The Devil’s in the Details
There was a time when printers lamented:
The typographical error is a slippery thing and sly
You can hunt til you are dizzy, but it somehow will get by.
Til the forms are off the presses, it is strange how still it keeps.
It shrinks down in a corner and it never stirs or peeps.
That typographical error, too small for human eyes.
Til the ink is on the paper, when it grows to mountain size.
The boss, he stares with horror, then he grabs his hair and groans.
The copyreader drops his head upon his hands and moans.
The remainder of the issue may be clean as clean can be,
But the typographical error is the only thing you see.
Printers used to set every word by hand: they picked metal letters out of a box of two cases (upper case and lower case — get it?); and typographical errors (we call them typos today) crept in, some said at the behest of a creature known as the “printer’s devil.” I rather like the idea of a small horned form coming in at night and moving those metal letters around at will, but then, I’m not a printer.
Typos are everywhere, and aren’t new to the modern world of computers, though they’ve certainly multiplied since the advent of rapid typing and even more rapid sending. In 1631, some print versions of the Old Testament showed up without the fairly vital word “not” in this injunction: “Thou shalt commit adultery.” The devils were having a fine time for themselves that night!
You do it. I do it. Anyone who has ever set keyboard to paper, so to speak, has done it: and we can’t all blame the printer’s devil. Take a few minutes next time your finger hovers over the “send” button and make sure that what you wanted to say is, in fact, what you did say. And then you’ll be … beyond the elements of style!
Posted in About Writing, Words on May 29th, 2008