The Golden Pencil: The Freelance Writer’s Resource

Proofing

by Anne Wayman on May 14th, 2006

Kristen King, owner of the Inkthinker blog has a great guest article about proofreading. As freelancers we’ve always got to proof our own work, but I think we need to recognize our limitations.

I am not a copy editor. My spelling is far too creative; my mind doesn’t seem to be able to see the details in a way that makes me reliable. So I always warn my clients that we will need a professional copy editor. Often they more or less agree, until it’s time to hire one. Then they want to use their secretary, sister-in-law or some other friend who may or may not do a good job. So we muddle through.

I’m also convinced it’s impossible to proof something we’ve written – not well anyway. It takes months before I can view something I’ve written with anything like a cold eye. Sure there are some tricks, including reading the work out loud, slowly, but we still know what to expect next and, because of that, are apt to miss something obvious.

None-the-less, proof we must and Dick Margulis gives some truly helpful tips.

You may also want to read: How To Proofread Your Own Writing.

Write well and often,

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POSTED IN: Freelance Writing Tips and Ideas