Yes, I know I have a fragment, but it's for style. :)

In the e-mail I'll link to, a journalist lambasts some subeditors for a stylistic correction they made without consulting him. The paper reprinted his e-mail, complete with errors. He repeatedly tells the subeditors that he has a far superior ear for the English language than they do. Ear, perhaps. Eye, not so much.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/jul/23/mediamonkey

Who drinks rosé in the spring? That's what I want to know. How gauche.

Hey, if you're in Texas, spring is freaking hot. Rose would be fine. :)

We have spring?

Yeah, for two days in late February. I remember it well...

To steal Garrison Keillor's joke, I think last year it fell on a Tuesday.

In the e-mail to which I will link....

Pedant. :)

Aren't I allowed to be a pedant in a [i]pedantic[/i] thread. At least I'm not [b]shallow and pedantic[/b].

PHP vs. HTML. Sigh.

I can't do either of them, so don't feel bad.

I can't believe the whole hissy fit was over changing his last sentence by removing an "a".

Prima donna

To borrow and paraphrase Churchill's joke, ending a phrase with a preposition is something up with which I will not put.

Jesus had a bear? man, why did they scrub that out, that sounds cool!?? fucking sub-editors.

This e-mail left me wondering if the sub-editors actually correct more than the journalist realizes, but he only notices when the correction is one of style. Perhaps he wrote this in a fury, but if you're extolling the greatness of your grasp of the English language while berating underlings, please write well.

I do editing work - for poetry, mostly- so I'm sensitive to his issue. Authorial intent is not something I tinker with. But he comes off as an ass.

>>I can't believe the whole hissy fit was over changing his last sentence by removing an "a".

I can. I totally get it. I hate, hate, hate it when editors change my words and, in so doing, change my original intent, meaning and/or, yes, even meter. Or metre, as he says. And I was an editor, too, for many years, so I totally get the editor's side as well. But I was with the guy the whole way through. I might have been madder than he was by the end.

So I also would have written the e-mail. But while mine would have been better proofread, it wouldn't have had so many cool British curses and colloquialisms.

And, finally, sadly, I wouldn't have sent it because I'm a giant wuss.

I suppose I can understand. I guess I'm both lucky and unlucky as there is no editor for an artist. There is certainly criticism after the fact but no one comes in halfway through the process and changes something or makes suggestions.

I still think this was a hissy-fit and he's claim that he was ruined writer was just too much for me. Shit like this happens and you need to get on with it.

Where does he get away talking to "the bosses" like this? It reeks of the unprofessional. What I'm hoping happened is that after the printing copies were taped up all over the offices of the paper so everyone could read it and see what a pompous ass he was.