Copyediting is one of the last stages of writing, and is a concentrated check on the consistency, flow, and accuracy of your writing. You should pay attention and check all factual statements, all spellings of persons or places, all titles or titles, make sure any scientific, mathematical, medical, or even any literary or musical term is used accurately. Pay attention to statements for their sense—is this statement in any way questionable? If you’re unfamiliar with it, don’t let it go by. Flag it if you’re doing a freelance project, or look it up. You are expected to stand behind what the article contains as far as accuracy is concerned.
And even if you’re copyediting fiction, there are often terms that need to be checked, names that need to be consistently spelled throughout the story.
Before you begin, make sure you have either a sheet of paper to record all place names and proper names or special terms, or create a new computer file and keep your record there. You must make sure that first and last names are spelled the same way throughout, that people are addressed consistently and if they are described physically in a certain way (color eyes, color dress), that it remains consistent.
In addition to fact checking, copyediting demands a thorough understanding of grammar and transitions. Paragraphs should follow each other logically, and transitions should be used to make sure they don’t make a distracting leap in thought. There should be no confusing words or phrases, no meandering sentences—if you’re not editing your own work, flag and make suggestions to improve sloppy writing.
There should always be proper agreement between subject and verb, proper use of clauses and phrases, and none of the common errors that glaringly signal a poor editor—make sure you use it’s and its correctly; make sure you don’t allow a “there” when it should be a “they’re” or a “their.” Yes, use your spell checker – but you can spell “there” correctly when you should be using “they’re” and the spellchecker will let it go. Use commas and semicolons correctly. If you're not sure, look it up.
If you have any doubt that a word is not used correctly—or you come across a word you’re unfamiliar with—look it up. Don’t assume the writer knows more than you do.
Read slowly—if you read quickly you’ll glance over words, not notice there’s a missing word, not notice if there’s a misspelling. You should feel terribly alert—because you’re reading for sense, grammar, usage and spelling. That’s a lot to be responsible for. If you can’t pay total attention, you’ll miss something. If have the time, it’s best to read once for sense and then once for close scrutiny of grammar and spelling.
Although proofreading is the last stage, and should not require the depth of work that copyediting does, it is also the last chance to catch errors that have made it through the process—any error: spelling, grammar, names that are not consistent, poor or missing transitions. Sometimes, in the course of editing, paragraphs or sentences or words get accidentally moved—the proofreader should catch it. Questions of style and format—how the publisher wants the article or story to look—must be checked again to make sure that bold, italic, bulleted or capitalized rules are followed.
Grammar, spelling, formatting, and how well sentences and paragraphs convey their intended sense affect a reader’s confidence in the story or article. Without careful attention to these final details, a story or an article can lose the respect it deserves.