I am an editor, a word shepherd. Employing a mix of instinct and craft, I help writers nudge their work into what they want it to be. I read with an intuitive sense of how a piece of writing operates. Words strung together either resonate or fail to resonate with all the other strung-together words I’ve ever read, and I try to articulate how they all work together. It is not my place, however, to guess a writer’s intention nor to substitute my own judgment for theirs.
The relationship between editor and writer depends on the personalities of each and the style of editing sought. Some writers need an editor to point out the constellations among the stars and move words into clearer alignment. Others need to be shown the vast emptiness between their words and how to fill it. A lucky few have most of the pieces already in place and don’t know it; these writers just need an editor to show them what they’ve already done. It is a gift when a writer shares his or her words with me before they are introduced to the world and I feel a responsibility to ensure those words are the intended ones. My faith as an editor is drawn from the passion each writer brings. The relationship is symbiotic. Each party is fragile without the other. And, as with all trusting relationships, each party is fragile with the other as well.
Editors are often accused of being merely frustrated writers intent on imposing their own ideas on a better writer’s text, but I have never found that to be true. My job is to bring to life a writer’s ideas, not my own. I seldom feel the compulsion to write that seems a constant in the lives of dedicated writers. On the rare occasions when I have my own words to play with instead of another writer’s, I still prefer revision to the initial writing down. As a writer, every word I pin down is a shearing away of other possibilities. As an editor, a world of possibilities awaits within each word I encounter. It would be more convenient, I suppose, to blend the two roles, but I find them mutually exclusive; as is no doubt already evident, I am as much in need of an editor as any writer I know.
