Need to cut words? Call a copy editor.
When people think about hiring a copy editor—if they think about it at all—I suspect it’s usually because they want to ensure that whatever they’ve written is typo-free and grammatically sound before they release it into the world.
But this morning, my wife reminded me of another reason copy editors are useful: We make things shorter.
Say you have a two-and-a-half-page document (as she did) that needs to be a two-page document (as hers did). A good copy editor can help. We’re well practiced in the removal of extraneous words, skilled at finding more concise ways of saying things, and trained to assess what absolutely needs to stay in a piece of copy and what can be trimmed without detracting from the overall meaning.
So the next time you find yourself faced with a 686-word personal statement that needs to clock in at 500, get in touch. Your copy will be sleeker in no time.
6:57 pm, 23 October 2009
That skill is, indeed, vital.
(Feel free to edit out “indeed.”)*
*And “out.”
9:11 pm, 23 October 2009
my favorite story about brevity of words:
President Coolidge (“Silent Cal”) went to church one Sunday. When he got back, his wife said, “what was the pastor’s sermon about?” Silent Cal said, “Sin.”
She said, “well, what did he have to say about it??”
Coolidge: “He was against it.”