Mary
Norris's career at The New Yorker began with a lucky
connection, but continued by dint of patience, perseverance, and
talent. Between You & Me is Norris's cheerful memoir of
three decades as a proofreader, fact checker, and copy editor. Some
of what she's learned has to do with grammar and usage, but she also
treats us to history lessons and field trips.
Naturally,
Norris encounters some marvelous writers, including John McPhee, the
great natural history reporter. “When McPhee uses an unfamiliar
word, you can be sure it's the only word for what he's trying to say,
and he savors it, he rolls the syllables in his mouth as if words
were food and he were licking his chops.” Then there are others,
who go nameless: “There were writers who weren't very good and yet
were impossible to improve, like figure skaters who hit all the
technical marks but have a limited artistic appeal and sport
unflattering costumes.”
This being
The New Yorker, even the proofreaders are legendary. Norris
draws a memorable portrait of Eleanor Gould, grammarian and query
proofreader. “Clarity was Eleanor's lodestar, Fowler's Modern
English her bible, and by the time she was done with a proof the
pencil lines on it looked like dreadlocks.” Right next door sat Lu
Burke, who “patrolled the halls like a prison warden–you could
almost see the ring of keys at her side–and she terrorized anyone
new in the copy department.”
These
women schooled Norris in standard spelling and grammar, and in the
quirks and shibboleths of The New Yorker's style. She has
interesting things to say about hyphens and commas; she explains what
a dangling participle is, and why it can't always be fixed.
I have my
quarrels with a few of her stances. Norris places overmuch confidence
in the stylings of Strunk and White, though I suppose that is natural
in E. B. White's old bailiwick. I don't quite trust her discussion of
'that' and 'which'; and I'm readier than she is to embrace 'they' as
the pronoun when 'he' or 'she' can't be determined, for whatever
reason. Her
review of
the other nominees for that post, however, is extremely entertaining:
“Shem and herm sound like Noah's offspring; ho,
hom, hos, if they ever had a chance, would have succumbed to the
'ho' problem; se and hir are apparently used by an
online group devoted to sexual bondage; ghach is Klingon.”
Compared with these, is a simple 'their' really so offensive?
But it is
difference of opinion that makes horse-races, in the immortal words
of Pudd'nhead Wilson, and a lively argument can be more fun than
immutable authority. Norris does a challenging job well, and writes
about it entertainingly. This is her first book, and I'm eager to see
what she'll get up to next.
Email edition, May 2015
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