{"id":425,"date":"2017-04-11T10:45:22","date_gmt":"2017-04-11T10:45:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/?p=425"},"modified":"2017-04-11T10:46:12","modified_gmt":"2017-04-11T10:46:12","slug":"proofread-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/","title":{"rendered":"How to proofread your own work"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px;\" class=\"sharethis-inline-share-buttons\" ><\/div><p>&#8216;Proofread your own work?&#8217; I hear you say. &#8216;But that&#8217;s ridiculous! You proofreaders are always telling us it&#8217;s impossible!&#8217; And it <em>is<\/em> impossible to proofread your own work to the same standard as a trained and impartial professional. But if you use common sense and a keen eye, you can get&nbsp;your manuscript to a good standard before it hits the copy-editor&#8217;s or proofreader&#8217;s desk &#8211; and hopefully save yourself a few spondoolies! Here are my tips on how to go about it.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Read your work out loud.<\/strong> This is the single most important thing you can do when trying to polish your own writing. Don&#8217;t worry about sounding ridiculous. Shut the door. Wait until everyone has gone out if you have to. And, most importantly, take your time about it. Reading a piece out loud will show up a multitude of sins. If you slow down and really look at what you&#8217;re reading, it should help you to spot any missing little words. You may spot other errors as well.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Read each line backwards.<\/strong> That&#8217;s the next step. Invest in some ink and paper and print out your manuscript so that you can hold a piece of card under each line, just like when you were learning to read at school. Most of my proofreading is done on screen, but I still find it easier to see&nbsp;mistakes in a printed passage. If you can afford it, do it. Read each line backwards, a word at a time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<figure id=\"attachment_426\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-426\" style=\"width: 590px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-426\" src=\"http:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"person proofreading sitting at desk with papers\" width=\"590\" height=\"394\" srcset=\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 590px) 100vw, 590px\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-426\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A Lesser-Spotted English Proofreader in its native habitat.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Those are my two top tips &#8211; a couple of basic principles, if you like. Here are some pitfalls to watch out for.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Run a search for &#8216;pubic&#8217;.<\/strong> You won&#8217;t regret it. (Unless you&#8217;re actually writing about genitals, of course, in which case you&#8217;ll probably find yourself typing &#8216;public&#8217; by accident.) If you mention martial arts at all, you might also want to search for &#8216;marital&#8217;.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Consistency is key.<\/strong> You may have noticed that apostrophes and quotation marks can be curly or straight depending on which font is used. Make sure all yours are consistent. Even if you&#8217;re sure you&#8217;ve applied the same font throughout, you might be surprised. I don&#8217;t think I&#8217;ve ever seen a manuscript where the odd &#8216;odd&#8217; apostrophe hasn&#8217;t crept in.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Pay special attention to the letters f, i, l and t<\/strong>, especially when they crop up close together. Check that ls aren&#8217;t is and is aren&#8217;t ts, or vice versa. Check that double letters aren&#8217;t triple.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>There are also a few simple things you can do to make it much easier to format your book for print or digital distribution.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Please don&#8217;t use double spaces.<\/strong> Not after full stops; not anywhere. It takes seconds to run a &#8216;find and replace&#8217;. Watch out for triple spaces if you&#8217;re a heavy-handed typist!<\/li>\n<li><strong>Get rid of spaces at the ends of paragraphs.<\/strong> I know the feeling only too well &#8211; you&#8217;re typing away and your thumb automatically adds a space at the end of the sentence. But you don&#8217;t need one at the end of a paragraph.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Use Word&#8217;s &#8216;Styles&#8217; function.<\/strong> If you don&#8217;t know what it is or how to use it, there are plenty of tutorials out there. Take some time to figure it out and your copy-editor will thank you for it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I could add a lot more, but that&#8217;s enough to be going on with! Remember the three golden rules:&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>read it out loud,<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>read it backwards, and<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>take your time!<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8216;Proofread your own work?&#8217; I hear you say. &#8216;But that&#8217;s ridiculous! You proofreaders are always telling us it&#8217;s impossible!&#8217; And it is impossible to proofread your own work to the same standard as a trained and impartial professional. But if you use common sense and a keen eye, you can get&nbsp;your manuscript to a good [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[66,204,205,69,203,21,4],"class_list":["post-425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-proofreading","tag-authors","tag-diy","tag-do-it-yourself","tag-help-for-writers","tag-how-to","tag-proofreading","tag-writing"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v25.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How to proofread your own work - Catherine Dunn<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"If you use common sense and a keen eye, you can proofread your own work to a decent standard and save some money on your editing costs.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How to proofread your own work - Catherine Dunn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"If you use common sense and a keen eye, you can proofread your own work to a decent standard and save some money on your editing costs.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Catherine Dunn\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-04-11T10:45:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-04-11T10:46:12+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-1024x683.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Catherine\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Catherine\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/\",\"name\":\"How to proofread your own work - Catherine Dunn\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076-1024x683.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2017-04-11T10:45:22+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-04-11T10:46:12+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/#\/schema\/person\/11f7bc3f987350d342d9098fa993109d\"},\"description\":\"If you use common sense and a keen eye, you can proofread your own work to a decent standard and save some money on your editing costs.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/IMG_0076.jpg\",\"width\":3456,\"height\":2304,\"caption\":\"A Lesser-Spotted English Proofreader in its native habitat.\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/index.php\/2017\/04\/11\/proofread-work\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"How to proofread your own work\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/catherinedunn.co.uk\/\",\"name\":\"Catherine Dunn\",\"description\":\"editing &amp; 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