The technology exists today for anyone to publish a book. Without an editor, however, a vanity press will still put out books like Moon People (first page link).
Within HIBAFN, Lucy engineers the sale of Pete’s book and becomes its editor and also manages to come out of the novel not only professionally successful, but “wise” (considering her choice of, and Pete’s reading of, Peking). At the same time, mega-successful author Pamela McLaughlin says “Editors are accountants with red pens.” What is Hely trying to tell us about editors/the editorial process, or is he merely highlighting the divide between authors and editors?
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Stephen King is so profusely laudatory to his staff of editors in the Acknowledgments section--always makes me wonder what sort of shape his books start out in.
ReplyDeleteAnother favorite of mine, HS Thompson, obviously relied on some brilliant, patient editors to patch together his better work (not the Rum Diary though).
I assumed an editor was simply a failed writer who still wanted to sniff the biz, sort of like a Hollywood caterer, but from what I know of these writers and actual editors I'm friendly with, they perform a substantial service.
Or don't, as in Bill Simmons' case.
It's easy to have a Kafaesque view of the writing process, a solitary writer banging away on a typewriter, completely cut off from the world, but in actuality most books are the fruits of several editors' labor. (Except for Kafka, who wanted all his books destroyed upon his death.)
I think that a lot of writers have brilliant ideas about the story, and even a writing style, but a lot of people write down a story that they have in their head, and leave out details because they already know something about it, because it's their story. An editor can read a book and tell a writer that something doesn't make sense to the average reader, or say a part of the book is really slow.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure that most of us have read books that we wish the author would have taken their 120 page explaination and chopped it down to say 20 pages.
Example: who doesn't think that Frodo spent too damn long in the Shire, and that even if he did, we didn't have to spend so many pages talking about what the hell he was doing in the Shire, when he really didn't do much.
I think that Hely was giving us two different kinds of editors for two different kinds of readers.
ReplyDeleteSteve: how about editors not as "failed" writers, but as writers who are better at seeing the big picture whereas authors are writers who tend to get lost in details?