Dreyer's English - Benjamin Dreyer 2022
Copyediting FAQ
The trimmables
The stuff in the back
There’s a lot of deleting in copyediting, not just of the “very”s and “rather”s and “quite”s and “that”s with which we all encase our prose like so much Bubble Wrap and packing peanuts, but of restatements of information—“AS ESTAB’D,” I might politely write in the margin to point out that yes, we know already.
Much repetition, though, comes under the more elementary heading of Two Words Where One Will Do, or redundancies. Some of the following may strike you as obvious—though their obviousness doesn’t stop them from showing up constantly. Others are the sorts of things you could likely get away with without anyone’s noticing—but they’re snippable nonetheless.
(The bits in italics are the bits you can dispose of.)
absolutely certain, absolute certainty, absolutely essential
added bonus
advance planning, advance warning
all-time record
As well, you don’t set a “new record.” You merely set a record.
ATM machine
ATM = automated teller machine, which, you might argue and win the argument, is redundant enough as it is.
blend together
cameo appearance, cameo role
capitol building
closed fist
A closed hand is, I suppose, a thing. But as there are no open fists, neither are there closed ones.
close proximity
Like “from whence” (see below), “close proximity” can be defended simply by its lengthy history of turning up in competent prose, but to be proximate is, inarguably, to be close, so if you need to emphasize intimacy, perhaps find a less galumphing way to do it.
CNN network
CNN = Cable News Network.
consensus of opinion, general consensus
The word “consensus” has the “general” and the “of opinion” baked right in. It doesn’t need any help.
continue on
The airlines like it. I don’t.
crisis situation
depreciated in value
direct confrontation
disappear from sight
earlier in time
end product
end result
I can appreciate the difference between a midprogress result and an ultimate result, but “end result” is cloddish.
equally as, equally as
Use one or the other, not both. Alan Jay Lerner’s “I’d be equally as willing for a dentist to be drilling / than to ever let a woman in my life,” from My Fair Lady, is often pointed out by aficionados as one of the prime grammatical calamities in musical theater lyric writing—not only the “equally as” but that “than” that should certainly be an “as.” That the singer of the lyric is the persnickety grammarian Henry Higgins only adds to the ironic fun.
exact same
To be sure, “exact same” is redundant. To be sure, I still say it and write it.
fall down
What are you going to do, fall up?
fellow countryman
few in number
fiction novel
Appalling. A novel is a work of fiction. That’s why it’s called a novel.
Lately one encounters people referring to any full-length book, even a work of nonfiction, as a novel. That has to stop.
final outcome
follow after
free gift
A classic of the redundancy genre, much beloved of retailers and advertisers.
from whence
Whence means “from where,” which makes “from whence” redundant. Still, the phrase has a lot of history, including, from the King James Version of the Bible, “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.” So I suppose you can write “from whence” if you’re also talking about thine eyes and the place your help is comething from.
full gamut
A gamut is the full range or scope of something, so the word needs no modifier. Ditto “complete range,” “broad spectrum,” “full extent,” and their cousins.
fuse together
future plans
gather together
Yes, I know: “We Gather Together (to Ask the Lord’s Blessing)” and “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them” (Matthew 18:20). Two wrongs, even sacred ones, do not make a divine right. We can just gather.
glance briefly
Indeed, that’s what your garden-variety glance is: a brief look (or quick or momentary).
HIV virus
HIV = human immunodeficiency virus.
hollow tube
Bet you hadn’t thought of that one, had you.
hourly (or daily or weekly or monthly or yearly) basis
integrate with each other
interdependent upon each other
join together
kneel down
last of all
lift up
main protagonist
I don’t hold with the notion that a story can have no more than one protagonist, but “main protagonist” grates.
merge together
might possibly
moment in time
Whitney Houston notwithstanding.
more superior
mutual cooperation
___ o’clock A.M. in the morning
Just plain unacceptable. Ditto “P.M. at night.”
While we’re here, let’s dispatch “twelve midnight” and “twelve noon”; “midnight” and “noon” are all you need to say.
orbit around
overexaggerate
Even spellcheck sneers at it.
passing fad
A fad is, by definition, of brief duration. A fancy may not be (though it’s certainly superficial and usually capricious), so Ira Gershwin (“The radio and the telephone / and the movies that we know / may just be passing fancies and in time may go”) and Cole Porter (“And it’s not a passing fancy or a fancy pass”) are in the clear.
past history
Also past experience. If you use this as a header on your résumé, you’re sabotaging yourself.
personal friend, personal opinion
“Personal,” more often than not, begs to be deleted whenever or wherever it shows up.*1 And the only thing worse than “my personal opinion” is “my own personal opinion.”
plan ahead
preplan
Horrid.*2
raise up
reason why
I include this here largely to disinclude it. You can usually do without the “why,” but there’s no particular reason you ought. Not “the reason is because,” though. That’s a bit much.
regular routine
return (or recall or revert or many other things beginning with “re-”) back
rise up
If you think I’m going to pick a fight with Lin-Manuel Miranda, who uses the phrase “rise up” repeatedly in Hamilton’s “My Shot,” you have another think coming.
shuttle back and forth
sink down
skirt around
slightly ajar
sudden impulse
surrounded on all sides
swoop down
To be nitpickingly technical about it, swooping is a downward action, so “swoop down” is one more word than one needs. But everyone says it, so let’s give it a pass. We’re also very used to “swoop up,” as in swooping up (or scooping up) a dropped ball or child.
unexpected surprise
Dreadful. And common, in both senses of the word.
unsolved mystery
Once it’s solved, it’s not a mystery anymore, is it.
usual custom
wall mural
No, really, I’ve seen this.
Copyediting FAQ
Q. What’s the most redundant redundancy you’ve ever encountered?
A. I recall it as if it were yesterday:
“He implied without quite saying.”
I was so filled with delight on encountering that, I scarcely had the heart to cross out “without quite saying” and to note in the margin, politely and succinctly, “BY DEF” (i.e., by definition).
But I did it anyway.
SKIP NOTES
*1 I’d like to be able to condemn “personal friend” as a product of our modern era of actual friends and virtual friends, but I can’t, as I’ve found numerous uses of the phrase going back to the 1800s.
*2 An awful lot of “pre-” compounds work just fine without the prefix, so be on your guard. Some people quibble over “preorder,” but it does carry a meaning that “order” doesn’t quite: If I order something, I expect it to be delivered as close to immediately as is humanly possible. If I preorder something—a book, say—I recognize that it’s not yet available and that I’m going to have to wait for it.