Quotes About Editing

Writers think in metaphors. Editors work in metaphors. A great reader reads in metaphors. All are continually asking, What does this represent? What does it stand for? They are trying to take everything one level deeper. When they get to that level, they will try to go deeper again.

I wish life could be edited as deftly as prose. It would be nice to go back and write a better story, correcting weaknesses and follies in the light of what I now know. What I've noticed though is that any attempt to trim out the dark matter takes away some of the good that was also buried in the muck. The past is a package deal and I don't believe there's a way to tell some of the truth without telling most.Wisdom comes at a price, and I have paid dearly for mine.

As time passed, events became mutable. People justified their actions, and the more shame they felt about a memory, the more they chewed it over, fretting and defending and editing, until they could live with it.

Avoid the RTP Syndrome. When you rush to Publish, you rush to mistakes and chaos. Guaranteed.

Be aware that every word you know is going to try to sneak into your manuscript.

You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you. And you edit to let the fire show through the smoke. ARTHUR PLOTNIK

He didn't know what he felt. For the first time in his life, his thoughts were a jumble, tossing and turning and writing over each other like an endlessly edited story.

Penelope slid her gloved finger under the envelope flap and nudged it open, pulling out the single sheet of paper on which she saw the fine, neat handwriting that had become so familiar to her since she'd started editing Colin's journals.

The lessons of slushing and editing build up over time, and you're not necessarily thinking about them while you're working, but they're in the back of your mind, probably influencing your choices.

I put myself in the place of the listener when editing my writing. The last thing that I want to do is be preached at and told who to be or what to think when listening to an artist. However, I do want to be inspired. There's a fine line.

Working on script development, casting, editing, and music is incredibly inspiring to me, and it's wonderful to see something you love come to life.

People are following me because they want to see pictures of me. So why is Instagram editing them?

I think people are feeling more artistic and creative with something like Instagram that makes editing easy. That's a good thing for sure.

Professional humorists and cartoonists have to go through a stage in which they have to kill their own internal editor just so they can get stuff out. So whether they believe it or not, they need me on the other end to do that editing for them.

I like radio because you can do an hour-long interview and then three days later have a finished piece.

Embrace constraint. What you get in return is the art and craft of editing your own life, weeding out what is and isn't necessary.

I have made this letter longer than usual, because I lack the time to make it short.

I have made this letter longer than usual, only because I have not had the time to make it shorter.

Je n'ai fait celle-ci plus longue que parceque je n'ai pas eu le loisir de la faire plus courte.

I have only made this letter longer because I have not had the time to make it shorter." ( Letter 16 , 1657)

But I do wish some of these young reporters had the opportunity I had to work more closely with editors who could help them shape a story and make it better. "They still get edited, but not the way I worked with editors every step of the way on a story—it was the way we all learned the craft in those days. Today we just don't have that many people.

Coming back from the G20 summit, Trump was editing an upcoming speech with Porter. Scribbling his thoughts in neat, clean penmanship, the president wrote, "TRADE IS BAD." Though he never said it in a speech, he had finally found the summarizing phrase and truest expression of his protectionism, isolationism and fervent American nationalism.

He says Bezos takes a red pen to press releases, product descriptions, speeches, and shareholder letters, crossing out anything that does not speak simply and positively to customers.