There can\u2019t be many books about the life and adventures of a professional word doctor, but one that came out in 2015 is definitely worth a look.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s\u00a0Between You and Me<\/em>, by Mary Norris, a longtime\u00a0New Yorker<\/em>\u00a0copy editor who calls herself a \u201ccomma queen.\u201d Norris admits that the book\u2019s very title is a grammar lesson: \u201cMy fondest hope is that just from looking at the title you will learn to say fearlessly \u2018between you and me\u2019 (not \u2018I\u2019).\u201d<\/p>\n Copy editors are those driven souls who spend their days fixing authors\u2019 manuscripts. They cherish a perfectly sharpened No. 1 pencil as if it were a flawless diamond. And they look askance at technology, which breeds terrible language habits. Norris once texted a friend \u201cGute Nacht\u201d (good night<\/em>\u00a0in German), and her autocorrect changed it to \u201cCute Nachos.\u201d<\/p>\n Norris touches lightly on her pre-New Yorker<\/em>\u00a0days. In her teens she checked swimmers\u2019 feet at a public pool and later delivered dairy goods on a milk truck. She first started reading\u00a0The New Yorker<\/em>\u00a0in graduate school at the University of Vermont. She got an entry-level job at the magazine in 1978 and worked her way up to copy editor, working with a roster of illustrious writers that included Philip Roth, James Salter, and George Saunders.<\/p>\n Much of this tidy two-hundred-page book is an informal but informative discourse on grammar and punctuation. The author\u2019s voice is warm and cordial, and also self-assured and feisty. Reading\u00a0Between You and Me\u00a0<\/em>is like sitting at Norris\u2019s table while she speaks about her life and her passion for language.<\/p>\n There are ten chapters, whose titles reflect the book\u2019s breezy tone. Chapter One is called \u201cSpelling Is for Weirdos.\u201d A later chapter is titled \u201cA Dash, a Semicolon, and a Colon Walk into a Bar.\u201d<\/p>\n Early in the book Norris profiles Noah Webster, whose greatest achievement was 1828\u2019s\u00a0An American Dictionary of the English Language<\/em>.\u00a0This hugely successful work established the legitimacy and singularity of the American language.<\/p>\n Webster was an odd man who sometimes just made stuff up and claimed it was true. But he was a scholar of great influence who counted George Washington and Benjamin Franklin among his friends (Franklin felt that the letters c, w, y,<\/em> and j<\/em>\u00a0should be removed from our alphabet).<\/p>\n We have Webster to thank for the American spelling of jail<\/em>\u00a0instead of gaol<\/em>\u00a0and mold<\/em>\u00a0instead of mould<\/em>.\u00a0America\u2019s u<\/em>-less spellings of words like\u00a0color<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0flavor<\/em>\u00a0(as opposed to the British preference for\u00a0colour<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0flavour<\/em>) are Webster\u2019s doing. He also got the\u00a0k<\/em>\u00a0removed from the end of such words as\u00a0music<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0traffic<\/em>,\u00a0and got\u00a0re<\/em> changed to\u00a0er<\/em>\u00a0at the end of\u00a0theater<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0center<\/em>. But he was unsuccessful in his attempt to get\u00a0ache<\/em>\u00a0changed to\u00a0ake<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0soup<\/em>\u00a0to\u00a0soop<\/em>.<\/p>\n