In other words. Take things with a grain of salt. Different cultures, different spelling, different meanings. The list goes on and on.
Personally I just read the story and enjoy it for what it is.”
It’s not a matter of “picking apart every single mistake”. It’s a matter of feeling that the author respects you enough to actually communicate clearly. If she or he doesn’t care enough to simply read, aloud or in their head, to her or himself what they wrote, then why would I care enough to read it. Of course, I simply let most mistakes pass, but when I see them starting to pile up and change the meaning of the message, I don’t bother to finish reading. How do others feel about this?
It’s not a matter of caring more for the grammar or spelling than the meaning. Frequently, especially with homonyms, mistakes can total change the meaning of what has been written. It can be very confusing, to say the least!
As for, “Different cultures, different spellings, different meanings”, I think Tels missed the point. I, at least, was amused that a piece by alys9 illustrating the problems with spell checkers, should contain a spelling that could cause confusion in another country. That’s why I titled my comment “Irony abounds” with my tongue planted firmly in my cheek.
So, write in whatever manner suits you, but if you wish to communicate, at least to this reader, at least take the minimal care required to proofread first. I think that we all “just want to read the story and enjoy it for what it is”. Try taking a little more care so that we may!
Liz
Comments
An Ideal World...
I'll admit that I cringe when I read of someone wearing "heals", and I am always surprised by posts that are barely intelligible, but I'm pretty sure that people don't write badly because they aren't taking the time. It's that they don't know any better, and they're writing as well as they can.
I will say that I have a positive sense of achievement when I've managed to puzzle through a mixture of spelling mistakes, missing spaces between words, and pronouns with uncertain antecedents.
this site needs a "like" button
Yes, what Kaleigh said.
My personal kryptonite (brings me to my knees every time I see it) is when someone writes "phase" when they mean "faze" which bizarrely seems to happen quite a lot.
But you know, first world problems and all that. I'm usually just glad they've taken the time to write. If they didn't then there wouldn't be much of a site here at all.
not as think as i smart i am
I third what Kayleigh wrote.
I proof/edit for a few writers I respect and I tend to 'proof' unconsciously as I read any story. If they're poorly spelt or confusingly expressed I give up reading. I've done the odd edit for rebecca.a (her spelling :) ) so I'll take careful note of the phase v faze error. (As a retired electronic engineer I tend to use the former rather more frequently than the latter)
Robi
Quit reading
I too have quit reading some otherwise good stories. Stories with good plots, interesting characters and interesting action, but lack the continuity of expression that would make reading it a joy. I'm a compulsive editor. My usual reading involves doing a cut and paste from the "printer friendly" page into my Word program. Then as I read I'm compelled to make the corrections. Maybe I'm OCD in that respect. It's not as if I intend to send it back to that author so they can re-post it. Usually it will just sit on my hard drive and never be read again.
If that gets too much, then I just quit reading.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
I think you meant
homophones not homonyms as the latter wouldn't necessarily change the meaning, but the former might.
Angharad
getting ones message across....
Well,
I won't say I'm the best of authors nor that I never make misteaks (sic). I do find, however, that if there are significant and repeated errors in a story I am reading that I cease to do so and here is or are the reason(s) why.
I make sufficient errors on my own merits and usage of the written word; both in spelling, incorrect word usage, and improper punctuation (that's why a good editor is so important). Yes, my word processor is capable of both spell checking and of grammatical correction. Both do a very good job and sometimes alter my intentional misuses which I have placed in an effort to assert a specific level of education upon certain of my characters.
The principle reason I do not continue to read, however, is that I do not wish to become less capable than my present ability. I have discovered that repeatedly reading stories which improperly use "there, their", or "of, off", "hear, here". "to, too, two", "shoo, shoe, and show - of all things" plus others, seems to cause me to begin making such errors myself. In an effort to minimize any further errors in my own works (whenever I am able to get back to them) I halt reading such material. Regrettably, I have found that these errors have begun to find their way into my working world and that cannot be tolerated.
This malady is, unfortunately, not limited to posted material but may also be found in printed texts. I recently purchased a rather expensive (21.00 Euro) book and found within the first six pages, no less than ten spelling errors plus two uses of improperly selected words wherein one spelling was used when another should have found its way to the page. Needless to say I put down the book (not to be thought of as "putting down" in the sense of some poor animal who has been too seriously injured to save... although, perhaps, I should have done so).
I know I might be missing a very valid and interesting conceptual treatise on the part of the author but the significant spelling or word usage errors (for me at any rate) is something on which I must pass.
God Bless You all
Anesidora
It hurts a lot
Everyone else lives in a different reality, or I'm just in my own. Most of my stories don't connect very well with the denizens here. The issue bothers me a lot. In my past life, I wrote lots of technical reports and was generally praised for my vocabulary. It is unclear to me why those skills have not readily transferred here.
Or, is it the genre I choose that makes my stories still born?
Everything I write is from the heart.
If I have errors...
I don't consider it nitpicky to tell me. I know I make them, I usually end up finding them afterwards, in the editing for book stage. But, I feel that if I have fewer than 3 spelling errors in 20,000 words, I'm doing pretty good.
AS for Grammar errors, I do try. Any of those you spot from a character's point of view are intentional usually, as that is how those people talk/think. You may still feel free to let me know of those as well, I won't mind. I'd much rather have that than people stop reading.
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When to stop editing?
You have summed up my own problems well although I also find the need to stop editing before I've put myself off from writing the next piece. To give perspective I've just edited your comment as though it were my own and unintentionally, within 5 minutes, made it almost unrecognisable next to the original…
"If I have errors… …I won't consider it nitpicking of you to tell me as I know I make them. Without outside help to spot my mistakes some I will only find in the later editing for book stage and even then I feel that if I have fewer than 3 spelling errors in 20,000 words then I'm doing pretty well.
As for grammatical errors, I do try. Any of those you spot from a character's point of view are usually intentional as that is how I imagine the person talks or thinks but please feel free to tell me about these too as I won't be offended - I'd much rather have that than people stop reading."
Rhona McCloud
Thank you, Liz
The whole point about writing is communication. If the words on the page get in the way of the author communicating with the reader, then the author has failed. To take a different angle, I have given up reading Stephen Donaldson as his prose is just utter wordy thesaurus-driven bollocks (Say what you think, Stephanie)
I wrote something a while ago, which is a truism understood by much better writers than myself. Good prose should do one of two things. It should either astonish with its virtuosity and splendour, so that readers feast, awe-struck on its beauty, or it should disappear smoothly so that the reader doesn't notice it but is carried along in the flow of the story. When there are shedloads of homophones (thank you, Angharad) or other errors, that disappearance is rendered impossible.
Unmuddle Your Narrative
What stops me from reading is muddled narrative. I can forgive any number of spelling mistakes or grammatical errors, but when I have to re-read a passage three or four times to work out who is speaking to whom, or when the point of view keeps changing without warning, I tend to move on.
If you have more than two people taking part in a conversation, then you MUST attribute each piece of dialogue to a named - or otherwise clearly identified - character. And if they're going to talk at length, please identify them first.
One more tip: make every paragraph follow on as seamlessly as possible from the one preceding it. The hack writer's inability to do this - or more likely they couldn't be bothered - was why the word 'meanwhile' was invented.
I Welcome
Polite corrections,
I was asked by my high school English teacher if American was my first language. My answer was no, it was German, I was living with my great grand mother who hailed from Homburg Germany when I was learning to speak. This coupled with some head trauma as a child has left its mark in how I write and the mistakes I make.. .
My war with the American language has been witnessed by many here, and those nice enough to PM me about my gaffes, has allowed me to gradually improve. The key to that improvement is that the corrections have been polite and constructively given thanks to all of you who care enough to offer help to a brain damaged fledgling writer.
Huggles
Misha Nova
With those with open eyes the world reads like a book