Comments on: The importance of manuscript formatting/I admit to being a nerd!

By: rebeccakuder

rebeccakuder — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 18:34:17 +0000

Arden, thanks for confirming my expert-ness. I needed that today! ;)

By: rebeccakuder

rebeccakuder — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 18:33:50 +0000

Cyndi, your students would thank you. :) Sharon, I agree. It is good manners. Another TOTAL pet peeve is when people are supposed to submit double-spaced prose for a workshop and they send it in with 1.5 spacing (thinking no one will notice?) because they somehow think it’s okay to ask everyone else to read 1.5 times as much of their work. I was in a workshop once with a wonderful mentor and friend, and I could see her barely being polite to someone who did that. She was exploding inside, I could tell (and so was I!) The student acted like they didn’t realize it. (Since when is 1.5 line spacing the default for anything! She must have done it manually! I’m getting all het up again just THINKING about it!)

By: Sharon Short

Sharon Short — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 17:37:50 +0000

I’m right there with you! Formatting: yes, please! It’s like good manners for the writing.

By: ardenm

ardenm — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 16:57:25 +0000

Word up to that, you Word Expert you!

By: Cyndi

Cyndi — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 16:11:30 +0000

Hear, hear! While it can be annoying to learn (and follow) non-standard guidelines, why give editors or first readers a reason to toss your work without actually considering the content? I’m working my way through the manuscripts for next month’s AWW intensive, and the formatting runs the gamut from good to awful. This reminds me why it’s probably NOT a good idea for me to try teaching…my students would kill me ;-)