Can a writer become an editor/copy-editor

Ugawa said:

Hey.

I’ve heard that authors don’t like to read through peoples manuscripts, just in case a story they read is similar to one they’re writing or going to write. (For obvious reasons). So are editors/copy-editors able to be authors themselves?
Hopefully that made sense .

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Well you could always edit nonifction. Then it wouldn't be an issue.

Some editors do go on to become writers, and from what I know, they often still keep their editorial position. I can think of a couple of fantasy editors who published books. Uhm, err, one had a last name starting with G, and another might have been Somebody Fisher? However, not everyone who can write can edit, and not everyone who can edit can write.

I know an editor who penned three novels. Awful! That said, these spoke more to a lack of imagination rather than the technicalities of writing correct text. This same editor wrote an historical novel that contained glaring inaccuracies that could have been resolved by a cursory internet search. One wonders how such attention to detail could fail when applied to fiction.

My point is authors do not necessarily make good editors just because they can write a eighty thousand word manuscript, just as editors can, and often do, make lousy writers.

I write novels but my journalism background does little to aid in that work.
C

I've taken a short course in editing and proofreading. Because I'm recently retired and the income is limited I'm looking to start freelance editing while I write my third book and try to get the earlier five published. I've volunteered for beta reading here a few times. So far I haven't found writing and editing are a conflict of interest.

There are different skill sets required for each, though as AnneMarble mentioned, some editors can write, and some editors are much better at just editing. Aside from the mechanics of writing, there's a different way of looking at and reading a manuscript when you're editing that doesn't have as prominent a place when you're riding the waves of creative genius.

I write and edit. It's never caused a conflict for me as I do not edit my genre. It makes my manuscripts cleaner and my writing more proficient on the earlier drafts of a piece.

That being said, I've never felt the urge to steal someone's idea. It's hard to think about that when you're untangling a run on sentence or correcting the punctuation shaker with its top off. Editors who are also writers don't have time to think about such things. Trust me.

I still don't quite understand your question, but I've written stories all mylife, and I do work as a copy editor.

I consider myself a writer first. I copy edit articles for magazines. I find it mind-numbingly boring, but it pays the bills until I can get on the NYT Bestseller list.

So...yes, writers can be copy editors?

This mass-stealing of other people's ideas strikes me as a nonwriter urban legend. Ideas are cheap. It's the working-out of ideas that matters, the words themselves, and so it's the words that are copyrighted.

Yes, you could be an editor and still write your own work. In fact, many members of AW are editors in effect over on the SYW forums, and there are editors and agents who crossover to writing (with pre-established contacts, nice.)

For myself, full-time editing would probably spoil my appetite for words and slow down my own writing.

Ben Bova was editor of Asimov's for some time, and he has over a hundred novels in print. I would like to write and edit my own ezine as well, but I don't think I'll be disuaded by anyone else's work.

I wrote short stories while I was doing editorial work for a lit mag. Trust me, not even once did I see a story idea that I'd want to co-opt (to avoid that word "steal"). As has been said, ideas are cheap, and it's really quite easy to edit without having any conflict of interest with your own writing.

Ugawa said:

Cool.

Thank you everyone. I was just asking because my College English teacher told me you can't be an editor and an author.

XX

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Maybe not of the same work. But beyond that I don't see any reason why not.

Your teacher is incorrect. Some famous twentieth-century writers who have been editors include Jorge Luis Borges, Ding Ling, T. S. Eliot, and James Michener. Back in the day, it was very common: Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Balzac, Thackeray, Poe, and many other nineteenth-century literary figures were editors. In the US, a number of well-received literary novelists like Daniel Menaker, William Maxwell, Helen Yglesias, and others are or were editors in magazines and/or publishing houses.

Either your teacher didn't express himself well or you didn't fully understand what he meant.

He may simply have been trying to say one shouldn't wear one's writing and editorial hats at the same time if one is trying to write creatively, because creativity and editing are different functions that use different halves of the brain and your concentration would be split.

Better to spend time writing, then when your allotted writing session is finished go back and concentrate on editing what has been written.

Just a thought.

Ugawa said:

Cool.

Thank you everyone. I was just asking because my College English teacher told me you can't be an editor and an author.

XX

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I agree with everyone else. An editor can be a writer. The argument your teacher put forth is like saying someone who reads can't write because s/he could end up stealing ideas. Editors fix as necessary. They're not thinking, "ooh, great idea for me to use later!" More likely is, "I'm not getting paid enough to edit this thing."

Namatu said:

I agree with everyone else. An editor can be a writer. The argument your teacher put forth is like saying someone who reads can't write because s/he could end up stealing ideas. Editors fix as necessary. They're not thinking, "ooh, great idea for me to use later!" More likely is, "I'm not getting paid enough to edit this thing."

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That thought runs through my head roughly every half-hour here...

Storm Dream said:

That thought runs through my head roughly every half-hour here...

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But especially when engaged in overtime!

The poor teacher hasn't put forth any argument at all.

I declare us all right, teacher wrong.