Editors on Editing: What Writers Need to Know About What Editors Do (45 page)

The fact that such words are today freighted with more significance in fiction than they may carry in real life
is
a fact, and the author has to take it into account. A woman executive swearing in the office is common; a woman executive swearing in a novel will probably signal things to the reader that the author might not intend. As always, the editor’s primary task is to clarify the author’s intentions.

It is certainly possible that one would come across an author who was actually homophobic, racist, or anti-Semitic, in which case you have the option of simply not publishing him. But let us be clear: the option of
my
not publishing a given author can
not
be called censorship. Censorship is a general prohibition against publication, usually requiring the power of the state or a similar social institution, such as the church. As specific editors, or even specific publishers, a disinclination to publish a certain book is a matter of taste, of whom we choose to be associated with, not of censorship. As long as the author has the option of taking the book elsewhere, or of publishing it himself if all else fails, there is not a question of censorship,
only of commercial or social success, which is a different matter entirely.

There is, of course, also the possibility that one might find a homophobic, racist, or anti-Semitic author who was a truly great writer—consider the cases of T. S. Eliot or Ezra Pound. I have always wondered what I would do if I came across a fiction writer whom I believed to be truly excellent who was also, say, homophobic; but since this has never happened, I honestly don’t know how I would react, although I’m very curious. I could certainly imagine publishing a nonfiction book by an author I thought was significant although he was homophobic—the essays of Louis Farrakhan, for instance.

…

As a rule, I firmly believe that an editor’s own politics, opinions, and prejudices have no place in the editing process, which can lead to some strange situations. While editing G. Gordon Liddy’s autobiography,
Will
, I found myself in the odd situation of helping Gordon rewrite his attack on the student radicals who had converged on the Democratic convention in Chicago in ‘68. There we were, sitting at my dining room table as I urged Gordon to cut the rhetoric and hone his comments on the antiwar demonstrators into a substantive attack, an irony not lost on either of us since Gordon knew well I had been there myself rioting in Grant Park. Luckily, we had become good friends despite differences in some of our political opinions, and in return for my editorial help I extracted a promise that he would read Hannah Arendt’s
On Revolution
, which salved my noneditorial conscience somewhat.

In some respects it is easier to edit someone whose experience in the world or political convictions are widely different from my own than it is to edit someone who stands closer to me. The very distance creates a discipline and an alertness: you can feel yourself making the effort of imagination and empathy required by the task; the discipline is palpable, indeed sometimes mind-wrenching. When dealing with a closely allied sensibility or political orientation, the temptation to slide oneself into the text is more subtle. Before signing a contract with Dennis Altman for
The Homosexualization of America; The Americanization of the Homosexual
, Dennis and I had to have long and frank discussions, for this was an area I was actively involved in, had in fact written about, and Dennis was understandably nervous that precisely this closeness could represent a danger to the integrity of his views, the individuality of his opinions. Thus prepared, we managed the process quite well and, while I do not agree with everything written in that book either, I was proud of the fact that in the end Dennis assured me that he felt the book had remained totally his.

Perhaps the tenderest area of P.C. sensitivity in gay fiction today concerns
the portrayal of unsafe sex in gay novels set in the era of AIDS. On the one hand, there is the strong stand taken by Sasha Alyson, who will not allow any descriptions of unsafe sexual practices in any fiction published by Alyson Publications. On the other hand is the position taken by Warren Singer, an old friend of mine who had AIDS and with whom I discussed Sasha’s position: “Lord, the only place we ought not to have to practice safe sex is in our imagination!” This quandary could lead to endless philosophic discussion, but the question is best addressed on a concrete basis, case by case.

Recently I read a story of gay romance between an HIV-positive and an HIV-negative person—their antibody status clearly established in the text—in which the protagonist who is positive realizes after withdrawal that the condom he was using had broken. Neither the protagonist nor the author made any comment about this, and the story simply went on, but I didn’t. I had been brought to a full stop because I didn’t know how to interpret this incident. It would certainly be a significant event if it happened to you in the course of a romance and it must be significant in the course of this story, but the author had left unclear what that significance was supposed to be. This is a bit like saying offhandedly that there is an elephant in the living room and not mentioning it again. This will not do. As Chekhov informed us: if you introduce a gun in the first act of a play, it had better go off before the end of the last act, otherwise it shouldn’t have been there in the first place. If a character practices unsafe sex in a contemporary gay novel, that fact carries an interpretive weight that the author has to take into account, because the reader certainly will. Times have changed. Similarly, if a character casually uses words like “Jew boy” or “nigger” today, the reader will inevitably feel the author is making a rather strong point about that character, whereas we would not necessarily assume that if the text were written sixty years ago.

The point, I think, is not to have general rules, which never work very well in editing anyway, but to point out to the author in each case what implications the reader will likely draw from the incident and to make sure that the author does not inadvertently create an effect that was not desired. The author may well intend a character to be obnoxious, but authors seldom intend to present themselves as obnoxious. As always, the editor’s role is to help the author achieve her aim, not to ensure that the writer is politically correct.

In general, the attempt to make any fiction politically correct is a misguided one; it is an attempt to police the imagination. This inclination has been quite prominent among the politically committed since Plato first banished poets from his ideal republic; its resurgence today is merely an unfortunate but quite predictable by-product of a valuable surge in political
activism, the dangers of which have always been self-righteousness and intolerance.

The political activist and the poet have always marched to different drummers. As an editor, my loyalties lie with the freedom of the individual imagination, the fruits of which have done very little harm in the real world. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of political action. Until the politically correct can actually produce a better world in fact rather than in theory, I for one am not willing to grant them control—or even veto power—over the realm of imaginative literature.

Jane Isay

J
ANE
I
SAY
began her career in publishing in 1963 as first reader for Harcourt, Brace. Beginning in 1964 she spent fifteen years at the Yale University Press, leaving in 1979 as executive editor. Since then Ms. Isay has held executive editorial and publishing positions at Basic Books, Harper & Row, Simon & Schuster, and Addison-Wesley. She left Addison-Wesley in 1991 to become publisher of Grosset Books, an imprint of G. P. Putnam’s that she is reviving
.

Ms. Isay’s enlightening essay discusses the “special strains and special opportunities” inherent in the editor-author relationship when the author is a scholar. When there is a “built-in inequality between the authority who is writing the book and the editor who is trying to make it the best possible work,” Ms. Isay writes, “a special kind of alliance needs to be formed between the authority, who knows more about her subject than anybody, and the editor, whose task is to help bring forth the very best book of which the scholar is capable
.”

Citing specific editorial examples and experiences, Ms. Isay’s advice is practical, direct, and candid on every aspect of this relationship, whether the scholar is writing for a peer group, attempting to interest a wider range of scholars, or hoping to interest the general reading public
.

“
Scholars are not always trusting of people who know less than they do,” Ms. Isay writes. And so she advises that the editor’s attitude be one of “informed interest and respect,” and that “being genuinely knowledgeable
about the author’s field is a great boon because it makes the editor a sophisticated reader and because it provides a common language
.”

Books written by scholars, whether they are simply academic, reaching the writer’s peers, or somewhat broader, intended to interest a wide range of scholars, or most general, trying to interest the general reading public, all benefit from the relationship between editor and expert. But this alliance, a fundamental element of success in any of these publishing quests, is a delicate one, subject to special strains and special opportunities. I’ll talk about that relationship first. Then I’ll sketch the differences in editing the different kinds of books and offer some tips.

Editors in trade houses publishing general nonfiction are often working with professional writers, many of them journalists whose professional experience includes rewriting on the basis of an editor’s suggestion. But when there is a built-in inequality between the authority who is writing the book and the editor who is trying to make it the best possible work, a special kind of alliance needs to be formed between the authority, who knows more about her subject than anybody, and the editor, whose task is to help bring forth the very best book of which the scholar is capable. The editor’s attitude, therefore, should be one of informed interest and respect for the author’s subject, and of course for the author.

Being genuinely knowledgeable about the author’s field is a great boon because it makes the editor a sophisticated reader and because it provides a common language. Scholars are not always trusting of people who know less than they do, and they can be premature in thinking that an editor’s ignorance of the field may signal ignorance of what to do for the book. Sometimes an editor’s canny ignorance or naivete can help a scholar understand how much needs to be explained and can push an author into clarity, but with scholars writing for other scholars, sophistication is generally best. A good grasp of the field, and even having strong opinions about the subject, can be crucial to your success. A knowledgeable and tactful editor can sometimes embolden the author or help the author anticipate criticism, and thereby make the book stronger.

It was once editing a book written by a distinguished psychiatrist who was writing about psychiatry and philosophy, a field I had studied and about which I knew more than he. In the course of editing the manuscript,
I was able to point out the arguments that were going to get him unnecessarily into trouble with the philosophers. The author was able to strengthen his arguments, not take them back, because I offered him dissent in the form of helpful advice. This wasn’t easy, though, because this author, like all experts, wanted to be in charge of the content of his book. In another situation, I was working with a superb literary critic of the Bible, whose book needed a final chapter. In trying to tell him what I wanted in that chapter, I compared it to the service that closes Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement—he understood what I wanted immediately and wrote the final chapter to one of the most influential books of biblical criticism of the era. On the other hand, editors need to know when to admit ignorance. Herbert Simon, the Nobel laureate in economics who is also a computer genius, was queried about a word in his essay. “It’s not in Webster III,” I wrote. “The editors promise me it will be in the Fourth Edition,” replied Simon. Touché.

It takes time for the mutual trust to grow as the dialogue between an editor and the author continues. Even when the book itself is not the subject, it is important to chat, to listen, and even to gossip about the scholar’s world. The editor picks up lots of information about what is going on in the discipline, and can become more sophisticated about the readership for the book. The author may discover a genuine comrade-in-arms in his or her editor, easing the experience of going public. I’m sorry to say that it is not so easy or natural for a scholar to listen to somebody who doesn’t know as much about the subject as he or she, especially when the editor is young. And authors are perpetually told horror stories about the perils of publication. An open mind as to the value of what the editor has to say can speed the process of successful editing.

It is true that a good editor can see the problems in argument, order, language, and clarity no matter what the subject. I think the main problem scholars have to overcome is the attitude that if they understand the manuscript, and it has received good peer readings, it is ready to publish. Nobody likes to be told there is more work to do, especially by a nonexpert. In my experience, the truly great scholar is more likely to be open to honest criticism and to be ready to pitch in and make the sensible changes. Defensiveness doesn’t pay.

In the course of conversations about the field, the manuscript, and the world at large, the relationship of trust that underlies any satisfactory author-editor relationship is slowly built. You cannot overestimate the importance of that trust, especially when the author is a great expert and has no particular reason to listen to the editor’s suggestions or to take them seriously. It is extremely difficult to get a point across to an author who thinks the editor doesn’t understand or appreciate her or his discipline, and
infinitely easier to make suggestions to a scholar who can tell that you respect the field. I once had a manuscript in the social sciences that was almost entirely written in jargon. It was clearly exciting research, and an important book, so I had it rewritten for the author. The book was well reviewed and sold much better than anyone expected, but the author never forgave me. My being put off by the jargon alerted him to the fact that I was not a proponent of his discipline. He was right about that, so not only his writer’s pride, but also his scholar’s pride was hurt. Authors can smell out a silent dissenter, so it’s best to stay away from editing scholarly books whose discipline you don’t respect. The look on a scholar’s face when I’ve struck just the wrong note isn’t a happy sight. But there’s plenty of good work to be done with scholars in the fields you enjoy, so let’s get on to that.