An anecdote on editing

My Ph.D. supervisors were not particularly hands on. This was not slacking on their part -- it suited me just fine and they could see that I had the thesis project in hand. There was a lesson from one of my supervisors that I will never forget, though. I was writing my first conference paper proposal/abstract. I felt it wasn't quite right and asked for his advice. I expected him to suggest a new framework, or different terms, or a multitude of other minor language edits. He did one thing. He cut and pasted one sentence so that it was higher up the proposal. The reordering made all the sense. I learned that a lot of writing is not just what you say, but the order in which you say it.

An anecdote on editing was originally published by Martin Paul Eve at Martin Paul Eve on December 29, 2020.