You Don't Say

John McIntyre, whom James Wolcott called "the Dave Brubeck of the art and craft of copy editing," writes on language, editing, journalism, and random topics. Identifying his errors relieves him of the burden of omniscience. Write to jemcintyre@gmail.com, befriend at Facebook, or follow at Twitter: @johnemcintyre. His original "You Don't Say" blog at The Baltimore Sun ran from 2005 to 2021, and posts on it can sometimes be found at baltimoresun.com through Google searches.

Sunday, July 21, 2024

There were giants on the copy desk ...

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An anecdote from the time before I made my escape from Gannett's Cincinnati Enquirer. The Enquirer  featured a local columnist named Fra...
3 comments:
Thursday, July 18, 2024

The Old Editor gets cranky in the morning

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I see some things in published journalism nearly every damned day. Just look.  Too few people today have had any experience with horses, and...
5 comments:
Monday, July 8, 2024

The Old Editor vents

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Some random observations on writing and editing   As an editor, do what you can I have spent more than forty years in journalism, which priz...
2 comments:
Sunday, June 23, 2024

Thoughts on an Invitation to Apply to Johns Hopkins University's Police Force

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Campus is crawling with undergraduates, half of them scurrying to the Eisenhower Library, the other half sashaying off to Charles Village ba...
1 comment:
Wednesday, June 12, 2024

Learning how to talk

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I was a graduate student fifty years ago when I first heard a faculty member speak of being "politically correct," a little self-c...
4 comments:
Sunday, June 9, 2024

Tell me about your worst undergraduate course

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It was half a century ago, at Michigan State University, and I had disregarded Jean Nicholas's advice to pick courses by the best profes...
1 comment:
Friday, May 31, 2024

That historic verdict

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The conviction yesterday of former President Donald Trump in a New York state court on thirty-four felony counts was, everyone agrees, histo...
8 comments:
Sunday, May 26, 2024

The routine of work

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 Preparations: Small pot of tea brewed,  a chocolate bar unwrapped.  Coffee comes later. To the proof pages. One comma flicked away,  anothe...
Saturday, May 25, 2024

Buyer, beware

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 The Kentucky Derby and the Preakness are past, the Belmont Stakes yet to be run. In Maryland we're all agog over the recently approved ...
2 comments:
Monday, May 13, 2024

Asked and answered

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More in comments on "Ask me anything" : We'll start with the semicolon. 1. What's an easy way to remember the proper times...
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