Edie here. Today I'm super excited to have a good friend, Ramona Richards as a guest. She's a great editor and an amazing writer. Her newest book is sitting on my nightstand right now - and isn't going anywhere any time soon because I love it so much. The details about the book are at the end of the post, so be sure to give it a look and a great Write Conversation welcome!
How I Learned to Stop Picking Nits and Love the Language
by Ramona Richards
@RamonaRichards
Ramona Richards is the author of nine books, including
her most recent release, My Mother’s
Quilts. Her devotions have appeared in such publications as Fulfilled: The NIV Devotional Bible for the
Single Woman, Trusting Jesus Every Day, Wonderfully Made, Heavenly Humor for
the Woman’s Soul, Heavenly Humor for the Dieter’s Soul, and several others.
Ramona has worked on staff or as a freelancer with more
than 20 magazine and book publishers, including Thomas Nelson and Abingdon
Press. She now works as a freelance editor and writer from her home office in
Nashville, Tennessee
How I Learned to Stop Picking Nits and Love the Language
by Ramona Richards
@RamonaRichards
If
when we are taught English we are just taught the rules of grammar, it would
take all our love of our language away from us. What makes us love a subject
like English is when we learn all these fantastic stories. Feeding the
imagination is what makes a subject come alive.
~Daniel Tammet,
author of Born on a Blue Day
That Infernal Editor
It’s a universal piece of advice
given to every writer who ever sat down at a keyboard: turn off your internal
editor and just write. Easier said than done for most of us, which is why I
call it the “infernal” editor. One of the crafts we must learn to ply our trade
is English grammar, and an emphasis on the importance of correct grammar is in
every class, blog, or tutorial we read. But in the first draft process, that’s
the exact thing that can stop us cold.
And where does that nagging editorial voice that freezes us up come
from anyway?
With most writers, we were
brought up to it. We absorb it in what we read before, during, and after the
time we start learning what to call nouns and adjectives. My formal training
dates back to junior high, in a fair land far away (Tennessee in the 1970s),
when Mr. Dobbins imbedded in my brain a love of diagramming and subject/predicate
agreements. Then I majored in English. Twice. Correct grammar became a passion.
People were afraid to write me letters. I was a grammar dictator. I took
advanced courses, and could even diagram sentences from James Joyce. The only
literature classes I took were medieval and modern. I preferred studying the
history of the English language to the historical classics. I wanted to be a
writer and editor, not a literature professor.
The second time, for my master’s
degree, I had to take a foreign language. German. Which taught me even more about grammar (German and English
have similar Indo-European roots). By the time those degrees were in hand, I
had Harbrace, Turabian, the Chicago
Manual of Style (CMS), and Strunk
& White memorized. I had a red
pen grafted to my left hand. I was ready for publishing. I started writing more
stories and sending out applications for jobs at publishing houses.
For the love of...story. |
For the Love of…Story
Then I actually got a job in
publishing. Working with children’s books. And I had quite the reality check. Here
are the first two lessons I learned in publishing:
- Story is king, no matter what your genre.
- There’s no such thing as a perfect book.
I still remember the first letter
of correction I received from a reader. As a grammar dictator, I was
devastated, even though I’d had nothing to do with the book. It had been
published long before I’d even graduated from college. I was embarrassed for my
company. My boss, however, was quite nonchalant.
“Ramona,” she said gently, “if
you get upset over every mistake in a printed book, you’re going to spend your
life in a tizzy. There’s no such thing as a perfect book. Humans make mistakes.
And grammar changes.”
Wait. What? Grammar changes?
Definitely not something I heard
back in that fair land far away. I was just beginning to learn how far away it
was. I soon began to read publications like The
Editorial Eye, which covered the ongoing changes in grammar. Now I read
grammar blogs. I went from being a prescriptivist
(one who dictates how grammar should be
used correctly) to a descriptivist
(one who describes how current grammar is
used correctly). And I discovered that editing content, editing story, is far more satisfying to me than
making sure the jots and tittles were all straight.
I began to truly appreciate the beauty of this whackadoodle language we call English. |
Above all, I began to truly
appreciate the beauty of this whackadoodle language we call English. It’s fluid
and flexible with rules that guide yet shift. It allows for different
stylebooks to flourish (Associated Press is not CMS is not APA style, and the
Oxford commas are not universal). It allows new words to be added and old words
to change or vanish. Nouns become verbs, and vice versa. It allows for author
voice and dialogue as well as dialectal phrasings. It allows for the Oxford
English Dictionary folks to choose “emoji” as the word of the year. After all,
the OED has always been a descriptivist
publication.
This may mean that some
“mistakes” in books aren’t really mistakes. And if your grammatical knowledge
is based on what you learned before 2001, please do not mention split
infinitives. They’ve been quite acceptable since 1983. Or to quote a CMS
Q&A column: “In this day and age, it seems, an injunction against splitting
infinitives is one of those shibboleths whose only reason for survival is to
give increased meaning to the lives of those who can both identify by name a
discrete grammatical, syntactic, or orthographic entity and notice when that
entity has been somehow besmirched.” (http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/qanda/data/faq/topics/SplitInfinitives.html)
Another reason to love the CMS
folks.
It really is OK for us “to boldly
go where no one has gone before.” And other places.
So what’s my point?
Love Words, Not Commas
My point is that an intense
emphasis on whether a book you’re reading has mistakes is the same internal
editor that stops you from writing. When you’re reading a new book, focus on
content, on story, on flow (especially in nonfiction), and NOT on the
occasional trip-up by a copyeditor. Because if you let a few grammatical
mistakes or typos upset your reading of a book, then you are going to overlook
some of the most beautiful and well-written (if not well-proofed) books in our
language. (Even most Bibles have
typos.)
And THIS is the first step to turning off your internal editor. When
you can turn it off when reading other authors’ books, you can do it for
yourself and your own writing.
The Craft of Grammar Has Its Place
This doesn’t mean you won’t
notice the mistakes. You will. After all, correct grammar and a smooth, unique
syntax is part of your tradecraft. The gift is to be able to ignore them in
light of the story being told. If you can get to this point, you can likewise
ignore them in your first draft.
And this doesn’t mean that you’ve
stopped caring about grammar or that you won’t be able to turn that infernal
editor back on once you’re into the editing process. The knowledge doesn’t go
away; it’s just temporarily reassigned. I no longer care about typos in blogs,
Facebook posts, or emails (although I do make a quick judgment about the
author). Instead I save my grammar dictator status for the second draft of my
own books and any I’m getting paid to edit.
The first rule of professional
editing is: Be kind but clear. Authors should keep this in mind for the first
draft of every book. Torture your characters…but be kind to yourself. Focus on
telling the story you love. Jots and tittles can come later.
TWEETABLES
Appreciating the beauty of this whackadoodle language we call English - @RamonaRichards (Click to Tweet)
http://www.amazon.com/My-Mothers-Quilts- Devotions-Needlework/dp/1617956120/ref |
My Mother’s Quilts
A quilt is love that serves a purpose.
Inspired by thirty family
heirloom quilts, each devotion depicts the enduring legacy of faith, family,
and tradition. Rich, personal, sometimes heartbreaking, often funny, each
reading provides a lesson and encouragement from the faithful women who crafted
the quilts.
Full-color photographs of
each quilt show the style and artistry of each beautiful work. The quilts, sewn
by several generations over more than one hundred years, are as unique and
lovely as the hands that created them. The oldest was buried during the Civil
war to keep it safe, and the author’s mother created the newest in the last
years of her life.
Available at all book
retailers
$15.99
Worthy Publishing
9781617956126
-------
Some grammar-oriented sites I
read. There are many more.
Chicago Manual of Style
Lingua Franca
Sentence First
The Subversive Copy Editor
Read>Play>Edit
Throw Grammar from the Train
(which introduced me to the word
“peeverein” – I am forever grateful)
http://www.throwgrammarfromthetrain.blogspot.com/
Now there's a much needed post. I find myself getting hung up on grammar and style while writing my YA or middle grade novels. Let me tell you something: an 11 year-old narrator isn't going to get it right. Nor should he. Nor should a narrator of any age. When we allow grammar and style to take front stage, we cannot help but clash with voice. And since voice is derived from a strong character and the experience of the author, any meddling will destroy your story on two fronts. You may get an A+ from your college English professor, but a one-star on Amazon. Of course, this becomes an issue for the new writer, who fears turning anything over to an agent or publisher that isn't perfect. Probably the reason why there is often a tremendous difference between an author's first published book and her second. Once you've got readers, the author feels more freedom to explore the language, which is what the publisher wanted in the first place.
ReplyDeleteThanks for a great post.
I used to love to diagram sentences!! I've never know another person who loved to do them! Of course that was eons ago. I've forgotten more than I probably ever knew.
ReplyDeleteI also have to say I had the honor of reading an advance copy of My Mother's Quilts and absolutely loved it. I highly recommend it. Thanks for a fun and interesting post, Ramona.
hullo, Ane, now you do. know another person who [used to] love to diagram sentences! i LOVE grammar, but when i'm writing i invent my own words and my own "proper" form... ha!
DeleteMe too. I loved to diagram sentences. Still helps me today...well, sort of. :)
DeleteAbsolutely LOVE this post. And I'm like Ane. I loved diagramming sentences too.
ReplyDeleteThank you!
When I write my first draft, I "spew from the heart." Yes, I have four or five major edits afterward, but at least I have the story and my characters down. No sense stifling creativity when it's bursting forth; we have plenty of time later to hone our writing. Even then, we have to know when to let go--to realize, as you said, that no book is perfect.
ReplyDeleteA wonderful post! Pinned and shared. :)
Thanks for sharing this, Ramona. Lately I find that the only thing more annoying than grammatical errors in blog and social media posts (e.g., Your such a good writer.) is the immediate and obnoxious self-righteous correction in the comments (e.g., *You're). I appreciate the reminder to get back to the love of words above the GC (grammatically correct).
ReplyDeleteGreat article. I used to love diagramming sentences in Spanish but nowadays many people are not very happy with all the changes the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language want to impose. English is a very playful language and very flexible. I love it too.
ReplyDeleteWhat a lovely post. Congratulations on your new book! (And thank you for listing mine.)
ReplyDeleteThanks for your post, Ramona. Yes, I'm one of those who just can't turn off that infernal editor. Even during NaNoWriMo, I fought with him through the entire process. Sometimes I won, but most often, he did...correcting grammar, punctuation, and dialogue. Arrrggghhh! I'm still working on it and hope that one day I can kick him to the curb, at least until I NEED him!
ReplyDelete