Legal Writing

Proofreading from Hard Copy

By Guest Author

Few people now (with the possible exception of poets) write on paper.

For most of us, our thoughts take shape on screen, and our words exist as
magnetic patterns on disk, rendered as phosphor dots, or the flat screen
equivalent. Sometimes that’s the final form of the writing. It’s destined for
the Web or another online destination, and may never exist in permanent
form.

Of course, it has not always been this way. The only way of reading words,
until recently was through marks on a writing surface such as paper, sometimes
referred to derisively by techno-nerds as “sliced dead trees”.

This is the way we all learned to read, and many people still recommend
proofreading long pieces of writing using printed output, since it comes
more naturally to most than screen-based checking. For any long pieces of
writing (”long” being over 1,000 words), I almost always print out my
documents and sit down with a red pencil, away from the computer.

I’ve picked up some basic ideas in the course of years to deal with the
problem of proofreading from paper. Some may work for you, some may not.

• Use Courier, or some other non-proportional typeface. Mistakes
  (especially punctuation errors) often seem to show themselves more often
  when your writing appears in this form. Don’t try to lay the piece out in
  its final format – concentrate on the words, not the appearance.

• Print out your work double-spaced, and leave wide margins at left and
  right for comments and corrections. Number the pages, especially if you
  print double-sided.

• Don’t make the corrections on the computer as you find them. Move away
  from the computer, or at least close the file. When you have finished proofreading the entire piece, make the corrections on the computer, crossing them off on paper as you go.

• Read your work out loud. It forces a higher level of concentration than
  silent reading.

• Use a red (or at least a color other than black) pen or pencil to mark
  up your text. When you come to make the corrections on the computer, use
  another color (say blue) to check off the corrections as you make them.

• Take the trouble to learn the standard proofreading signs and symbols.
  It means that you will be able to work on other people’s work, and they on
  yours when necessary.

• For proofreading (i.e. basic spell-checking in context), read backwards
  (i.e. from the bottom of the page upwards). Since the words come in an
  unfamiliar and unnatural order, you are more likely to find mistakes than if
  you read forwards and read what you expect to see, instead of what’s already
  there.

As I say, you may not find that all these work for you, but all are worth trying
at least once.

Hugh Ashton was born in the UK, and now lives in Kamakura, Japan, where he
has lived for 21 years. He works as a writer and journalist, specializing in
IT- and financial-related work. His first novel, Beneath Gray
Skies, an alternate history novel dealing with a Confederacy in the
1920s, is available through Amazon, etc. Details here.

Full post as published by Daily Writing Tips on January 05, 2010 (boomark / email).