Another Busy Day on The Book
Another quiet day on the blog front, mostly because I am working through my ms of The Book. I took ten minutes out to post a comment on Chris Dillow’s Stumbling and Mumbling Blog on what seemed to me to be a not very well argued case based on a version of social evolution in a hunter-gatherer society (of the mind, that is, not of a real society).
It’s amazing how many references need checked to meet the bibliographical standards of publishing. The slightest discrepancy is a repeated reference that does not quite correspond to the entry in bibliography, and a copy editor sends a ‘query’; the remedy: check and re-check and clear up anything not perfect (a dropped capital letter can result in a query; a different edition from one end of the book to an entry at the end (many months later in writing time); a changed date of publication, and worse, the reference you had a year ago that you cannot find the details today).
I am also reading for sense (and non sense!). A clean page worries me more than a page with red ink – did I miss something? Two or three pages without red ink provoke me into reading them over again.
This is slow work and takes patience and non-interruption. It excludes taking time to read notes from the daily mail and hourly email. That is why the blog is under pressure.
I’ll try to do better tomorrow.
It’s amazing how many references need checked to meet the bibliographical standards of publishing. The slightest discrepancy is a repeated reference that does not quite correspond to the entry in bibliography, and a copy editor sends a ‘query’; the remedy: check and re-check and clear up anything not perfect (a dropped capital letter can result in a query; a different edition from one end of the book to an entry at the end (many months later in writing time); a changed date of publication, and worse, the reference you had a year ago that you cannot find the details today).
I am also reading for sense (and non sense!). A clean page worries me more than a page with red ink – did I miss something? Two or three pages without red ink provoke me into reading them over again.
This is slow work and takes patience and non-interruption. It excludes taking time to read notes from the daily mail and hourly email. That is why the blog is under pressure.
I’ll try to do better tomorrow.
2 Comments:
The product of your labours will be well worth the wait on our part. Your blog is always a pleasure to read too, so stick in there.
Well thank you Nemo for your kind remarks.
I am trying to post pieces and my editing work corresponds with a rather barren stretch of Adam Smith pieces by the usual, and new, authors in the world's media.
It's 10.30 pm in Edinburgh and this is the first opportunity to leave my editorial work since early this morning.
I shall continue writing something each day, probably like today, as I cover aspects of Smith's thinking.
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