But He Did Look Good in Those Long Pants
Malvern's a tale told entirely through the emails of Rob Baltusrol, an out-of-work journalist. (From a play: "Bakers, you know, they bake better pies, they get to keep their jobs. Do that in journalism they take you out and shoot you.") One of the book's emails is Rob's copy-editing cover letter; to wit:
"A good copy editor possesses two essential knowledges -- all that's important, and all that's unimportant. The first allows him to make sure the sentence reads right. The second allows him to spot the differences between the liners Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary, to identify May Pang, Rosie Ruiz, and Edith Head; to know who's nonplussed and who isn't. A good copy editor knows the names of Alfred Hitchcock's Three Investigators, knows which four states are technically commonwealths; that the Beatles' single 'She Loves You' was on Swan Records, and of course how to spell bouillabaisse, Reykjavik, fuchsia, and Pete Townshend and Spike Jonze."
I bring this up not to engage in what one astute critic of facebook called "banal self-promotion" but because I may have just caught the whopper of whoppers -- one so huge that I say "may" only because I can't even believe it got through. (Yes, as big as the error at the end of Casablanca.)
On the inside dust jacket of Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh, the John Lahr bio of Tennessee Williams -- yes, the inside jacket; hardcover; Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc. for God's sake!! -- there's a reference to a Pancho Gonzalez, alluded to as a lover of Williams's. Small problem. He wasn't. Pancho Gonzalez -- and it's a good thing he's dead, he had quite the temper -- was a tennis player, and an extraordinary one -- a well-known one! The person they meant, who is mentioned several times in the book, who has several mentions in the index (Gonzalez is not mentioned in the book, has no mentions in the index) is Pancho Rodriguez. Whoops.
This is why every publishing house, every newspaper in the country of any income, should pay some old geezer to sit at the back reading every bit of copy the company puts out. For 30 g's a year, it's worth it to keep your Panchos straight.
And if you're curious about the "knows who's nonplussed and who isn't" line: that has to do with the meaning of the word. You think you know what nonplussed means? Trust me: you don't.
"A good copy editor possesses two essential knowledges -- all that's important, and all that's unimportant. The first allows him to make sure the sentence reads right. The second allows him to spot the differences between the liners Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary, to identify May Pang, Rosie Ruiz, and Edith Head; to know who's nonplussed and who isn't. A good copy editor knows the names of Alfred Hitchcock's Three Investigators, knows which four states are technically commonwealths; that the Beatles' single 'She Loves You' was on Swan Records, and of course how to spell bouillabaisse, Reykjavik, fuchsia, and Pete Townshend and Spike Jonze."
I bring this up not to engage in what one astute critic of facebook called "banal self-promotion" but because I may have just caught the whopper of whoppers -- one so huge that I say "may" only because I can't even believe it got through. (Yes, as big as the error at the end of Casablanca.)
On the inside dust jacket of Mad Pilgrimage of the Flesh, the John Lahr bio of Tennessee Williams -- yes, the inside jacket; hardcover; Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc. for God's sake!! -- there's a reference to a Pancho Gonzalez, alluded to as a lover of Williams's. Small problem. He wasn't. Pancho Gonzalez -- and it's a good thing he's dead, he had quite the temper -- was a tennis player, and an extraordinary one -- a well-known one! The person they meant, who is mentioned several times in the book, who has several mentions in the index (Gonzalez is not mentioned in the book, has no mentions in the index) is Pancho Rodriguez. Whoops.
This is why every publishing house, every newspaper in the country of any income, should pay some old geezer to sit at the back reading every bit of copy the company puts out. For 30 g's a year, it's worth it to keep your Panchos straight.
And if you're curious about the "knows who's nonplussed and who isn't" line: that has to do with the meaning of the word. You think you know what nonplussed means? Trust me: you don't.
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In fact, the exact opposite, and it's rare to see a writer use it correctly.