Reviewing, etc.

Jason's post brings up one of my own personal nightmares, namely, the possibility that I may blatantly misread an author's argument and say something Very Stupid as a consequence. Actually, I did say something Very Stupid in a review I wrote several years ago, although it resulted from a slip of the pen as opposed to a slip in my interpretation. ("Did I write that? I can't possibly have written that. Oh God, I wrote that." Exit, pursued by an Oxford Companion.) Of course, there are other traps to worry about. Many years ago, I saw a book review in the Times (London) under the byline of a certain philosopher. Before I clicked through to the review, I amused myself by predicting what the CP would say. I clicked--and lo! I had managed to hit all of the CP's main points. Now, that's not reviewing; that's refusing to engage with the book in front of you. (And if you're that predictable, why should anyone bother to continue reading your work?)

Copyediting book reviews can also be a slippery business. For starters, the reviewer usually last sees her manuscript on the day she sends it off to the journal. Production schedules are normally too tight to run the risk of asking reviewers to look at MS markups or first proofs, since the maximum turnaround time at both stages is approximately a week to ten days. Then, there are the pragmatic issues involved in verifying quotations against the reviewer's MS. If the journal is based at a smallish school with a smallish library, then the library might not own the book (especially if it's an expensive monograph). If the journal is at a Research I with a major library, it's too often the case that someone has checked the book out or taken it off the shelf to photocopy it. Unless something is really wrong somewhere, it's unlikely that the editor will catch interpretive errors.

And, in any event, it's so easy to miss things that are obvious. The anthology I'm currently reading has a major "oops" on the dust jacket: the list of contents features an author nowhere to be found in the actual book. Similarly, for many years the Oxford World's Classics edition of Oscar Wilde's works proudly announced that it contained The Portrait of Dorian Gray. (It looks like OUP has finally gotten around to fixing that little problem.)

Meanwhile, now that I've finally recovered from the flu, I'm enjoying the moderate Southern California warmth (high 60s-low 70s)--a great improvement over upstate NY snow. I'm particularly happy to be back in a city with sidewalks, since I love walking. When I'm out here visiting my parents, I try to get in 5-8 miles per day, which is out of the question in my little village. We don't have sidewalks in many areas (strike one); the traffic is often too dangerous to walk where there are no sidewalks (strike two); and the Erie Canal path, while scenic, is a little dicey for a SSF (Single Small Female) like myself once you walk beyond populated areas (strike three). And at this time of year, it's a little difficult to work up any enthusiasm for walking anyway, although I usually get in a couple of miles per day just from going to school and back.

Libraries are on the agenda for tomorrow and Friday: first the Huntington Library and then my undergraduate alma mater.