"She's not like me, so I like that. She's basically not as emotional. And she's white. Having someone who does have some difference in those surface kind of ways is good, because I want everyone to understand it.
"Then my copy editor is a black woman whose background doesn't seem to have been all that different from mine, and that's good, because any column I write, I'm going to have a huge readership of white people and a huge readership of black people. And having the two people who first respond to it be representative of smart and caring people of both those groups is ideal for me. I trust their vision."
-- Donna Britt, The Washington Post
"Best Newspaper Writing 1994," Commentary
"What I learned as an editor was, number one, how important it is to maintain a reader's interest. It's too easy to stop reading a story and turn the page. Especially at the jumps. Second, any story can be cut. My training in writing headlines helped me. You only have a few words to work with, and you've got to get the most out of them. I was an editor for five or six years, and I think editing stories helps you tremendously in writing. I think writers ought to be editors at some point, and vice versa."
-- David A. Waters, The (Memphis) Commercial Appeal
"Best Newspaper Writing 1997," Religion/Spirituality Writing
"When we get new editors here, I have a standard greeting for them: Now AP wants you to have imagination. Be bold. And above all, keep your goddam hands off my copy."
-- Saul Pett, Associated Press
"Best Newspaper Writing 1981," Non-Deadline Writing
"I know there's a whole school of thought in newspapers that experienced, professional reporters just do it and don't need their hands held. I think that's crap. What makes an editor great is support. I don't know a writer who isn't insecure. An editor has to say, 'We think you're wonderful, we know you can do wonderful work.' Even when you work is terrible. Second, there's some gift -- a sensitivity to nuances in writing. There are some editors who can just read your copy and instinctively feel what's going to make it better and what is not."
-- Cynthia Gorney, The Washington Post
"Best Newspaper Writing 1980," Features
"Listening is a key quality. I really need someone's eyes to jump back at me. It validates all the work I'm doing. It says, "Yes. We are onto it. We've got it. Let's go.'"
-- Anne Hull, St. Petersburg Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1994," Non-Deadline Writing
"I happen to like editors ... Every time an editor gives me an idea to go cover something, an idea that sounds to me perfectly terrible, I go do it. If it turns out badly, I can say I did what they told me to do. Yet that idea is an idea I would not have had, because all of us are lazy. You get to a certain age and every contemporary of yours is now an editor, or a publisher. You're blundering around with kids 25-30 years younger than you are ... Whether editors are smarter than me or dumber than me, more often than not, their dumb ideas turn out to be very good for me, so I almost never turn one down."
-- Murray Kempton, Newsday
"Best Newspaper Writing 1985," Commentary
"Some reporters can't stand to be edited. And editors can really screw up, especially those who aren't on your wavelength and don't understand your style. But when you have an editor who respects your style, he can be so helpful. For me, some of the most fun of the whole process now is getting on the terminal with them after I've written the story and seeing the printout come back with these marks on it, and seeing how right they are, and getting together and fixing it. I just love that."
-- Greta Tilley, Greensboro News and Record
"Best Newspaper Writing 1983," Non-Deadline Writing
"Probably I could stand more editing than I'm getting these days. They tend to miss things because they trust me a lot. They believe I can spell and things like that, and that sometimes embarrasses me."
-- Carl Schoettler, The (Baltimore) Evening Sun
"Best Newspaper Writing 1988," Obituary Writing
"The best reaction I've ever had was on a story I wrote last year, one of my favorite stories. It was about a widow of a Marine who was killed by a sniper in Beirut. She and her husband had lived this idyllic 1950s life. Their dreams, what they wanted out of life, were so simple. I felt very strongly about this story and I've never had an easier time writing. It was there. It was done in a day period. And I really wanted my editor to like it. And he got up and he came over to me, and he put his hand on my back. He didn't say anything. He just stared off into this vague distance. He was obviously very choked-up. And he said something like, 'Just terrific.' And then he just walked away. It was great."
-- David Finkel, St. Petersburg Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1986," Non-Deadline Writing
"I think that an editor's role is to help the reporter focus on what we have to do right now and then try to help them decide how to approach it and how to tell the story in the best way. Stay calm and try to think about what needs to be done to get the best story in the paper, trying to help a reporter in the field get a feed in, or get a reporter who's struggling focused on how to deal with a particularly tough part of the story. The small things and the big things all make a difference."
-- Jennifer Orsi, St. Petersburg Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 2000," Team Deadline News Reporting
"Trust your reporters' instincts. They're the ones who are out there."
-- Tom Scherberger, St. Petersburg Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 2000," Team Deadline News Reporting
"On the budget, put editors' names along with the names of reporters. On a complex story, it's vital. You're not simply sitting there reacting to what the reporter has placed in the system. You're clued in."
-- Neville Green, St. Petersburg Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 2000," Team Deadline News Reporting
"The kind of editor-reporter rapport that you always hope for was there. He knows me, he knows my writing, he knows my style, and the changes he suggested were invariably improvements in my voice. So that was wonderful. And sometimes Ben's greatest contribution was just pulling me back, not adding something, but just taking a line out at the end. Actually we dropped a kicker on day one. He said, 'You know, you ended this twice and your first one was better.' I think that was almost word-for-word what he said and he was right."
-- Mitchell Zuckoff, The Boston Globe
"Best Newspaper Writing 2000," Non-Deadline Writing
"I've had all sorts of different editors, and I found that editors play an incredibly big role in helping reporters develop. I found that when an editor did not really pay attention to my copy, or just didn't do much, I didn't really improve. And then when an editor really worked with me on it and did a lot of things and helped me, my writing was taken to a whole other level. So I have come to value editors a great deal."
-- Leonora Bohen LaPeter, Savannah Morning News
"Best Newspaper Writing 2000," Deadline Reporting
"Fabiola Santiago was my first editor ... I recently saw notes that she has sent me through the years, and I was reminded that she taught me everything ... The first time she edited me, I took notes, and I never made the same mistake again, she says. I no longer take notes when I'm edited, but I try not to make the same mistake twice."
-- Mirta Ojito, The New York Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1999," Covering the World
"Often editors can fall into some of the logistical things. 'Do you have all the film you need? Do you have a pen? Is so-and-so coming to do this?' What enabled us, I think, to do something better was our ability to focus on the bigger picture. What is it that we really want to give our readers and how can we deploy our resources in a way to most effectively get there?
-- Suki Dardarian, The (Tacoma, Wash.) News Tribune
"Best Newspaper Writing 1999," Team Deadline News Reporting
"Walk slowly through the newsroom. I find that the crazier things are in the newsroom if you calmly walk around and look people in the eye and nod and don't seem harried yourself, I guess it's reassuring to them. I don't know why, but the bigger, the faster things are going, the slower I roam around."
-- Randy McCarthy, The (Tacoma, Wash.) News Tribune
"Best Newspaper Writing 1999," Team Deadline News Reporting
"Plan ahead as much as possible. If you're running the story, force yourself to break away and delegate, so that you can keep getting ahead. If you're just thinking about the next deadline, you're always going to be behind."
-- Miriam Pawel, Newsday
"Best Newspaper Writing 1997," Team Deadline News Reporting
"You want to be a part of the big story. It's only natural, but the problem is your hat's changed; you have reporters to go out and do the reporting and to do the writing and that's what they do best. Your job is to be a leader. And being a leader doesn't mean getting out there and basically telling everybody, 'Here, watch me while I do it.'"
-- Terry Jackson, The Miami Herald
"Best Newspaper Writing 1996," Team Deadline News Reporting
"They have saved me a whole lot more times than they have hurt me, let me put it that way."
-- Rick Bragg, The New York Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1996," Non-Deadline Writing
"You develop a relationship with an editor, when it's right. Where you speak in shorthand. And there's no baloney; you can get business done real fast, and while everyone's ego needs massaging, that becomes a side issue that you can, with trust, put away and you can say, 'Hey, now, I feel like I'm in a rut. These columns aren't working.' And this person can say, 'You're looking pretty good to me. You've got to get out on the street more. You gotta put your heart into it more.' They tend to boost you as much as guide you."
-- Peter H. King, Los Angeles Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1996," Commentary
"A very important role an editor plays at the idea stage is to be a barometer, be a bellwether, somebody you bounce an idea off. The editor has to filter it, think about it, and tell you, 'Yes, you're right on track here,' or, 'No, you're not.' Joel just said, 'Yeah, you've got something good here. This is good, do it.'"
-- G. Wayne Miller, Providence Journal
"Best Newspaper Writing 1992," Non-Deadline Writing
"You just can't demand that people do what you want them to do. You have to turn them loose, and let them make their mistakes. Then you come in and say, 'Perhaps you could have done this better if you'd done so-and-so.' And generally, you have to teach people to say less."
-- Richard Aregood, Philadelphia Daily News
"Best Newspaper Writing 1993," Editorial Writing
"Actually, I think we can't expect anything from reporters that we haven't tried to explain to them. We ought to say to the reporter, 'I didn't mean to screw up your lead. I did it totally by accident. I was editing your story too fast. I'm sorry.' If there's anything I'd like from reporters it would be a sense that I could go to them and say, 'This is why I did what I did,' and maybe be met halfway with an understanding that I'm here not to hurt, but to help."
-- Charles Klaveness, The New York Times
"Best Newspaper Writing 1993," Headline Writing
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