A Gladitorial Fight with Rubber Crutches

"In ancient Rome, the title of the person who sponsored a gladiatorial fight to the death was Editor."

- Writing for the Web 3.0

It's not surprising the the noun editor was used for fights because nowadays, as writers, we are all suspicious of editors. Kilian said that we can be our own editors which is hard for me to do because what looks right to me because it's my writing style is wrong to someone else reading my work for the first time.

For me, I can only edit my work on paper. Kilian stated that "you simply cannot trust your own proofreading abilities unless you proofread from paper. Not only is computer-screen text hard to read, it's hard to proofread as well." The longer I try to catch errors in my writing on a computer screen, the less accurate my editing will be because the monitor makes my eyes tired.

Kilian explained to us that "a writer lives inside your head, and so does an editor. They don't always get along. Your inner writer is having a great time being creative and showing off his vocabulary; your inner editor is watching over the writer's shoulder and tearing her hair out."

That is exactly how I feel. As I'm writing I think that my writing is flawless and perfect, but as I edit my own work, I sometimes take a step back and ask myself did I really just write a fragment and then a run-on sentence. It is very aggravating reviewing your own work because you never want to think you can write well and sometimes editing your own creative pieces or academic essays, you question your writing ability.

The style guide within this chapter is incredibly helpful and I know that I will be referring to it throughout my writing on the web. Most of these style rules were in one of my News Writing style guides from freshman year and it was nice to have a little refresher.