My dear boy,
You meet a man through his books. Hence, an editor must work in the interest of the writer and never tell his own story using the words of the writer.
Editors are somewhat necessary bottlenecks, language connoisseurs or gatekeepers, if you may, who must grant passage to a writer’s meanings and intentions through the gateway of the editorial enterprise. A sentence may be verbose yet hold weight in rhythm. It could be plain and simple, yet cuff the minds of readers. Philip Roth underscores the foregoing when he says, “The best editing is invisible.” Mind you, no writing is innocent. It is nearly impossible to separate a man from his writings, irrespective of the subject matter explored. Seldom does a man compare to the pen.
On the contrary, the yoke and burdens of the man are stripped from him by the pen. The pen, therefore, becomes a threshing floor for his aspirations, thoughts and regrets, determining the taste of the ink. As such, overt embellishments are but attempts to conceal the true taste of the ink. The ink is the man in liquid form. William Zinsser establishes that a “Memoir isn’t the summary of a life, it’s a window into a life.” It follows, therefore, that an editor ought to refine the window, not replace the view.
Anyway, a man you would not meet in the office, you will meet on paper. Reading the letters of Abraham Lincoln has exposed me to his passion. He was a serious man who found the business of leadership dull without love in his life. He called off his engagement with Mary Todd, whom he later married, and was depressed for weeks and could do no work. Indeed, he was a man of like passion as we are. He was an attentive father and a wonderful husband who didn’t hide his longing for his wife’s presence.
In one of his letters to Mrs. Mary Todd Lincoln dated June 12, 1848, he writes, “Will you be a good girl in all things, if I consent? Then come along, and that as soon as possible. Having got the idea in my head, I shall be impatient till I see you…” in response her wish to ‘return to this side of the Mountains.” My boy, I am thrilled reading his letters to his family members, perhaps because all my life I had seen him in one light: Mr. President.
See, read autobiographies; they will do you a great deal of good. Autobiographies seek to reinforce that our heroes are men who aspired to a higher calling. An autobiography without a character flaw is a lie and should be thrown in the trash. George Orwell corroborates the same in the 1946 piece Why I Write, thus, “Autobiography is only to be trusted when it reveals something disgraceful.”
Autobiographies ought to be boring and much less fantastical. To be otherwise is to seek to deceive. On the other hand, we must also take into cognizance that an autobiography is simply yesterday’s story told using the words of today. Hence, as Graham Greene observes in Ways of Escape (1980), “In autobiography there is always a little fiction,” because memory shapes narrative.
Talking about autobiographies, I have considered an opening sentence for mine: “It took a lifetime to be me.” Perchance, a reminder that it wasn’t instant. My dear boy, good things take time; take note. Just as Abraham Lincoln would say, I may be a slow walker, but I never walk backwards. By the way, that was my campaign philosophy as a varsity student.
Moving on. When men write, they become unclad. However, certain editors clad them for whatever reason, selfish or not. Writing should strip you bare. Francis Bacon, in Of Studies, acknowledges the same when he says, “Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man.”
My dear boy, to learning, there will be no end. Likewise, to editing, there will be no end. Sometimes, to become a classic, one draft is enough. Achebe’s Things Fall Apart agrees.
Love,
Dad.
